We need to shape the medical degree programme of the future

With a background as a researcher and associate professor at the Department of Biomedicine, Janne Lebeck took up the role of director of studies at medicine on 1 February. As director of studies, she will help to advance and develop the medical degree programme, so that the students acquire the academic competences that medical doctors will need in the future. A big task where her focus will be on good collaboration:

"My task is to make sure there’s a coherent approach and to facilitate good ideas and suggestions from teaching staff, management and students. I see the role of director of studies as a coordinating function, where we work together to offer the best possible medical degree programme at Aarhus University."

The medical doctors of the future

According to Janne Lebeck, first and foremost the focal point should be providing the students with the best possible education, although this is a task that is continuously developing:

"Our job is to educate and train the doctors of the future. That’s to say, we constantly need to stay aware of whether there are areas that need extra focus in the degree programme. For example, this could be more focus on the prevention of diseases, better digital skills and knowledge and skills that support a strong collaboration across the healthcare sector, so that we follow-up on patients even after they’re discharged from hospital or leave their GP’s practice," she says.

New academic regulations in place

In 2020/21, a new set of academic regulations were introduced for the medical degree programme, and with them the foundation was laid for much of the work of the director of studies, says Janne Lebeck.

"A huge amount of groundwork lies behind the new academic regulations and over the coming months, I will work with the Board of Studies on fine-tuning and implementing them, so that we can offer the degree programme that was intended with the academic regulations. It's an exciting task that I’m really looking forward to," she says.

As an example of a focal point, she points to the coherence between the Bachelor's and Master’s degree programmes.

"The Bachelor’s and the Master’s are based in two different departments, and one of the things I want to look into, is whether we can make the cohesiveness between the two even better. Is there a way in which we can better facilitate cooperation?” asks Janne Lebeck.

In the engine room

The medicine degree programme has a total of twelve semesters spread over the Bachelor's and Master's degree programmes, with many different lecturers, coordinators, course managers and hundreds of students involved. And for Janne Lebeck, the first task is to really get to work in the engine room.

"It's very important for me to come in and understand all the workflows. The medical degree programme is a huge apparatus, and there are many facets that I need to get to grips with. My background is from the Department of Biomedicine, so I also need to learn more about how the Department of Clinical Medicine functions and how they work together with the students," she says.

And for this big machine to run as smoothly as possible, what is required is an overview and clear communication, so that everyone is pulling in the same direction," says Janne Lebeck.

"Communication is an area that I’m also looking forward to working with. In general, I actually think that Health’s communication on the degree programmes is really good. But I would like to see if there are areas where we can improve the communication even more. For example, can we become better at communicating changes or decisions, so there’s a better understanding of the background among the students?”

Janne Lebeck also takes up the position as chair of the Board of Studies, which also includes student representatives. She is looking forward to learning more about what the students think of the medical degree programme:

"They’ve got a lot of good ideas and thoughts. Of course, not everything is possible, and it's also part of my job to assess which ideas we can and should proceed with."

Facts about Janne Lebeck

• Associate professor at Biomedicine since 2016.
• Lecturer on the course “Functional Anatomy and Histology” (Second semester of the Bachelor’s degree)
• Research areas: Aquaglyceroporins (membrane transport proteins) and their role in the development of obesity and type 2 diabetes and gender differences in the body's energy conversion.
• 2016-2020: Course manager for the Macroscopic Anatomy course on the medical degree programme.

Contact:

Associate Professor Janne Lebeck
Aarhus University, Department of Biomedicine
Tel.: (+45) 8716 7651
Email: jl@biomed.au.dk