The Carver College of Medicine’s medical doctorate degree curriculum features the integration of basic sciences with clinical application and experience that also increases students’ ability to individually tailor their educational experience.  

Innovation, Integration and Individualization constitute the three “I’s” of our curriculum. Given the phenomenal pace of change in technologic progress and the explosion of scientific discovery of new knowledge, tomorrow’s physicians must be educated in ways that will allow them to continuously adapt to the complex and continuously evolving environment of health care delivery. The goal of the curriculum is to develop enduring attitudes, skills, and knowledge that will provide focus and direction for tomorrow’s physicians in a future that cannot be easily predicted.

Examples of the ‘Three I’s’ in the CCOM Curriculum:

  • Innovation- Scientific content taught in context of the 6 fundamental mechanisms of health.
  • Integration- Early clinical experiences integrated with scientific content to provide contextual learning. Our foundational science courses are each co-directed by a scientist and a clinician.
  • Individualization- Increased time during the last three semesters for students to choose how they will tailor their educational experience.

Our exciting curriculum consists of a triple helix model composed of three strands that extend through all four years of medical school. The three strands are Mechanisms of Health and Disease, Medicine and Society, and Clinical and Professional Skills. The strands are interwoven in a helical spiral that assures not only integration of their material but also affords the deliberate revisiting of material in a manner that promotes progressively deeper understanding and mastery.

Other features of the curriculum include longitudinal mentored clinical experiences starting in the first week of medical school as well as beginning clinical clerkships after just 3 semesters of preclinical instruction, rather than the more common four-semester format.  By the end of the 5th semester students will have completed all of their core requirements leaving the remaining 3 semesters for students to tailor their educational experience to prepare them for their selected specialty.

Our triple helix model

Foundations Course

Mechanisms of Health and Disease (MOHD)

Clinical and Professional Skills (CAPS)

Medicine and Society (MAS)

Integrating Bonds

Further Curricular Explanation

Students will learn the art and science of medicine through an integrated approach among the three strands, which is similar to how they will practice medicine in the future. Health is maintained by a complex state of continuously changing interactions within our bodies and with our environment. The Mechanisms of Health and Disease (MOHD) strand covers the 6 basic internal mechanisms that help maintain health. The 6 basic mechanisms include genetics, the immune system, metabolism, the delivery of oxygen and its use, structural and locomotive (skin, musculoskeletal) systems and neuropsychiatry. Significant disruptions or abnormalities of the homeostatic balance within and among these mechanisms results in disease states. These mechanisms are so inter-related it is difficult, or even impossible, to impact one system without impacting the others. The MOHD strand is delivered in the first 18 months through a series of separate courses, each of which is co-directed by a basic scientist and clinician. The MOHD strand continues throughout the entire curriculum – its content integrated within the clinical clerkships.

Beginning students are often startled to discover that the proximate causes of over half of human disease lies in our environment, including our behaviors, culture and society. Interactions with a changing environment result in dynamic responses within the 6 basic mechanisms in order to try and maintain a steady state of health. Failure to maintain homeostasis leads to disease. To emphasize the critical impact of the environmental component on both health and disease another major strand in our curriculum is called Medicine and Society (MAS). This strand also has separate courses in the first 18 months as well as content embedded within clinical clerkships.

The physician or health care provider plays a critical role through the effective utilization of their professional skills in helping to maintain the health of individuals and populations. These medical professional skills as well as expected professional behaviors will be taught in a third strand of the curriculum called Clinical and Professional Skills (CAPS). As with the previous mentioned strands, it too will have separate courses in the first 18 months and ongoing content integrated during the clinical clerkships. The goal of CAPS is to provide students with the knowledge, skills and attitudes required for professional development and clinical excellence including the sense of inquiry and lifelong habits of skill acquisition, self-assessment and reflective practice. CAPS incorporates the developmental process of learning by offering sequentially more challenging experiences across the four years, repeated practice opportunities, observation and feedback, and self-directed learning and reflection.