Program Overview

Programme: PGDip in Family Medicine

The Postgraduate Diploma in Family Medicine is a two-year part-time programme offered by the Faculty of Health Sciences at the University of Pretoria.

Programme Information

• The programme consists of a modularised curriculum delivered through distance education, with a blended approach that includes campus-based teaching, web-based teaching, and workplace-based learning.
• The programme is designed to provide students with the knowledge, skills, and competencies required to practice family medicine effectively.

Admission Requirements

• Applicants must have an MBChB (or equivalent) degree.
• Applicants must be registered as medical doctors with the Health Professions Council of South Africa (HPCSA) or with the licensing authority in their country of origin.

Curriculum

The programme curriculum includes the following modules:

• FFM 700: Family-oriented patient care
• FMD 700: Chronic diseases
• FMF 700: Psychiatry
• FMI 700: Infectious diseases
• FMX 700: Practice management
• HAK 700: Philosophy and principles of family medicine
• PCC 700: Clinical primary care
• PCP 700: Community-orientated primary care

Module Content

• FFM 700: Study of the family as the object of care, family systems theory, tools for family-oriented care, family life-cycle, ethics of treating families, family conference, the family and chronic illness, family violence, and alcohol abuse in the family.
• FMD 700: Study of diabetes mellitus, asthma, epilepsy, hypertension, cardiac failure, obesity, and chronic pain.
• FMF 700: Psychiatry in family practice, including depression, anxiety, suicide, the difficult adolescent, substance use and abuse, schizophrenia, dementia, and delirium.
• FMI 700: Introduction to infectious diseases, contagious diseases important to travelers, contagious diseases in tropical regions, viral illnesses in children, fever of unknown origin, sexually transmitted diseases, haemorrhagic fever, infective diarrhoea, meningitis, leprosy, HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis, rabies, school attendance and infectious diseases, community-acquired pneumonia (CAP), acute virus hepatitis, and rational use of antibiotics.
• FMX 700: Study of human resource management, financial management, auditing of management and services management, leadership, and clinical governance for clinical primary care.
• HAK 700: Study of the origins and emergence of Family Medicine, principles of Family Medicine, the consultation, patient-centred medicine, communication, the doctor-patient relationship, and medical ethics.
• PCC 700: Study of primary care over the whole quadruple burden of disease (HIV/AIDS, TB, maternal and child care, non-communicable diseases, trauma, and violence) and in terms of the morbidity profile of primary care in South Africa.
• PCP 700: Study of the concept of community-orientated primary care, the five principles of community-orientated primary care, local health and institutional analysis, comprehensive care, equity, practice with science, and service integration around users.

Examinations and Pass Requirements

• Assignments must be submitted for each of the eight modules, with a minimum mark of 50% required to pass.
• One resubmission is permitted for each module if a student does not achieve the required mark.
• Workplace-based learning and assessment will be driven by peer learning and documented by means of a portfolio of learning.
• The portfolio of learning must include evidence of self-directed learning, evidence of learning by means of observations, and evidence of learning skills by use of a logbook.
• A minimum final mark of 50% is required to pass each module.

National Exit Examination

• There will be one national exit examination for the country, offered by the College of Family Physicians.
• The portfolio of learning will be part of the assessment and will give students access to the national exit examination.
• Successful candidates will receive a Higher Diploma from the College as well as a Postgraduate Diploma from the University.

Pass with Distinction

• An average of at least 75% in the modules and the portfolio is required to obtain the diploma with distinction.

Minimum Credits

• The minimum number of credits required to complete the programme is 120.