Since 1991, Introduction to Community Medicine has been a section of a required second year course, Pathophysiology of Clinical Medicine. Its purpose is to introduce students to the interface between medicine and community issues. Students are divided into small groups. Each group studies a different community issue while working with a community instructor. The student groups analyze the various elements of the issues, become involved in community activities, develop recommendations for addressing these issues and then the individual students communicate their impressions.

OBJECTIVES

To give medical students:

• an opportunity to develop skills that will help them be more effective when they are working to solve community problems.
• an opportunity to acquire knowledge and experiences that will allow them to assess community services for their patients.
• an opportunity to develop skills that will help them to be effective treating patients within diverse cultures.
• an opportunity to demonstrate and communicate their knowledge.

For more information, contact:

Jeanne Wegner
Medical Education Program Coordinator
Department of Medicine
Phone: (815) 395-5645
E-mail: JeanneW@uic.edu