A significant new study titled Musculoskeletal Medicine: An Assessment of Attitudes and Knowledge of Medical Students at Harvard Medical School, was published in the May 2007 issue of Academic Medicine.

Harvard medical students were given the musculoskeletal medicine basic competency examination first given to Pennsylvania medical students in 2003 and subsequently given to medical students in Australia and elsewhere. Consistent with the result of these earlier exams the Harvard students failed.

The survey and exam were offered to 608 medical students during the 2005 tot 2006 academic year. There was a response rate of 74% (449 of 608).

Students rated musculoskeletal education to be of “major importance” but rated the amount of curriculum time spent on this as “poor”.
This study identifies that throughout North America medical students have inadequate preparations for understanding and clinically addressing common musculoskeletal problems that fall within the mainstream of chiropractic practice. The Bone and Joint Decade confirms this is a truly international problem.
Examination results on average were that students in all years failed to reach the passing benchmark of 70%, except for fourth year students who had taken an elective related to musculoskeletal medicine – and even they barely passed on average. The individual students passing rates on the exam, which was accepted as a “nationally validated basic competency exam in musculoskeletal medicine”, were 2% for second year students (2/98), 7% for third year students (9/129) and 26% for fourth year students (22/84).

This study identifies that throughout North America medical students have inadequate preparations for understanding and clinically addressing common musculoskeletal problems that fall within the mainstream of chiropractic practice. The Bone and Joint Decade confirms this is a truly international problem.

References:
Day CS, Yeh AC et al. (2007) Musculoskeletal Medicine