How do health systems approach patient experience? Development of an innovative elective curriculum for medical students

Medical students currently learn about patient-centered care and practice communication skills via a variety of curricula. However, there is little in the published literature describing a standardized approach for training future physicians how health systems approach and work to improve patient experience. The [Anonymous1 and Anonymous2] Schools of Medicine designed a plan to pilot a two-week elective for medical students in their clinical years. The curriculum is designed to help students understand and appreciate the key elements of the patient experience across the continuum of care and prepare students to impact the patient experience either as a practicing physician and/or as a future leader. Teaching methods include experiential activities as well as a variety of flipped-classroom sessions, dedicated time for independent reflection and study, interactive lectures, and a capstone project. This elective is slated for implementation at both medical centers over the next couple of years and the curriculum design stakeholders will continually review and refine the structure of the course based on feedback from participating students and core educators. The goal is to develop a novel and reproducible patient experience curriculum that can be taught to medical students around the country, ideally during both the clinical and pre-clinical years of their training. Experience Framework This article is associated with the Staff & Provider Engagement lens of The Beryl Institute Experience Framework. (http://bit.ly/ExperienceFramework) Access other PXJ articles related to this lens. Access other resources related to this lens.