The Family Attachment Scheme
How to produce a good report
Dr Kieran McGlade
k.mcglade@qub.ac.uk
Family Attachment Scheme
Deadline
• Friday 29th April 2006
Week 10 of the second semester to allow
time for revising for other exams.
Family Attachment Scheme
A few Do’s
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•
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Work with your partner(s)
Think about the structure of your report
Think about who is going to read it
Look at past reports in the department of
General Practice
Family Attachment Scheme
A few Don’ts
• Leave it to the last minute
• Fall out with your partner(s)
• Put lots of brochures and leaflets in the
appendices
• Try to cover every single learning outcome
in your report
Family Attachment Scheme
Writing your report
• An account of your visits
• An account of your impressions
• Draw on what you have learned in the “Individual
in Society” and “Science, Society and Medicine”
courses.
• Draw on what you have learned from others in
your tutorial group.
Family Attachment Scheme
Tips for preparing for the Report
• Use a diary
• Include information from tutorials and other
parts of the course as well as your visits
• Look at exemplars of previous reports but
write your own
• Do not pad the appendices!
• Don’t have to be nice about the course!
Family Attachment Scheme
Family Attachment Scheme
Dept of General Practice,
Queen’s University Belfast
Visit Date:
Duration:
Dialogue Student/Patient/Family
Issues Arising
Any
-biomedical
-psychosocial
-professional
-factual
Issues that arise which the student needs to or
should find out more about – should be jotted
down here
For example:
- social class
-various conditions ( medical)
-odd behaviour requiring interpretation
Miss X volunteered with great feeling how
much she missed her mother and how she
had been a great source of strength at
difficult times in her life
Found it a bit embarrassing when Mrs X got
distressed talking about her mother. Must
bring this up in the tutorial group – what is
the best way to deal with these situations –
what should you say or do.
Why did Miss X never marry?
What proportion of the population remain
unmarried?
What influence has the unmarried state on
health?
Example of a student learning
log
Family Attachment Scheme
Response
What did the student do to resolve/ address
Issues
Eg Looked up
Spoke to etc
We were surprised at how profoundly this
elderly lady still missed her mother
Useful discussion in tutorial group about
loneliness and also about changing
composition of society and extended family.
See if we can get answers to how many
people do not marry etc. from census data
V Good
Introduction and background.
Description of how the study was carried out.
Ability to interpret and critically evaluate the “family’s” life experiences
Ability to draw parallels with experience gained from other parts of the course /
other students’ experiences.
Ability to quote from the relevant literature and relate this to own learning
experiences in the family.
Writing style
Salient personal commentary and conclusions
Appendices and documentation provided
Family Attachment Scheme
Good
Adequate
Poor
Introduction and Background
• Putting the family in context
– The area
– How far did this family’s environment and
experience differ from your own?
• Background to the Family Attachment
Scheme
• Brief summary of your work
Family Attachment Scheme
How study was carried out
• Brief description of the visits (how many,
how often etc)
• How any difficulties were addressed in
arranging visits
• How you went about recording information
• Confidentiality issues
Family Attachment Scheme
Interpret and Critically evaluate
• What did YOU make of the things you
learned from the patient(s)?
• Did anything surprise you? Why?
• What meaning did the patients confer on
their illness experience?
Family Attachment Scheme
Parallels / Connections
• Draw parallels and connections between
what you have learned through direct
experience in the FAS and
– What you have discussed/learned in other parts
of the course
• Science Society & Medicine
• The Individual and Society
• Your Family Attachment Tutorials and other
Students’ insights
Family Attachment Scheme
Other Aspects
• Writing style
• Personal Commentary
– Do not repeat what you have already said in the
main report
– Don’t say how wonderful course was
• Appendices
– Directly referred to
– Relevance explained well in the text
Family Attachment Scheme
Literature
• Don’t quote for the sake of it
• Use the library and the web to find answers
to questions in your log. You can quote a
web reference.
• You can use references from other parts of
the course BUT
• Make the relevance to your report CLEAR
Family Attachment Scheme
Sources of Information
• http://www.qub.ac.uk/cm/gp/Courses/Undergradua
te/FAS.html
• http://www.qub.ac.uk/cm/undergrad/year1/0405/fa
mily/
• Queens Online
• NB Other Courses!
– Second Year – The Individual in Society
– First Year – Science Society and Medicine
Family Attachment Scheme
The Report
• For regulations see para 12.3 of the study guide
• Combined effort (two or three students)
• Main part (4,000 words)
• Personal reflection (750 words) in appendix
Family Attachment Scheme
The Report
• Your GP tutor may wish to have a copy of your
final report
• Your tutor may be happy to review a draft of your
report but will not be assessing it
Family Attachment Scheme
Deadline
• Friday 29th April 2006
Week 10 of the second semester to allow
time for revising for other exams.
Family Attachment Scheme