Integrating basic sciences and clinical skills: a thread of Clinicopathological Correlations in a Clinical Skill Course

Understanding the pathologic basis of diseases and their clinical correlates has been growing in parallel to the relevant advances in science and medicine. However, most reformed medical school curricula have mainly addressed the overall content integration with a less emphasis on explicitly structuring the integration of pathophysiology or other relevant basic sciences in clinical skills (CS) courses. Clinicopathologic Correlations (CPCOR), when effectively designed in CS courses, link the clinical findings to their related basic science fundamental changes. Regular highlighting of relevant CPCORs in CS courses enhances student acquisition of clinical reasoning skills and at the same time triggers their translational scientific curiosity. The six-step CPCOR process, detailed in the manuscript, starts with developing session learning objectives that guide CPCOR content development relevant to the weekly CS case. A typical CPCOR session includes pre-encounter and post-encounter small group activities in which students formulate broad and narrow differential diagnosis respectively. Throughout the session, students discuss risk factors, etiopathogenesis, and history and physical examination findings for the identified differential diagnoses. These small group activities are enhanced by a large group session delivered by a Pathologist-Clinician team that leads student centered CPCOR discussions relevant to the weekly CS case. In addition to the enhanced clinical reasoning skills, the implemented CPCOR process augmented the curricular emphasis of lifelong learning skills while reinforcing the importance of the pathologic basis of the clinical findings. Our streamlined CPCOR process can easily be adapted into other medical school curricula to meet relevant needs of integration and clinical reasoning enhancements.