Oral pres. “GIMMICS : An educational game for final year pharmacy students and general practitioner trainees in family practice”.

GIMMICS (Groningen Institute Model for Management in Care Services) - introduced at the VUB in 2007 - is a teaching game in which a primary pharmacy setting is created at the university. Organized halfway through the primary practice training, students work in small teams of 6 students to run their own pharmacy during 4 weeks. A combination of real life situation cases is presented to the pharmacies, with special focus on pharmaceutical care and communication skills. Teaching goals are: (i) prepare students for their responsible and challenging tasks as pharmacist, (ii) improve the quality of pharmaceutical care in the primary setting, (iii) meet any heterogeneity between different pharmacy practice trainings, and (iv) help students to reflect and correct for their mistakes.
To improve mutual communication and action between pharmacists and physicians, general practitioner students joined the game in 2010 for two weeks with their own general practice. This educational game includes a structured mix of activities which trainees can not always practice in real life traineeship, such as consultations with simulated patients, home calls and visits, prescribing medicines and pharmaceutical preparations, and medico-pharmaceutical meetings. Therefore, apart from their own gaming and assignments, both groups of students are confronted with specific cases requesting interdisciplinary cooperation.