Evaluation of an educational program in preventive cardiology.

Area of Science:

• Medical Education
• Preventive Cardiology
• Public Health

Background:

• In 1979, the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI) funded a preventive cardiology (PC) educational program at the University of Tennessee, Memphis (UTM).
• This initiative aimed to integrate PC principles into the medical school curriculum.

Purpose of the Study:

• To evaluate the impact of the PC program on medical and dental students at UTM from 1979 to 1984.
• Assessed changes in student health behaviors, attitudes toward PC, and PC knowledge.
• Examined the program's influence on the development of future PC educational initiatives.

Main Methods:

• A pre- and post-survey design was employed, with data collected in 1981 and repeated three years later.
• A 30% random sample of freshmen medical and dentistry students at UTM participated.
• A control group of medical students from a similar, nearby state medical school was included for comparison.

Main Results:

• UTM medical students demonstrated significant improvements in attitudes towards the preventability of heart disease (P < .05) and PC knowledge (P < .0001).
• Personal health behaviors and parameters remained generally good among UTM students.
• While control students also improved PC knowledge, the increase was less significant than in UTM students (P < .05).

Conclusions:

• The NHLBI-supported PC program at UTM successfully enhanced students' knowledge and attitudes regarding heart disease prevention.
• The program fostered significant institutional changes, expanding the focus on PC and general prevention.
• Low statistical power limited the ability to detect all potential differences between UTM and control students.