Integrating public health into medical education: Community health projects in a Primary Care Preceptorship

Physicians must integrate care of populations with the care of individual p atients to function optimally in today's health care environment. With this understanding, medical school curricula are increasingly addressing the sk ills and knowledge of public health along with those of clinical medicine. The University of Utah School of Medicine in 1997 revised its four-year cur riculum to increase the teaching of topics needed by future physicians, inc luding public health. This report describes one course in the curriculum, t he Primary Care Preceptorship (PCP), a fourth,year, six-week required rotat ion that assists students in learning about the health needs of a community along with providing primary care for its individual residents. Students i n the PCP spend approximately 60% of their time in clinical primary care an d 40% completing a community health project. In the first year of the PCP, 32 students completed projects on clinical problems, 27 on community health needs assessment, 26 on patient education, and 15 on epidemiology.