Early Pre-clinical Exposure Enhances Medical Student Knowledge and Readiness in Caring for Patients with Disabilities

Area of Science:

• Medical Education
• Disability Studies
• Healthcare Training

Background:

• Physicians often lack dedicated training in managing patients with disabilities.
• This gap can impact the quality of care provided to individuals with disabilities.

Purpose of the Study:

• To assess the impact of integrating disability-focused content into pre-clinical medical education.
• To evaluate changes in medical student knowledge, readiness, and attitudes towards patients with disabilities.

Main Methods:

• Implemented supplementary readings, clinical reasoning cases, and patient panels into existing pre-clinical curricula.
• Utilized self-reported measures to assess student outcomes before and after the intervention.

Main Results:

• Medical students reported significant increases in their knowledge regarding the care of patients with disabilities.
• Students also reported enhanced readiness to provide care for patients with disabilities post-intervention.
• No significant changes were observed in student attitudes towards patients with disabilities.

Conclusions:

• Integrating disability-focused content into pre-clinical medical training effectively enhances student knowledge and readiness.
• Further strategies may be needed to address and improve medical student attitudes towards patients with disabilities.