Developing an action plan for integrating sleep topics into the medical school curriculum

Sleep disorders are prevalent although they go unrecognized by clinicians, partially because of limited exposure to sleep medicine topics during medical school. Sleep topics can be integrated during both the preclinical and clinical years of the medical school curriculum by developing an integration strategy and action plan. Components of the action plan include examining the current medical school curriculum and the teaching infrastructure. Understanding curricular governance issues and how curriculum time is allocated will allow development of an effective integrative strategy. Sleep topics can be integrated into neuroscience, neuroanatomy, physiology, and behavioral science courses during the preclinical years. The sleep history and physical can be integrated into the physical diagnosis course. Sleep disorders can be introduced in clinical correlation courses. Integration strategies during the clinical years may include computer-based simulations. Careful assessment of the existing curriculum, curricular governance processes, and available educational resources will optimize the probability of successfully integrating sleep topics into the medical school curriculum.