Faculty of Medicine, Dentistry and Health Sciences Medical Education Unit

Postgraduate Students

Academics within the Medical Education Unit supervise Doctor of Philosophy (PhD), Master of Education (Research) and Honours students who are undertaking research in an area of interest relevant to their expertise.

Prospective students
Contact information
Current and past projects
Online resources

Prospective students

Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)
Master of Education (Research)

The Faculty of Medicine, Dentistry and Health Sciences has an international reputation for high quality, high impact research in a diverse range of fields. There are a number of postgraduate research opportunities within the faculty. The faculty has more than 800 PhD students, located in the faculty's schools, departments and centres or in one of the faculty's affiliated research organisations. Students in the Faculty of Medicine, Dentistry and Health Sciences are supervised by either two supervisors or one supervisor and a supervisory committee.

Research students of the Medical Education Unit are usually supervised by one or two academics within the MEU and an academic with expertise in the field of interest from another department or school within the faculty or university. The research topic and supervisors are usually chosen by negotiation with the student.

Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

The PhD program is a research degree incorporating a thesis of 80,000 to 100,000 words. The usual length of enrolment for a PhD is three years full-time or six years part-time. Full-time PhD students are permitted to enrol for a maximum of four years and part-time students for a maximum of eight years. The first year of the PhD is a probationary year, and candidature is confirmed only if the student has made satisfactory progress in that year.

The Degree of Doctor of Philosophy Handbook contains detailed information about the PhD and its associated regulations.

Master of Education (M.Ed)

Prospective masters students of the Medical Education Unit can enrol in a M.Ed (Research) with joint supervision. This is a one to one and a half year degree which can usually be taken part-time. M.Ed (Research) students can sometimes convert to PhD candidature after a specified period of time. Such a transfer follows evidence of satisfactory progress and the agreement of supervisors. The transfer is administered by the School of Graduate Studies.

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Contact information

For more information about these programs, please contact:

A/Prof Agnes Dodds
Medical Education Unit
Faculty of Medicine, Dentistry and Health Sciences
The University of Melbourne 3010
AUSTRALIA

email: Email
phone: +61 3 8344 9794

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Current and past research projects

Date Degree Topic Supervisors
2007- PhD The Representation and Teaching of Clinical reasoning in the UoM and UI Medical Courses

Prof Lesleyanne Hawthorne
A/Prof Susan Elliott
Mr Neville Chiavaroli

2006- PhD Overseas Trained Doctors in an Urban Australian Hospital: An Ethnographic Study

A/Prof Susan Elliott
Dr Marilys Guillemin
Dr Eleanor Flynn

2004- M.Ed (Research), part-time A qualitative study to identify teaching methods used by expert clinician educators when teaching clinical reasoning to medical student. A/Prof Susan Elliott
Dr Kerri-Lee Krause
2003- PhD (part-time) The Notion of Social Justice in Medical Professionalism and Undergraduate Medical Education A/Prof Susan Elliott
Dr Marilys Guillemin

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Online resources

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