English teaching in the Italian medical faculties: results of a survey

BACKGROUND: Although a compulsory examination in medical English has been present in the medical degree curriculum in Italy since 1990, guidelines indicating what should be learnt and suggesting some means of overcoming the various problems this entails are still lacking. OBJECTIVE: To investigate the main features of teaching English in the Medical Faculties and enquire into how the various problems are solved in the individual English teaching units. METHOD: A questionnaire addressing the above issues was sent out to all the Italian Universities with a Medical Faculty. RESULTS: The first finding of our survey was that response was very poor: less than 30% of the survey volunteered any reply. Within the very reduced sample which responded, there was a high degree of variation among the solutions adopted, although the underlying problems were perceived to be much the same throughout Italy. CONCLUSIONS: The general objective of the English course for medicine should be more precisely defined, together with a series of specific minimum skills the student should possess to pass the final examination. A closer collaboration among the English teaching units might help to standardize these requirements, improve the quality of the teaching and hence the level of proficiency in English for the specific purpose of medical practice.