Comparison of the scope of allopathic and osteopathic medical school health promotion programs for students

Purpose. To compare the number and scope of health promotion programs for s tudents in allopathic and osteopathic medical schools in the U.S. and Canad a. Design. A one-time cross-sectional survey design was applied in this study. Setting. This study was conducted in 141 accredited allopathic and 17 accre dited osteopathic medical schools. Subjects. A total of 158 representatives from the allopathic and osteopathi c medical schools participated In this study. The response rate for the sur vey was 100%. Measures. A structured telephone interview was conducted to survey represen tatives from the medical schools. The survey contained 85 multiple-choice q uestions organized into four sections: administrative characteristics, type s of institutional and health promotion program policies, participation inc entives and facilities, and type/scope of health promotion program activiti es. Chi-square analysis was used to analyze survey variables by type of med ical education and level of intervention. Results. Of the 158 medical schools, only 20% (n = 32) provided a health pr omotion program for students. Although osteopathic institutions (29.4 %) ha d a greater percentage of programs than allopathic schools (19.2 %), there was no significant difference in scope of program offerings by type of medi cal education. Allopathic programs offered exercise and nutrition/weight ma nagement significantly more often and at a higher level of intervention. La stly, allopathic programs had significantly more monetary resources availab le for programming. Following prudent research protocol, investigators shou ld be mindful of the limitations of this study. In this study, some school representatives chose not to answer personnel- and finance-related question s. Additionally, because of the self-report nature of the survey, the respo nses given to the questions may not have been accurate. Conclusion. Allopathic and osteopathic medical school health promotion prog rams for students were very similar in scope.