Curriculum

Chart Your Curricular Path

Ohio State helped forge the American medical curriculum. Recognizing students' different learning styles, Ohio State created the nation’s first Independent Study Program in 1970, developed a problem-based learning curricular pathway in 1990, and in 2002, produced an exciting hybrid curriculum that marries the best of the case-based and lecture-discussion approaches.

Impressive, but what does it mean to you?

Judy Westman with students

It means that Ohio State educators are constantly looking for innovative ways to help you become the best physician you can be -- a physician ready for the clinical side of medicine, but also with an understanding of the basic ethical, policy, cultural, business and research issues involved in medicine today.

Ohio State offers you two curriculum pathways for mastering the basic sciences: the Integrated and the Independent Study pathways. Choice of curricula allows students to self-select into the method of learning that works best for them, a special option that attracts top students from around the nation.

THE INTEGRATED PATHWAY, broken down into body systems-oriented content, fuses the basic and clinical sciences. This pre-clinical curriculum combines the proven educational methods of studentcentered active learning, small group case-based discussion, and lectures. Taught in “blocks,” each subject area includes normal histology and physiology, as well as pathophysiology, pathology, and pharmacology.

THE INDEPENDENT STUDY PATHWAY allows students to utilize highly structured objectives, resource guides, web and computer-based materials to learn on their own. The ISP curriculum is organized into interdisciplinary study units called modules, arranged by organ systems, focusing on Normal Human (healthy) the first year and Pathophysiology the second year.

You don't have to wait long before you step into the clinical setting. Beginning in your first year, you’ll spend time with a community health organization, beginning to learn how to evaluate patients – knowledge you’ll put into practice during your experience with a primary care physician. Your foray into the patient care world is a gradual process and increased as your history taking, interviewing, physical exam, and psycho-social skills mature. Ohio State’s Clinical Skills Education & Assessment Center allows you to build your clinical proficiency in a low-pressure setting that includes individuals trained to portray patient cases.