Prerequisites and basic notions

To begin a direct internship, the intern must: - be enrolled in the third year of the program (it is possible to begin the internship during the second semester of the second year of the program, but it cannot be concluded before the beginning of the third year of the program);
- have participated in the activities envisaged for the indirect internship;
- have obtained a minimum of approximately 90 credits;
- have obtained the certificate relating to the General Training Course on Safety in the Workplace

Program

The internship involves carrying out activities at companies or research laboratories of the universities to which the degree program belongs, which are active in the development of healthcare technologies and/or medical devices and/or services for diagnosis, treatment, and prevention, and which are available to host students at their premises. Direct internship activities will be preceded by basic training (indirect internship, minimum duration of two hours), led by the program instructors or industry experts, to provide interns with knowledge of:
● medical device regulations and standards;
● design security aspects;
● privacy and data protection principles;
● intellectual property management principles;
● project management principles;
● tools and methods for bibliographic research;
● effective communication of results through reports and presentations.
Basic training will be provided during frontal lessons, typically in the months of October, April, and July. In the event of a justified inability to attend in person, lessons can be followed asynchronously by viewing the materials provided in the dedicated Moodle section.
There are two possible types of direct internships:
● Internal: at one or more research laboratories at the Universities of Verona, Modena-Reggio, and Trento;
● External: at a company or institution. The intern will carry out his/her activities under the joint supervision of a company representative (Company Tutor) and a university professor (Academic Tutor).
If the internship takes place at one or more research laboratories, supervision will be entrusted to two professors, who will act as Academic Tutor and Company Tutor respectively. Where possible, considering the maximum number of interns the company/laboratory can accommodate, working groups (teams) of two to four interns with a shared training project may be established.

Bibliography

Didactic methods

The company or research laboratory hosting the intern defines the scope of the internship and the expected general objectives. The intern, with the support of the Company Tutor, identifies the specific objectives, activities to be completed, deadlines to be met, and expected results, developing a work program (internship project) to be shared with the Academic Tutor before starting the internship. The finalized internship project must be approved by the Internship Committee. Each intern/team will organize periodic meetings with the Company Tutor and the Academic Tutor to present the results achieved and review the project's progress, encouraging active and participatory discussion and fostering constructive criticism.

Learning assessment procedures

At the end of the internship, the Company Tutor is required to complete an intern evaluation questionnaire on the Esse3 – Internships and Stages platform, based on a format predefined by the Internship Office. At the end of the internship, each intern/team will produce a short video presentation (approximately 5 minutes), to be uploaded to the course Moodle section, presenting the results achieved and the activities completed, as well as strengths and suggestions for improvement.

Evaluation criteria

In support of and prior to final approval of the internship within the online process, the Academic Tutor, after consulting with the Company Tutor, evaluates the intern's work, taking into account the following aspects:
- commitment and participation in activities at the company/laboratory premises;
- autonomy, collaboration, and the intern's ability to achieve the established objectives;
- materials prepared for the mid-term evaluation of the project's progress;
- methods of presenting project results in plenary sessions (e.g., final internship report);
- active participation in the presentations of the results of other working groups.
To determine the recognition of indirect internship hours, the internship committee will verify participation in the proposed training activities and the quality of the final video content. Based on the above criteria, the internship can be either approved or rejected.

Criteria for the composition of the final grade

The internship can be either approved or not approved.

Exam language

Italiano