PEN Group Clinical Update Course


Week in the Life of the PEN Group Clinical Update Course 2012


AILSA KENNEDY PEN Group Collaboration Lead, Clinical Update Course


Course History Over the last 30 years, the PEN Group have run approximately 35 clinical update courses. The course was initially arranged over a weekend as an informal exchange of practice and ideas. Since then, it has evolved in line with evidence based practice to become a five day course with BDA validated assessment. It has tended to favour acute hospital dietetics but, in the 1990s, as home enteral tube feeding (HETF) evolved, HETF was incorporated into the course content. The course is revised annually, focusing on the available evidence for artificial nutritional support and its management, to develop an understanding of the underlying metabolic changes of malnutrition, and critical appraisal of the evidence alongside clinical practice. The course continues to be extremely popular and is frequently over subscribed.


Course development


Following a scoping exercise in 2008, involving dietetic managers nationally, it was unanimously agreed that the course be delivered at master’s level with the option to achieve master’s level credit. This fulfils KSF educational descriptors to demonstrate master’s level learning


in the specific area of clinical nutritional support allowing career progression. The teaching team co-ordinated a competitive tender process to identify the


best academic institution to deliver the course and award masters level credit. The collaboration with Queen Margaret University (QMU) and PEN Group clinical update has been an ongoing success.


Present day


The course commences with the pre-course work in early March. This peer reviewed work is to ensure a baseline level of knowledge between delegates in preparation for the residential section of the course, which begins in late June. This section incorporates lectures, workshops and practical anthropometry sessions. The aims of the sessions are to deliver evidence based theory and practice covering all areas of nutrition support. The post course assessment is a master’s level assignment in the clinical


area of the delegate’s choice. This is submitted late September. Final results are sent to delegates the following March. We are currently reviewing the course delivery and collaboration,


through comparison with other similar specialist group masters modules. We are commencing long-term planning to develop further specialist modules in definitive clinical areas.


PEN Group Clinical Update Course 2012


This year’s residential section was particularly eventful for the teaching team. Unfortunately the university campus was struck by lightning days prior to the arrival of 74 delegates. The lightning caused a fire within the main sub of the university’s source of electricity, resulting in closure of the campus. As this occurred on Friday mid afternoon the option of contacting delegates to pre warn of potential cancelation was not an option as the building was evacuated without access to contact details. The university worked tirelessly to ensure that services would be up and


running to accommodate the course delivery and thankfully due to the dedication of the university staff it ran without a hitch! Clinical Update 2012 is the third year of our extremely successful


collaboration with QMU and we will continue to run the four-day residential at the university campus in Musselburgh for the remainder of our contracted term until 2014.


BAPEN In Touch No.66 August 2012 6 New tutors


We are currently advertising for new tutors to complement the team, further details can be found on PEN Group website www.peng.org.uk and in the July issue of Dietetics Today. Ideally we are looking for experienced dietitians who have completed the clinical update masters module.


PEN Group Clinical Update Course 2013


The 2013 course will be advertised in the October issue of Dietetics Today. Provisional dates for the residential section are 24th – 27th June 2013. All details on the application process will be available on the PEN Group and QMU website, when the course opens to applications in October 2012.


Free course places 2013


Due to the present financial climate, we appreciate obtaining funding and study leave can be increasingly difficult. With this in mind we are offering five free funded places on the 2013 course. Look out for further details in PENlines and on the PEN Group website: www.peng.org.uk


2012 Teaching Team (not pictured in order): Alison Culkin (Tutor Lead); Jacklyn Jones (QMU Course Moderator); Ailsa Kennedy (PEN Group Collaboration Lead); Carole-Anne Fleming (Tutor and PEN Group Education Lead); Catriona McMaster (Tutor); Sara Smith (Tutor); Ameila Jukes (Tutor); Rhys White (Tutor); Oonagh Griffiths (Tutor); Emma Emmerson (Tutor).


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