Integration of racial, cultural, ethnic, and socioeconomic factors into a gastrointestinal pathophysiology course.
Publication/Presentation Date
3-1-2009
Abstract
BACKGROUND & AIMS: Our study describes a faculty development program to encourage the integration of racial, cultural, ethnic, and socioeconomic factors such as obesity, inability to pay for essential medications, the use of alternative medicine, dietary preferences, and alcoholism in a gastrointestinal pathophysiology course.
METHODS: We designed a 1-hour faculty development session with longitudinal reinforcement of concepts. The session focused on showing the relevance of racial, ethnic, cultural, and socioeconomic factors to gastrointestinal diseases, and encouraged tutors to take an active and pivotal role in discussion of these factors. The study outcome was student responses to course evaluation questions concerning the teaching of cultural and ethnic issues in the course as a whole and by individual tutorials in 2004 (pre-faculty development) and in 2006 to 2008 (post-faculty development).
RESULTS: Between 2004 and 2008, the proportion of students reporting that "Issues of culture and ethnicity as they affect topics in this course were addressed" increased significantly (P = .000). From 2006 to 2008, compared with 2004, there was a significant increase in the number of tutors who "frequently" taught culturally competent care according to 60% or greater of their tutorial students (P = .003). The tutor's age, gender, prior tutor experience, rank, and specialty did not significantly impact results.
CONCLUSIONS: An innovative faculty development session that encourages tutors to discuss racial, cultural, ethnic, and socioeconomic issues relevant to both care of the whole patient and to the pathophysiology of illness is both effective and applicable to other preclinical and clinical courses.
Volume
7
Issue
3
First Page
279
Last Page
284
ISSN
1542-7714
Published In/Presented At
Shields, H. M., Leffler, D. A., White, A. A., 3rd, Hafler, J. P., Pelletier, S. R., O'farrell, R. P., Llerena-Quinn, R., Hayward, J. N., Salamone, S., Lenco, A. M., Blanco, P. G., & Peters, A. S. (2009). Integration of racial, cultural, ethnic, and socioeconomic factors into a gastrointestinal pathophysiology course. Clinical gastroenterology and hepatology : the official clinical practice journal of the American Gastroenterological Association, 7(3), 279–284. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cgh.2008.10.012
Disciplines
Medicine and Health Sciences
PubMedID
19118643
Department(s)
Department of Medicine
Document Type
Article