The national e-learning initiative encompassing dentistry’s foundation years’ curriculum – e–Den – goes live tomorrow (Wednesday) to more than 1,200 dental foundation trainees and trainers across the UK.
The e-Den project is the first major collaboration between The Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh, The Royal College of Surgeons of England, The Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Glasgow, the Faculty of General Dental Practice (UK), and the Department of Health’s e-Learning for Healthcare.
It’s is a flexible online tool which can be accessed at a time and place to suit the learner and is available 24 hours a day.
The curriculum is primarily based on the UK Dental Foundation Training curriculum, and is made up of four domains – clinical, management and leadership, professionalism, and communication.
The content has been written by respected subject matter experts from across all fields of dentistry.
More than 500 sessions have been broken down into 12 modules covering broad subject areas such as anxiety and pain control, hard and soft tissue surgery, and restoration of teeth.
There is also a 13th module in development which will contain multiple choice and case study questions only.
Dental foundation trainees and trainers, who have been pre-registered as part of the initial roll out of the project, have been given access to the first module of 45 e-learning sessions covering elements of the clinical domain of the curriculum.
This first module focuses on patient assessment and includes topics such as assessment methods and techniques, good practice, and health promotion and disease prevention.
Each e-learning session is 20–30 minutes long and contains a mixture of high quality images, animations and video clips to provide an engaging and visual learning experience.
e-Den clinical lead, Paul Brunton, said: ‘This versatile learning resource provides educational support for dental trainees within the UK and will also contribute to continuing professional development of the entire dental team. With its flexibility and dynamic content, e-Den is a new tool for a new age.’
Further sessions covering the next elements of the curriculum will be released throughout 2010 and beyond.
Access to the e-learning will be given free of charge to NHS members of the dentistry team over the coming months.
For more information on e-Den, visit www.e-lfh.org.uk/dentistry or contact the e-Den team at [email protected].
