IAMSE Web Seminar - Scientific Foundations for Future Physicians

IAMSE Web Seminar Continues:

March 23, 2010
1:00 pm - 2:00 pm ET
Registration & Details: http://iamse.org/development/2010/was_2010_spring.htm

Scientific Foundations for Future Physicians: Association of American Medical Colleges and the Howard Hughes Medical Institute Report

For most of the last century allopathic medical schools have functionally recognized that medical practice should be based on science. The preparation for that scientific practice of medicine has generally been defined by a set of premedical courses heavy in the natural sciences continuing into the initial portion of medical training with more intense biological discipline based studies. The recent growth in the biological knowledge important to medical practice; the increased dependence on informational science and statistical evaluation of medical data; and the growing importance of physical science based medical technologies has placed increased demand on the medical education system. Since increasing the length of medical training is neither popular nor feasible, educators are faced with finding ways to increase science in the curriculum without increasing the amount of time devoted to learning it. Recognizing this, the AAMC and HHMI convened a committee of premedical and medical science educators to define what science a physician would need to use to practice medicine in the 21st century and then to determine where in the medical education process that science should be learned. The committee made several recommendations for consideration by the medial and premedical education community. The committee: 1) agreed that medical and premedical science education should focus on competencies rather than courses; 2) identified 11 overarching general principles for medical science education; and 3) established 8 competencies that every entering medical student should have mastered and 8 broad competencies every medical student should demonstrate prior to graduation. The committee then identified sample learning objectives and specific curricular examples to guide the interpretation of the learning objectives and competencies.

The presentation will focus on how the AAMC-HHMI report came to be; some of the philosophical underpinnings of the report; the structure of the competencies, learning objectives and examples; and the possible changes in premedical and medical curricula that could result.

Presenter: William R. Galey, Ph.D.