Study on the Medical Humanities and Social Sciences Curriculum in Korean Medical School: Current Teaching Status and Learning Subjects / 한국의학교육

PURPOSE: We did this study to find out the current teaching status of the medical humanities and social sciences curriculum in Korean medical schools. Further, we discuss the tasks at hand to improve the curriculum in medical education. METHODS: The curricula of 41 medical schools and the syllabi of 10 schools were examined. We analyzed the tables of course organization and contents of integrated medical humanities. After analysis of the contents, they were grouped into 6 categories of medical humanities and social sciences domain. RESULTS: Our results are as follow: 1) there are 3 types of medical humanities and social sciences subject forms: inter-disciplinary (integrated, for example, PDS), multi-disciplinary (separated subject form), and mixed (integrated+separated); 2) most schools offer medical humanities and social sciences in a required class; 3) medical humanities and social sciences are taught through all school years and all 8 graduate medical schools offer a medical humanities and social sciences course from year 1; and 4) the average academic credits for medical humanities are 10 or 11. With respect to the curriculum content, there is some commonality in 10 schools: disease prevention, health improvement, medical ethics, medical regulation, professionalism, and community medicine. Differences were seen in content selection and organization. CONCLUSION: After brief reviews of the medical humanities and social science curriculums, we discovered that all Korean medical schools meet the need of medical humanities and social sciences education. However, curriculum implementation differed in various ways. We suggest the following tasks: 1) clarification of educational goals in order to develop a core curriculum of medical humanities and social sciences in Korea; 2) sharing experiences of developing a well-designed curriculum with other medical schools for effective teaching of this subject area.

Teaching Medical Humanities in Korean Medical Schools: Tasks and Prospect / 한국의학교육

Scientific and humanistic aspects are integral to medicine and they must be bounded and integrated, not to suggest that one is more important than the other, or that they operate separately.In fact, the symbol of the physician, 'Caduceus' properly represents the bonding and intertwining between two forces of knowledge and wisdom or science and humanities, and as seen in the Hippocratic Oath, the humanities and the humanistic aspect of medical profession were important parts of practice thousands of years before medicine learned to use science as a new approach to acquire knowledge. However, the advances in science and technology in the early twenty century have fostered an emphasis on knowledge and technical skills in medical education with a neglect of the traditional humane and interpersonal aspects of the practice of medicine. Due to these concerns, for the last some 30years, there have been many attempts to improve general professional education and promote humanities curricula in medical education such as atruistic attitudes and professional behaviors that those pursuing careers in medicine should possess. This paper briefly reviews current status of teaching medical humanities and social sciences in Korean medical schools, and discusses tasks to be coped with to further improve the medical humanities curriculum in Korea including development of effective teaching and evaluation methods. This paper also emphasizes the importance of the role of the medical education systems such as National Licensing Medical Examination and the Medical School Accreditation System in improving the teaching of medical humanities and social sciences in Korean medical schools.