Forskningsområde

Søren Thorgaard Skou (PT, MSc, PhD) has vast experience within the field of osteoarthritis and other chronic conditions and has been the principal investigator of several high-quality randomized controlled trials on surgical and non-surgical treatment, one of which was published in The New England Journal of Medicine (impact factor of 79.26), the highest ranked of all general medical journals.

Currently, he is the principal investigator of a randomized, controlled trial of meniscal surgery vs. exercise therapy and education for young people with a meniscal tear (DREAM) and a 5-year EU-funded project (MOBILIZE, grant agreement No 801790) with the overall aim of improving health in people with more than one chronic condition (i.e. multimorbidity) through personalized exercise therapy and education.

Furthermore, he is the co-lead of Exercise First, a research program funded by Region Zealand aimed at developing, testing and implementing initaitives that support that the individual patient received the right prevention and treatment at the right time and to increase self-management using e-health. 

He is one of the main architects and leader of the implementation of the highly successful treatment program Good Life With osteoArthritis in Denmark (GLA:D) for patients with knee and hip osteoarthritis.

Furthermore, he is a recipient of a prestigious ERC Starting Grant from the European Research Council, and a postdoc grant and a Sapere Aude Research Talent Award from the Independent Research Fund Denmark. 

Undervisningsportfolio

Formel pædagogisk uddannelse

2018 PhD Supervisor course, IOB, SDU

2015-2017 Formal teaching qualification certificate in higher education pedagogy at AAU (10 ECTS) (adjunktpædagogikum)

2016 Certified on C1 level in English language on the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages: learning, teaching, assessment.

2016 Electronic multiple choice tests to evaluate students at SDU, 2015 GRADE guidelines (system for rating quality of evidence) at The Danish Health Authority.

2015 Online and blended learning for teaching at university level at the course ”Teaching for tomorrow” at SDU (5 ECTS).

Uddannelsesadministrative opgaver

Responsible for module on the Master of Physiotherapy from September 2015 to January 2018, responsible for theme and lecturer in RCT/study design at SDU in September 2016-January 2017, and responsible for theme and lecturer in Statistics at SDU in September 2015-January 2016.

Course developer and leader of PhD-course at SDU: Using news media and social media to increase the awareness and dissemination of your research” from September 2016

Course developer and co-leader of the GLA:D-course at SDU, which has now been exported to Canada, Australia, China, Switzerland and New Zealand.

Erfaring med undervisning, vejledning og eksamen

Teaching

More than 1250 hours of teaching activities at bachelor, master or PhD level

Furthermore, several presentations and courses for patients with knee and hip pain aimed at teaching them about their disease and how to treat it with a special emphasis on exercise and help to self-help.

Examiner experience

Chairman of PhD committee at SDU, Spring 2018

Examiner at nine examinations at MSc-level or BA-level

Examiner in Randomized Controlled Trials (RCT) and study design at the MSc in Physiotherapy at SDU Autumn 2016

Examiner in Basic statistics at the MSc in Physiotherapy at SDU Autumn 2015

Examiner of two projects at the MSc in Public Health at SDU Summer 2015

Examiner of a project at the MSc in Medicine with industrial specialization at AAU Winter 2014/2015

Examiner of a project at the MSc in Clinical Science and Technology at AAU Winter 2012/2013

Examiner of Assessment and treatment of musculoskeletal disorders at the BA in physiotherapy at UCN Winter 2012 and Summer 2012.

Examiner of MPhil thesis at University of Queensland, Australia, February 2018.

Referee of application for an academic position at the School of Health and Rehabilitation Sciences, University of Queensland, Australia (2017).

Furthermore, I have been censor at four examinations at the BA in Medicine at Aalborg University, 2016.

Metoder, materialer og redskaber og refleksion over egen pædagogisk praksis og fremtidig udvikling

I have been teaching a broad group of students at various levels and clinicians both at the university, the hospital and in other settings. The organization of the teaching has also been multiple, as it has been in large classes of more than 100, medium size classes, classes of no more than 20 and groups of 4-5 students. The teaching has involved different approaches, sometimes being lectures, other times being workshops, group-based teaching, laboratory-based teaching and practical teaching of specific clinical methods. I have intentionally tried to challenge myself by changing the audience, setting and approach to develop my teaching skills as much as possible. I have experienced that this has increased my possibilities and variation when approaching a specific teaching task, both new ones and tasks that I have previously performed. Furthermore, I have developed my teaching skills by taking a course in online and blended learning at university level, which gave me very relevant tools to use in my teaching, and a course in electronic multiple-choice tests, which can be used actively as formative assessment to support the learning process throughout a course. Whenever possible, I have tried to approach students based on the level that they are at by using differentiated teaching, giving more skilled students additional tasks and students challenged by the specific task extra supervision, motivation or help to succeed. One example is the Basic statistics course at the Master of Physiotherapy at SDU, where the level of previous knowledge within statistics was very different among the students. Here a practical approach applying differentiated teaching helped improve the learning process of the individual student. I also try to employ different methods and media in my teaching to help the students learn based on their preferred method in the most effective way. Two examples of this are that I some years ago started using screencasts for the students to watch before the lecture and small group work sessions during a lecture. This was well received by the students and seems to be helpful tools for my future teaching career. From my own MSc and as a supervisor for several projects at AAU, I have personal experiences and competences of using the problem-based learning method (PBL) both as student and as supervisor. I believe that these experiences and competences are beneficial and applicable to the teaching I am delivering at SDU. By giving students the possibility to acquire knowledge and skills independently working with a specific problem, PBL offers an important method used alongside other teaching methods. Furthermore, I use different online resources aimed at refining my teaching competences. I believe that teaching competences can be improved continuously throughout a teaching career. To develop my own competences further, I underwent the formal teaching qualification certificate in higher education pedagogy (Adjunktpædagogikum) at AAU in January 2017. In the official evaluation statement, my two supervisors evaluated the work I undertook during the Adjunktpædagogikum as “excellent” and commented that I am a “committed” and “dedicated” teacher and supervisor with “clear visions for continuing his development of his pedagogical competencies”. As part of the program I completed several workshops related to teaching, including a workshop on assessment and another one on flipped classroom. My pedagogical supervisor helped me improve my teaching by increasing my focus on using dialogs and discussions as part of my teaching and increasing my awareness of my role as a teacher in the classroom and as a supervisor of projects. I also underwent English language certification, ensuring that I am on level C1 of the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages. Combined with future courses, and the actual teaching and supervision at SDU and other institutions my qualifications as a teacher will be further developed.

Uddannelsesudvikling og universitetspædagogisk (følge)forskning, herunder pædagogiske priser

Responsible for module on the Master of Physiotherapy from September 2015 to January 2018

Forskningslederkursus

Research Management Course at Copenhagen Business School 2017-2018 with the aim of professionalizing research leadership