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Continuum of Basic & Clinical Neurosciences across the Entire Curriculum
Author(s) -
Jozefowicz Ralph F
Publication year - 2010
Publication title -
the faseb journal
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.709
H-Index - 277
eISSN - 1530-6860
pISSN - 0892-6638
DOI - 10.1096/fasebj.24.1_supplement.63.4
Subject(s) - curriculum , medical education , clinical neurology , neurology , clinical science , neuropathology , psychology , clinical neuroscience , medicine , psychiatry , neuroscience , alternative medicine , pedagogy , cancer pain , disease , pathology
Neurophobia is the fear of neural sciences and clinical neurology that medical students develop due to their inability to apply their basic science knowledge to clinical situations. The treatment for neurophobia is to ensure a strong basic science/clinical integration in all years of the medical school curriculum, resulting in a continuum of neurologic education. The 2nd year Mind, Brain and Behavior (MBB) course at the University of Rochester integrates neural sciences, neuropathology, psychopathology and psychopharmacology in a 9‐week modified PBL format. Neurology and psychiatry faculty, many of whom have MD/PhD's, deliver the bulk of the lectures, and residents serve as PBL tutors and laboratory instructors alongside the faculty. Involvement of clinical faculty and residents in teaching the MBB course not only helps insure that the material taught is clinically relevant, but it also eases the transition to the 3rd year clerkships. The outcomes for the MBB course have been uniformly positive. Not only have students consistently rated MBB as the best basic science course in the curriculum, but their performance on the NBME subject test in neurosciences has been significantly higher than the national mean. A neuroscience course that integrates basic science and clinical neurology is likely to prepare students well for the new USMLE gateway examination. And neurophobia might even be replaced by neurophilia!