The Clinical Officer Training Program is a community-based medical training program which was developed on the problem-based-learning (PBL) format. Clinical Officers (CO’s) are community health care providers licensed to practice medicine with physician supervision, but, may act as independent medical providers in some countries. In this regard, Clinical Officer act as medical providers helping to facilitate the delivery of healthcare to a wider population. As part of their comprehensive responsibilities, COs conduct physical exams, diagnose and treat illnesses, order and interpret tests, counsel on preventive health care, assist in surgery, and write prescriptions. Within the physician-CO relationship, Clinical Officers exercise autonomy in medical decision making and provide a broad range of diagnostic and therapeutic services. A CO’s practice may also include education, research, and administrative services. The Clinical Officer Training Program (COTP) was developed to provide the training necessary to be certified as Clinical Officer by the Ministry of Health or its governmental equivalence.
The COTP is a three-year program with the first year and a half being “didactic” and the second year and a half being clinical. The didactic curriculum is based on the Problem Based Learning (PBL) format (see Primer). In this PBL format, the student will be taught to develop skills needed for life-long learning. The student, over the course of a year, will be presented with thirty-six virtual patients, each accompanied by a list of objectives. In addition, the student will be given the resources and mentoring to develop skills in history taking and physical exam to be able to formulate an accurate differential diagnosis and treatment plan. Over the course of twenty-five patient encounters, the student will learn aspects of medical education which include, but are not limited to, human anatomy and physiology, microbiology, immunology and parasitology, histology, cardiology, pulmonology, gastroenterology, general surgery, orthopedics, obstetrics and gynecology, and pediatrics. In the clinical year, the student will be assigned rotating clerkships with local physicians / medical providers. These clerkships will focus on aspects of Internal Medicine, Pediatrics, Surgery / Orthopedics, and Obstetrics / Gynecology, as well as, their sub-specialty studies.