Teaching pharmacology within a multidisciplinary organ system-based medical curriculum.

We have described how the pharmacology of agents that act on the central nervous system (CNS) and endocrine system were incorporated into a case-based, multidisciplinary, integrated sophomore medical curriculum at Southern Illinois University School of Medicine (SIUSM). Faculty members from the Departments of Pharmacology, Pathology, Internal Medicine, Psychiatry, and Neurology were major participants in the CNS block, and faculty with primary expertise in radiology, epidemiology, and immunology also participated. Integrated sessions involving the entire class were organized around brief patient cases, which were given to the students in advance of the session.

Effect of anonymous test grading on passing rates as related to gender and race.

Background: Concerns about potential bias in the grading of medical students at the Southern Illinois University School of Medicine led to a major institutional policy change whereby students' identities were masked during the test-grading process. The present study assessed the effect of this anonymous test grading policy by comparing the performance of men and women students and of white and African American students prior to and after adoption of the policy change.

Method: A test-passing rate was determined for each of 476 freshmen students in the comparison groups from the eight classes of 1988 through 1995.

Comparing checklists and databases with physicians' ratings as measures of students' history and physical-examination skills.

Purpose: To compare two methods of rating students' performances on history and physical examination: (1) by using checklists completed by standardized patients (SPs) and databases completed by students, and (2) by using ratings of students by three physicians for each SP-student encounter.

Method: Four cases were chosen for the study, and 30 students were examined per case. The students were all in their fourth year at the Southern Illinois University School of Medicine in the spring of 1991.