Chief Complaints and Concerns

The novel structure and organization of the Shared Discovery Curriculum have required a new system of identifying and presenting the content and objectives for the college. As such, the College of Human Medicine faculty has identified a group of Chief Complaints and Concerns (C3) based on international lists of core objectives patient presentations.

Rather than the disciplinary (biochemistry, immunology) or organ system (cardiovascular or neurologic) classifications typically employed in medical education, the Chief Complaints and Concerns documents are focused on patients' complaints or physicians' concerns (e.g. shortness of breath or elevated blood sugar). The knowledge and skills to care for their patients define the end competencies of our medical school curriculum. The College of Human Medicine faculty have created the end-competency objectives for each of the Chief Complaints and Concerns by defining, for each topic, what an exemplary new resident should know and be able to do for a patient presenting in that manner. The process of bringing faulty together to carefully define these competencies has been a unique aspect of our curricular renewal process as well as a rigorous and intellectually stimulating one.

The C3s are found in JustinTime Medicine. They are fully searchable using key words and tags. The tags identify the disciplines linked to the content (e.g. medical genetics, cell biology), and identify when learners routinely encounter content (e.g. ECE, MCE).