College Of Medicine Research Unit
Goal:
To be the key unit in the
College of Medicine’s educational and research programs through supporting and
facilitating the research projects and activities in both the undergraduate and
postgraduate programs.
Objectives:
Provide support for the
research activities of the undergraduate and postgraduate students.- Review and provide feedback
for improvement of the research proposals submitted through the COM-Research
Unit.
- Conduct sessions on research
methodology and statistical software packages such as Statistical Package for
the Social Sciences (SPSS) for the enhancement of research skills.
- Provide support to COM faculty
who are involved in research projects.
- Organize the COM research
activities for conducting research days and to facilitate participation in the
research conferences organized by other institutions.
- Encourage and support
students’ participation in local and international meetings.
- Create a database for faculty
and students’ research activities and publication.
- Improve the publication rate
from the research projects being conducted in COM.
- Development of sessions for
research methodology.
- Sessions for skills in how to
analyze the research data using the statistical software packages.
- Assignments for medical
students for proposal writing and report writing.
- Recruiting qualified faculty
and administrative staff.
Achievements:
The Medical Research (MRES)
program was established in 2004 with the first batch of medical students. It
was designed to run longitudinally throughout the four years of the medical
curriculum and was divided into two blocks: MRES-I for the 1st/2nd year of the
curriculum where the students should identify their research topic and select
their supervisor. They would then prepare their research proposal which
is submitted to King Abdullah International Medical Research Center (KAIMRC)
for approval. During MRES-II for the 3rd and 4th year of the curriculum, the
students would collect data, perform the analysis, and present their research
project. Over the years, the MRES program has evolved with more support being
provided to the medical students.
The Research Unit was formally
established in 2011 to efficiently manage the workload due to the increased
number of students. The main aim was to promote research activities in the
College of Medicine by having all the supporting resources under one unit. The
members of the Research Unit meet regularly every week to review the progress
and are currently working on revising the schedule of MRES sessions so that the
students present their research projects at the beginning of the 4th year. The
Research Unit will facilitate the students’ submission of their research
manuscripts for publication and presentation in local and international
conferences.
The students are given
lectures on the different stages of research proposal, data collection, data
analysis, and report writing followed by tutorials / workshops, after which
they are required to submit assignments on which they are given formative
feedback. In MRES-II they are also given workshops on SPSS as well as data
presentation to help them in the final stages of their research project. The
faculty members of the Research Unit also provide individual consultation to
the students to guide them through each stage of the research proposal and
research report process. The Research Unit will also provide support to the Masters
in Medical Education (MME) students in the submission of their research
proposals for their Masters Project. All the research proposals of MBBS as well
as MME students are thoroughly reviewed by the members of the Research Unit
before they are forwarded to the King Abdullah International Medical Research
Center (KAIMRC) for approval. Research proposals submitted through the Research
Unit are generally expedited in the approval process from the KAIMRC.
The MRES program has submitted
400 research proposals (batches 1-9) of which 210 have been completed and 190
are in the process of being completed. There have been another 110 research
projects which have been completed in the MME program (batches 1-6). There
have also been 21 publications so far in medical journals. The research
projects have also been presented in both local and international conferences.
The Research Unit has been providing the main support in the submission of the
research projects to the annual conference organized by the Ministry of Higher
Education. Since 2011 it has also been active in organizing the annual
KSAU-HS Students Research Preparatory Day to select and award the best research
projects from the whole University.
Integration of Research:
The College of Medicine,
KSAU-HS is currently seeking an increased scholar research activities for
higher national ranking. Additionally, the College's target is to integrate
teaching and scholarship. There are several strategies for integrating teaching
and scholarship: bringing research into the classroom, involving undergraduates
in research projects, and broadening the definition of scholarship beyond
frontier disciplinary research.
Fostering Collaboration and Interdisciplinary
Science Research in the College of Medicine (COM):
Over the past decade or more,
there has been a marked shift toward scientific research that spans disciplines
and organizational boundaries and is carried out by teams rather than
individuals. The deanship at COM is continuously seeking to facilitate the
development of new research initiatives that cut across traditional
disciplinary boundaries. The research facilities and equipment at COM are made
available to faculty members to foster collaborative opportunities at COM. The
main goals are 1) to provide the infrastructure to conduct preliminary work
and/or develop pilot data that represents novel and innovative projects to
enable faculty members to submit competitive applications for external research
grants; and 2) to advance collaborations and multidisciplinary projects with an
overall emphasis on innovation and impact.