Changing Medical School IT to Support Medical Education Transformation.

Area of Science:

• Medical Education Technology
• Health Informatics
• Curriculum Development

Background:

• Medical schools face challenges integrating educational informatics technology (IT) to support evolving curricula.
• Existing IT support often relies on isolated, non-interoperable systems.

Purpose of the Study:

• To describe the implementation of a novel, integrated IT infrastructure to support a revamped competency-based medical curriculum.
• To demonstrate how aligned people, processes, and technology can transform medical student training.

Main Methods:

• Vanderbilt School of Medicine launched a redesigned, integrated IT infrastructure for its competency-based Curriculum 2.0.
• The system uses coordinated, interoperable technologies for instruction, effort capture, feedback management, and progress monitoring.
• IT personnel were realigned to create the new system, focusing on data capture and analysis for student and program success.

Main Results:

• The IT infrastructure enabled real-time monitoring of student performance across competencies via electronic portfolios.
• Students used portfolio data for self-assessment and goal setting, supported by mentors.
• Early identification of at-risk students was facilitated through automated alerts for low performance.
• Data visualizations informed high-stakes decisions regarding student progression and curriculum improvement.

Conclusions:

• Alignment of people, processes, and technology is crucial for successful educational IT implementation.
• Integrated IT systems can significantly enhance medical student training and curriculum effectiveness.