Theme
Curriculum
INSTITUTION
Al Faisal University
Conventionally, the traditional curriculum approach is implemented to teach the medical curriculum. It consists of two years preclinical followed by three years of clinical studies. As medicine develops through the creation of a massive knowledge base, it became impractical for medical undergraduates to master all these sciences. Therefore, during the past decade the integrated curriculum has become the norm in North American medical schools, and is being widely adopted worldwide.
STUDY AIM: This study explores the students’ perspectives on integrated curriculum and the key success factors for its implementation, therefore, helps the development of completely integrated curriculums.
We conducted a cross sectional study in which we collected the data through an anonymous, online survey administered to medical students of Alfaisal University in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia who studied for at least one year in a SPIRIL, hybrid-PBL integrated curriculum. We administered the survey to males and females from all college levels from first year to internship year (n=249).
249 students responded to our survey, out of which, ~42% reported not knowing what was meant by complete curricular integration; the remaining ~58% claimed to know what curriculum integration was, however, only ~44% of them were able to identify the correct definition outlining all the major components of complete curricular integration in the following question.
Out of the ~44% of students who understood what is meant by a completely integrated curriculum, a majority of ~83% perceives the integrated curriculum to be effective (p<0.001),
Moreover, out of students who understood what is meant by a completely integrated curriculum, a majority of ~61% believes the most important benefit of an integrated curriculum is that it helps students retain more knowledge and have a deeper understanding of concepts (p<0.001).
Out of students who understood what is meant by a completely integrated curriculum, ~44% believes that an integrated curriculum should be implemented in all years of medical school (p=0.001). In addition to that, majority of the students believes that the most effective method of implementing integrated curriculum is via PBL sessions (p<0.001).
Students find integration of basic and clinical concepts and integration across different study disciplines effective and important to their development.
Therefore, more efforts are need to be devoted to the development of effective complete trans-disciplinary integration models where the curriculum is completely both vertically and horizontally integrated all throughout the students’ medical education journey.