State of lifestyle medicine education in Saudi medical schools: A descriptive study

Lifestyle medicine (LM) is a patient-centric, evidence-based clinical practice supporting adopting and sustaining of healthy behaviours and improving health-related living standards. Unfortunately, even in developed nations, medical curricula have largely ignored the LM concepts. Some LM components have been incorporated into the medical curriculum in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia to determine the general status of teaching LM competency domains in undergraduate curricula in medical colleges.

A cross-sectional, descriptive survey was conducted in English and distributed from January to March 2022. In this study, only administrative position holders were included. The administrative directors (such as deans, vice-deans, and program directors) play a significant role and are responsible for policymaking in medical education. There are 38 undergraduate medical programs across private and public medical colleges in Saudi Arabia. MCQs, OSCE, Essay, SEQ/SAQ, Assignments, and OSPE, were the assessment techniques of the LM domains.

The response rate of the survey was 78.3%. Of all respondents, 61% were aware of LM domains. Twenty-four colleges teach one or more of the LM domains; the nutrition domain was the most common one. Mostly followed the traditional method (75%) and small group learning activities (71%). Programs also used large group learning activities and clinical teaching (35% each), followed by practical laboratory activities (19%) and other methods on very few occasions.

The current study also shows that LM is not taught effectively in medical schools in Saudi Arabia, although the results illustrate an increased interest and awareness among administrators. This study identified the general situation of teaching LM in medical schools. These findings provide valuable insights for shaping the future direction of medical education.