Core curriculum guidelines for a required clinical neurology experience

Abstract

Physicians in most specialties frequently encounter patients with neurologic conditions. For most non-neurologists, postgraduate neurologic education is variable and often limited, so every medical school's curriculum must include clinical learning experiences to ensure that all graduating medical students have the basic knowledge and skills required to care for patients with common neurologic symptoms and neurologic emergencies. In the nearly 20 years that have elapsed since the development of the initial American Academy of Neurology (AAN)–endorsed core curriculum for neurology clerkships, many medical school curricula have evolved to include self-directed learning, shortened foundational coursework, earlier clinical experiences, and increased utilization of longitudinal clerkships. A workgroup of both the Undergraduate Education Subcommittee and Consortium of Neurology Clerkship Directors of the AAN was formed to update the prior curriculum to ensure that the content is current and the format is consistent with evolving medical school curricula. The updated curriculum document replaces the term clerkship with experience, to allow for its use in nontraditional curricular structures. Other changes include a more streamlined list of symptom complexes, provision of a list of recommended clinical encounters, and incorporation of midrotation feedback. The hope is that these additions will provide a helpful resource to curriculum leaders in meeting national accreditation standards. The curriculum also includes new learning objectives related to cognitive bias, diagnostic errors, implicit bias, care for a diverse patient population, public health impact of neurologic disorders, and the impact of socioeconomic and regulatory factors on access to diagnostic and therapeutic resources.