Pathology Teaching for the Undergraduate Students in Korean Medical Schools: Current Debates and Future Program Design

ABSTRACT

This article aimed to summarize the current critiques or debates on the pathology teaching for the undergraduate medical students in Korean medical schools and to rationalize the curricular approaches for renovation and instructional strategies which are under the hot discussion. Of 41 medical schools in Korea, most pathology programs have been criticized along the line of their traditional discipline-oriented, teacher-centered curriculum and morphologydirected instruction by their limited emphasis of developing either the reasoning abilities or the effort for the systematic understanding of disease mechanism, while any measures of compensatory strategies against the declining participation to the autopsy remain unqualified. The formal instruction of the pathology course was also under the strong debates in regard to the driving effort in teaching every corners of the textbook contents aside from the overemphasis of rather monotonous and less dynamic microscopic observation equipped with the sketch-based laboratory works. Also, student's loss of interest on pathology and other concerns neglected during the undergraduate pathology course was discussed. The author stressed the leadership of the pathology course among other biomedical disciplines especially in development of the appropriate educational curricula such as the horizontal vs. vertical integrated teachinglearning process and tutorials. Alternative emphasis was made on more experimental experiences as a part of upgrading the reasoning power together with the simulated case studies prior to the senior class to meet the school objectives.