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The Companion Curriculum: medical students’ perceptions of the integration of humanities within medical education

BACKGROUND: The contributions of arts and humanities to medical education are known in the medical education community, but medical schools’ offerings vary. The Companion Curriculum (CC) is a student-curated set of optional humanities content for medical students at the University of Toronto. This s...

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Autores principales: Axelrod, Charlotte, Brenna, Connor TA, Gershon, Ariel, Peterkin, Allan, Nyhof-Young, Joyce
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Canadian Medical Education Journal 2023
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10254101/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/37304632
http://dx.doi.org/10.36834/cmej.72907
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author Axelrod, Charlotte
Brenna, Connor TA
Gershon, Ariel
Peterkin, Allan
Nyhof-Young, Joyce
author_facet Axelrod, Charlotte
Brenna, Connor TA
Gershon, Ariel
Peterkin, Allan
Nyhof-Young, Joyce
author_sort Axelrod, Charlotte
collection PubMed
description BACKGROUND: The contributions of arts and humanities to medical education are known in the medical education community, but medical schools’ offerings vary. The Companion Curriculum (CC) is a student-curated set of optional humanities content for medical students at the University of Toronto. This study evaluates integration of the CC to identify key enabling conditions for medical humanities engagement. METHODS: A mixed-methods evaluation gauged usage and perceptions of integration of the CC among medical students using an online survey and focus groups. Narrative data underwent thematic analysis, supported by summary statistics of quantitative data. RESULTS: Half of survey respondents were aware of the CC (n = 67/130; 52%), and, once prompted with a description, 14% had discussed it in their tutorial groups. Of students using the CC, 80% reported learning something new regarding their roles as communicators and health advocates. Themes were the perceived value of the humanities, internal student barriers, institutional neglect of the humanities, and student critiques and recommendations. CONCLUSION: Despite participants’ interest in medical humanities, our CC remains underused. To improve humanities’ visibility in the MD curriculum, our results indicate that greater institutional support, including faculty development and early curricular integration, is required. Further study should explore reasons for gaps between interest and participation.
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spelling pubmed-102541012023-06-10 The Companion Curriculum: medical students’ perceptions of the integration of humanities within medical education Axelrod, Charlotte Brenna, Connor TA Gershon, Ariel Peterkin, Allan Nyhof-Young, Joyce Can Med Educ J Brief Reports BACKGROUND: The contributions of arts and humanities to medical education are known in the medical education community, but medical schools’ offerings vary. The Companion Curriculum (CC) is a student-curated set of optional humanities content for medical students at the University of Toronto. This study evaluates integration of the CC to identify key enabling conditions for medical humanities engagement. METHODS: A mixed-methods evaluation gauged usage and perceptions of integration of the CC among medical students using an online survey and focus groups. Narrative data underwent thematic analysis, supported by summary statistics of quantitative data. RESULTS: Half of survey respondents were aware of the CC (n = 67/130; 52%), and, once prompted with a description, 14% had discussed it in their tutorial groups. Of students using the CC, 80% reported learning something new regarding their roles as communicators and health advocates. Themes were the perceived value of the humanities, internal student barriers, institutional neglect of the humanities, and student critiques and recommendations. CONCLUSION: Despite participants’ interest in medical humanities, our CC remains underused. To improve humanities’ visibility in the MD curriculum, our results indicate that greater institutional support, including faculty development and early curricular integration, is required. Further study should explore reasons for gaps between interest and participation. Canadian Medical Education Journal 2023-04-08 /pmc/articles/PMC10254101/ /pubmed/37304632 http://dx.doi.org/10.36834/cmej.72907 Text en © 2023 Axelrod, Brenna, Gershon, Peterkin, Nyhof-Young; licensee Synergies Partners. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/This is an Open Journal Systems article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License. (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/) ) which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is cited.
spellingShingle Brief Reports
Axelrod, Charlotte
Brenna, Connor TA
Gershon, Ariel
Peterkin, Allan
Nyhof-Young, Joyce
The Companion Curriculum: medical students’ perceptions of the integration of humanities within medical education
title The Companion Curriculum: medical students’ perceptions of the integration of humanities within medical education
title_full The Companion Curriculum: medical students’ perceptions of the integration of humanities within medical education
title_fullStr The Companion Curriculum: medical students’ perceptions of the integration of humanities within medical education
title_full_unstemmed The Companion Curriculum: medical students’ perceptions of the integration of humanities within medical education
title_short The Companion Curriculum: medical students’ perceptions of the integration of humanities within medical education
title_sort companion curriculum: medical students’ perceptions of the integration of humanities within medical education
topic Brief Reports
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10254101/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/37304632
http://dx.doi.org/10.36834/cmej.72907
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