Pilot implementation of the national longitudinal communication curriculum: experiences from four German faculties

Background: The German national longitudinal communication curriculum provides medical faculties with orientation for the content of their communication teaching. But its implementation also requires changes in the organization of teaching. However, due to a lack of reports and studies on experiences with the development and implementation of communication curricula, recommendations on the procedure and the use of suitable instruments cannot be provided. Consequently, as part of this exploratory study the implementation process of the communication curricula was observed at four faculties. Methods: A comparative case study was conducted against the background of a change management concept. The four participating faculties were selected in such a way that they differed significantly in their initial conditions, particularly the development stage of the communication curriculum. Group interviews were conducted with the project teams at each faculty concerning the conditions and experiences with the implementation process. The evaluation took the form of a qualitative content analysis with a focus on identifying supporting and inhibiting factors and useful activities. Results: Different faculty approaches, support structures, core skills, the scope of study and examination regulations, teaching organization and available resources can have a major impact on the implementation processes. It became clear that, depending on the status of the implementation process, other barriers and supporting conditions gain in importance. Strategically, it proved to be a particular success factor to implement the communication curriculum together with other innovations in the course of the conversion to a model study program. This enabled a particularly quick and efficient implementation. The implementation into an existing curriculum proved to be much more protracted. In addition, a change management concept was used to illustrate which measures were found to be effective for which task areas. This includes, for example, curricular mapping, the development of skills in communication teaching or the integration of communication into exams. Conclusions: Thus a concept with strategies and measures for the implementation of the National Longitudinal Communication Curriculum is available. It already contains numerous suggestions for planning one's own approach in line with the conditions and resources of other locations. However, it needs to be supplemented and further validated.