Enhancing existing medical school curricula with an innovative healthcare disparities curriculum

Background Effective healthcare disparities curricula seek to train physicians who are well equipped to address the health needs of an increasingly diverse society. Current literature on healthcare disparities curricula and implementation focuses on courses created independent of existing educational materials. Our aim was to develop and implement a novel resource-conserving healthcare disparities curriculum to enhance existing medical school lectures without the need for additional lectures. Methods This non-randomized intervention was conducted at the University of California Los Angeles. The curriculum was offered to all first-year medical students in the class of 2021 (n=188). With institutional approval, a new healthcare disparities curriculum was created based on the Society of General Internal Medicine's core learning objectives for effective healthcare disparities curricula (J General Internal Med 25:S160-163, 2010). Implementation of the curriculum made use of teachable moments within existing medical school lectures. Teachable moments were broad lecture topics identified by the research team as suitable for introducing relevant healthcare disparities content. The new lecture-enhancing healthcare disparities curriculum was delivered with the related lecture via integrated PDF documents uploaded to an online learning management system. Students were encouraged to complete pre- and post- course assessments to examine changes in disparities knowledge and self-rated confidence in addressing disparities. Matched chi 2 tests were used for statistical analysis. Results Participating students (n=92) completed both pre- and post-course assessments and were retrospectively stratified, based on self-reported use of the new lecture enhancing curriculum, into the high utilizer group (use of materials sometimes or very often, n=52) and the comparison low utilizer group (use of the materials rarely or very rarely, n=40). Students who self-identified as underrepresented racial and ethnic minorities in medicine were more likely to utilize the material (41% of the high utilizers vs. 17% of the low utilizer group, p<.01). Post-course knowledge assessment scores and self-reported confidence in addressing healthcare disparities improved only in the high utilizer group. Conclusions Integrating new guideline based curricula content simultaneously into pre-existing lectures by identifying and harnessing teachable moments may be an effective and resource-conserving strategy for enhancing healthcare disparities education among first year medical students.

Automated summary

This study aimed to develop a novel healthcare disparities curriculum by enhancing existing medical school lectures through teachable moments, without the need for additional lectures. Results showed that students who identified as underrepresented racial and ethnic minorities were more likely to utilize the new curriculum, and those who used it frequently demonstrated significant improvements in knowledge and confidence in addressing healthcare disparities.