A SURVEY OF THE CONTENT OF BSC COURSES IN PHARMACOLOGY IN UK UNIVERSITIES - IS IT TIME FOR A CORE CURRICULUM

The 18 UK universities offering three- or four-year BSc pharmacology c ourses were surveyed by questionnaire to determine course content, la boratory-practical content and project or dissertation requirements. I n this article David Dewhurst and Clive Page provide an overview of th e study, which highlighted the fact that there is no core curriculum. There was considerable variation in course content [only a limited num ber of common topics were taught in depth (>15 h timetabled time)] and the time spent doing 'wet' laboratory practicals varied considerably (range 0-145 h). A research project in the final year was the norm (al though the time allocation varied considerably), but some universities used a library-based dissertation as an alternative.