Clinical Assessment Skills for Enhanced Practice (MECP3001)

This module ensures that multiprofessional enhanced practitioners working in health and social care in a variety of different specialties understand and use core focused clinical examination skills in order to assess their patients/clients’ needs in a variety of settings.

Part of Enhanced Clinical Practitioner PGCert

This module is part of the University’s PGCert Enhanced Clinical Practitioner. You will study alongside other students on this course. The module is also part of the Professional Development MA/MSc course - a flexible course that you help design to take your career to the next level.

Overview

This module ensures that health care professionals, from a variety of different specialties, can understand and apply core focused clinical examination skills to assess their patients/clients’ needs in a variety of settings.

These settings will be multi-professional and caring for patients across their life span (from birth to end of life care, including mental health settings). Students will gain the knowledge and skills to undertake enhanced clinical assessment safely and accurately, and within the scope of their role.

Content will include:

Consultation models, history taking, effective communication skills, developing therapeutic relationships, risk assessments.
Focused clinical examination of body systems: respiratory, cardiovascular, nervous and musculoskeletal systems, abdominal assessment.
Mental health considerations in clinical assessment, and considerations when encountering the paediatric patient.
Documentation of history and examination, formulating differential diagnoses and evidenced-based management plans.
Legal, professional and ethical considerations for enhanced clinical practice.

It is expected that all advertised modules will run, but there may be situations where there are insufficient students to make a particular module viable.

Careers

Completing an enhanced clinical assessment module equips healthcare practitioners with advanced assessment skills that directly support improved patient care. Learners develop the ability to carry out safe, accurate enhanced clinical assessments, which strengthens their clinical decision‑making and professional capability. This expanded skill set can also open up wider employment opportunities within health and social care services, as enhanced assessment skills are increasingly valued across multidisciplinary settings.

Additionally, successful completion of this module enables progression onto further clinical development opportunities—specifically, it provides a pathway into the non‑medical prescribing module, supporting career advancement into roles requiring greater autonomy and clinical responsibility.

Module delivery

Delivery of the module uses a blended range of teaching strategies, including formal lectures, with input from subject specialists as appropriate, group work activities including problem-based learning, directed and independent sessions initiated through online platforms such as Blackboard, online learning resources and practical face to face clinical examination sessions. The delivery approach will be predominately delivered through a synchronous approach online or face to face, with some directed activities delivered asynchronously.