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eaching
is at the forefront of our attention as we continue to revise our
medical education curriculum, and this issue of Emory Medicine reflects
that concentration. Herein, we introduce a pioneering program, where
both experienced physicians
and medical students gain new technical skills and learn surgical
procedures using computerized robotic and simulation tools. We report
on our successful 150th anniversary gala, which contributed $300,000
to $28 million raised toward a goal of $55 million for a new medical
education building. This futuristic facility will enable us to fully
implement a revised, flexible curriculum that reflects student-centered
learning—one that will prepare our students to be lifelong
learners and leaders answering the medical challenges of the 21st
century.
The process to revise our curriculum
has been ongoing for several months now. We sought input from faculty
in every department, from students, and from colleagues in public
health, nursing and the college. We held a retreat where chairs
described the kind of graduate we want to produce, and we convened
a steering committee, which quickly multiplied into 10 subcommittees.
One point on which everyone agrees is that we must take full advantage
of our current strengths. One of the greatest of these, of course,
is our faculty.
The School of Medicine already has
a dedicated faculty who are delivering innovative instruction. As
Emory takes its next step toward being a destination university,
we build on their example. We encourage dialogue between administrators,
faculty, and students to share ideas among teaching and our curriculum
revision. Let this magazine be your forum for those ideas, and we’ll
print your responses in our next issue. We open the discussion with
a letter from the human anatomy faculty (below) and look forward
to hearing from you soon.
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From
our readers
The
article written by Sylvia Wrobel, “Warp, Speed,
Engage” (Emory
Medicine, Spring 2005) recognizes the importance of engaging
our medical students in clinical learning early in their education.
Undoubtedly, this need assists our future physicians in achieving
an identity with patient issues while concomitantly fostering a
sense of compassion and understanding for their ills. In this context,
we believe that our course in human anatomy (which has not been
called gross anatomy in more than two decades) serves as a model
for advocating these behaviors.
Specifically, we often bring patients
into the classroom to demonstrate abnormal movement as it relates
to the students’ learning of the musculoskeletal system and
encourage students to ask questions of the patients. Many of our
lectures are given by Emory physicians, and these specialists often
assist in the dissecting laboratory to create a clear linkage between
anatomy and clinical medicine. Recognizing that such a linkage also
includes an acceptance of the gifts of the body donors in our course,
we were among the first courses in the country to include an Emory
clergy person as part of our laboratory faculty. For more than 20
years, our students have arranged and administered a service of
reflection and gratitude at the end of the course.
While we do lack geographic proximity
to sufficient numbers of computers and viewing boxes, examining
images and radiographs has long been part of our students’
laboratory experiences. We believe that what we lack in resources
is more than compensated by our leadership as a fundamental basic
course that embraces clinical relevance.
The Human Anatomy
Faculty
Steve Wolf, Kyle Petersen, Art English, Bob McKeon, Ted Pettis
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