Med School Finalizes New Curriculum

The Medical School faculty is fleshing out the details of a controversial new curriculum that teaches medicine through a series of case studies rather than classroom lectures.

The so-called "New Pathway" is a five-year program extending through medical school and into the first year of residency. Applications are due October 15 for the class entering in the fall of 1985.

As a prototype for the program, seven first-year students are currently enrolled in a month-long elective using the case study method. The instructor, Jeffrey N. Berman, is taking a year off between his third and fourth years at the Med School, and said yesterday that it offers better education than he received his first year as a medical student.

"The whole idea behind it is that it is active learning. The students are actively thinking about the problems and going but and looking for the information to solve them," Berman said.

For example, students would be presented with the case of a patient with a ruptured spleen, and then learn anatomy and physiology necessary to treat such a condition.

In response to criticism that the case-study method doesn't offer a complete introduction to basic science, Berman said that students are forced to learn anything they don't already know. "It makes understanding basic science very important," he said.

Another emphasis of the program is using computers to aid diagnosis and treatment.

The program--which will involve 25 students each year--is a scaled-down version of the controversial seven-year plan first proposed by Med School Dean Daniel C. Tosteson '44 in the spring of 1982.

In its original form, the plan would have accepted college sophomores and covered the last two years of college, four years of medical school, and the first year of residency.

The students in the new curriculum will be selected from the entire class of 165, but will have to apply for the plan.

The original seven-year plan was strongly criticized during student-faculty committee discussions last year because of the problems associated with accepting students while they were still in college.

The current plan, which was approved by the Med School faculty last June, is not nearly so controversial. Eight separate committees are currently designing aspects of the curriculum and are expected to have their proposals finished in April, Berman said.

Dr. Michael A. Gimbrone Jr., chairman of the Identity and Defense subcommittee, yesterday said developing the curriculum is "a challenge," explaining. "It is not a matter of sorting through old information but seeking completely new information."

He refused to say if the committee would be finished by April but said it was reasonable to expect that work would be complete by the final meeting of the medical faculty's curriculum committee--which must approve the subcommittee's proposals--in May.

Those doctors still skeptical of the plan are generally adopting a wait-and-see attitude until the curriculum is completed, one critic, Dr. Arnold N. Weinberg said yesterday.

In addition to philosophical objections that a strict case-study method is not comprehensive enough, Weinberg said he is concerned that those designing the curriculum are being rushed and will not have sufficient time to do it carefully.