Mount Sinai Case Curriculum in Pediatrics

Introduction Medical student clerkships are designed to provide students with an opportunity to develop a critical, problem-oriented approach to patient care. Given the time constraints of traditional medical student clerkships, it is not feasible during a short clinical rotation to expose students to all of the pathologic entities within a particular discipline. This is especially true at multiple, often distant clinical sites with varied patient populations. Methods To address this in Pediatrics, we created a series of web-supported case seminars to review a variety of common problems. The teaching cases for the core Pediatric Clerkship are based on the Council on Medical Student Education in Pediatrics Curriculum. Each case is organized to include case objectives, suggested references, a case presentation, and guiding questions. Students prepare for teaching sessions by reviewing the case's objectives, patient presentation, and guiding questions on-line. Seminar sessions use these cases for the review of the clinical approach to patients, organization of data, generation of a differential diagnosis, and management for a variety of pediatric conditions. Sessions are entirely small-group, interactive, and case-based. The curriculum is web-supported and uses multimedia resources to ensure that the cases are standardized and can be delivered efficiently across multiple and distant clinical sites. Results Their quality and presentation have been assessed using anonymous, written evaluations by each student. Responses to this method of teaching have been extremely positive. Students have reported that the teaching is of high caliber and that the topics are high yield. They were also impressed by both the format and the level of interactivity of the sessions. Discussion The cases have now been used as the primary teaching tool in the Pediatric Clerkship for four years. They are continually being refined to incorporate contemporary medical topics and further address LCME mandates.