About the Curriculum
The PhD Program provides students with a broad foundation of biomedical, clinical and pharmacy related interdisciplinary training, followed by intensive training in advanced aspects of medical sciences, research philosophy and modern techniques. The duration of the curriculum is four years with a total of 60 credit hours (CH) in the program of study. This is in line with numerous PhD programs of highly reputable regional and international institutions. The curriculum will incorporate formal lectures, group projects, research presentations, journal clubs and writing review articles, to develop the students’ ability for critical thinking, intensive scientific writing, and problem-solving skills through research. All components of the PhD program will be conducted in English. The length of the educational and training components has been benchmarked against well-established international institutions such as the University of British Columbia and University of Alberta in Canada. The educational and research outcomes gained by the students throughout this program will be of a high international standard given the high-quality mentoring opportunities and state-of-the-art research facilities offered by Qatar University’s Health Cluster. The educational content is customized to reflect the local needs and the current healthcare environment in Qatar. The program has established links with several educational and medical institutions in the USA, UK and Australia to facilitate collaboration in the areas of teaching and research. Moreover, the PhD program is closely collaborating with prestigious national research, medical and educational institutions within the State of Qatar such as Hamad Medical Corporation (HMC), Sidra Medicine, Weill-Cornell Medicine-Qatar (WCM-Q), interim Translational Research Institute (iTRI), the Neuroscience Institute, Primary Health Care Corporation (PHCC) and National Center for Cancer Care & Research (NCCCR) to foster joint collaborative projects and a transfer of technical skills.
The typical steps for incoming students are:
- Enrollment in core and elective courses to develop a broad foundation in medical sciences.
- Select appropriate advanced courses to develop depth in an area of specialization.
- Rotations through research laboratories to learn a variety of techniques
- Participation in interdisciplinary seminars.
- Passing the written and oral PhD candidacy examination.
- Performing a significant body of original research on relevant topics within the focused project
- Drafting of manuscript(s) to enable publishing of novel research data in peer-reviewed international journals.
- Successfully defend a dissertation describing their research.
All requirements for a doctoral degree are typically completed within four calendar years from the date of matriculation in the PhD program.