Frequently Asked Questions
Q. What are we doing to reform medical education?
A. Certain aspects of the planned curriculum have been postponed as of spring 2009 (see next Q&A, below, for details). Yet we are moving ahead with curriculum development and reform on both campuses. Our faculty and students expressed dissatisfaction with specific aspects of our current program and invested enormous effort in developing ideas to address these concerns and improve the curriculum. We will continue to pursue a competency-based education. Students' mastery of competencies, guided by faculty mentors and attained through a choice of experiences, will be evaluated to determine their progress in medical education. In addition, our accreditation site visit in 2011 will include evaluation of how we meet new LCME accreditation standards, as well as existing standards. In light of these standards, we will be examining and revising our current curriculum.
Q. Four years of planning went into the MED 2010 initiative but now the educational reform as a whole has been postponed. What parts of this planning are we retaining and moving ahead?
A. A great deal of planning went into the MED 2010 educational reform initiative, much of which informs our work today. In 2010, the curriculum at the Twin Cities will start with the Immersion course – part of the MED 2010 proposal. Immersion is an introductory experience that melds previously separate coursework and grounds students in the skills needed to begin to think like doctors. It will include anatomy and related physical examination skills, taking patient histories, and basic principles of biochemistry, genetics and appropriate use and evaluation of the medical literature. Since January 2009, a group of faculty and staff has met to plan the Immersion experience.
In fall 2005, the Medical School began to offer medical students a Flexible M.D. program, in which they may complete their M.D. over three-and-one-half to six years. The Flexible M.D. opens up possibilities for students seeking to enhance the core curriculum with a more individualized education. Students in good academic standing may, in collaboration with a staff or faculty member, create a research portfolio, work in underserved communities in the United States or abroad, or pursue study in a health-related discipline. We will continue to offer the Flexible M.D. and expand its reach.
The Educational Steering Committee is working to modify the course calendar with the goal of better integration of content and the use of critical thinking cases to link the clinical and scientific foundations courses. While a few course directors plan to pilot new approaches in their courses in 2009-2010, most year 1 and 2 courses will stay the same until 2010-2011. Meanwhile, clerkship directors and some of our hospital systems are developing plans to introduce new approaches to the clerkships, starting as early as 2010. On our Duluth campus, plans for the New Dr. Curriculum are on track and the revised program will begin for year 1 students in 2010.
We expect to proceed with plans for assigned advisors for students at the Twin Cities starting with the entering class of 2010; at Duluth, the foundation for this approach is already in place with faculty Learning Community Leaders.
Q. Why is this effort to transform medical education taking place at Minnesota?
A. The University of Minnesota’s Medical School was cited in the Flexner Report (1910) as a school that had taken the lead in establishing an up-to-date medical education to serve the needs of the state. Today, we still strive to be leaders in medical education, ensuring that our future physicians benefit from an education that meets or exceeds current test and licensing standards, while providing them with a forward-looking approach that encourages leadership and continuous quality improvement.
Q. Is reforming medical education at the U of M an isolated effort or are other medical schools also embarking on similar efforts to transform medical education?
A. While we are responding to the growing nationwide recognition that medical education needs to change, other schools and institutions also have launched their own efforts. Some of our pilot programs are collaborative. Guidance for these initiatives comes from such nation- and profession-wide institutions as the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education’s competencies (approved in 1999), and the Association of American Medical Colleges’ Institute for Improving Medical Education (established in 2002).
Q. What are competencies?
A. A competency is a complex set of behaviors that integrates knowledge, skills and attitudes. It offers a 1,000-foot perspective; one example is: "Solve clinical problems using deductive reasoning." This broad statement implies a physician has a solid foundation in scientific information, the clinical understanding to ask appropriate questions, a solution-oriented perspective, and the ability to synthesize. A competent physician would demonstrate all these attributes. This one competency actually consolidates numerous related sub-competencies and objectives. By drilling down to these objectives, evaluators may reach a level of detail where individual behaviors can be meaningfully measured.
Q. What are the expected benefits of reforming medical education?
A. We expect to launch excellent future physicians, driven to serve their patients and their communities and prepared to critically assess themselves and their health-care systems with an eye to improvement.
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