(1) A New Curriculum for the NY/American Program at Sackler School of Medicine: Version ∞ and counting…

    

Dr. Sheryl Shoham

 

In 1996 the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC) initiated the Medical Schools Objectives Project (MSOP) to assist medical schools in addressing concerns about the preparedness of medical students to meet the challenges and expectations of caring for patients in the 21st century. The continuously expanding body of scientific knowledge, as well as the changes in society’s attitudes toward health and disease had contributed to the view that traditional medical education needed to redesign its learning objectives as well as its teaching methodology. 

The MSOP and other large scale curriculum projects such as “Tomorrow’s Doctors” in Britain, the “Scottish Doctor”; the Global Minimum Essential Requirements from the Institute for International Medical Education and “The Future of Medical Education in Canada” (FMEC) have all discussed competency based curricular models in undergraduate medical education and these changes have been implemented world-wide. The Medical Education community has utilized multiple pedagogic models, all designed to meet the changing ways that students in the 21st century learn best. 

In 2008 the Faculty of Medicine at Tel Aviv University gave the NY/American Program the mandate to create a pilot new curriculum that would include a competency based model based primarily on MSOP guidelines.  The curricular changes included:

•  Conversion of a traditional lecture- and laboratory-based to one that aimed to integrate basic science objectives with clinically relevant material from the very start of the first year of studies. 

• Change of the semester system to a series of “Building Blocks of Basic Science” in first year and “Systems” curriculum in the second year of study.

• Creation of a spiral curriculum that led students through normal processes in the first year and pathological processes in the second, all the while building on previously acquired knowledge.

• Linkage of disciplines (e.g. Biochemistry and Genetics; Cell Biology and Histology; Immunology and Microbiology) without regard to conventional departmental boundaries.

• Use of small-group, interactive, case-based study wherever possible throughout the pre-clinical curriculum.

• Conversion of portions of the curriculum (particularly in second year studies) to a “Flipped Classroom” model, with an emphasis on self-study.

• Use of National Board of Medical Examiners (NBME) assessment tools to gauge students’ progress

• We are about to enter the seventh year of our new curriculum.  The process is a continuously changing one with lessons learned for us as Faculty at every crossroads…and there are many.  In this presentation I will outline some of the changes we have made, the successes and the learning opportunities.