![]() Stanford is committed to be a premier research-intensive medical school that improves health through leadership, collaborative discoveries, and innovation in patient care, education and research. |
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Stanford's medical curriculum
The Stanford MD curriculum integrates basic science and clinical experience with in-depth study and independent research throughout the years of medical school. Other major themes of the new curriculum include:
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Integration
- Streamlined content and optimized course sequence
- Melding of basic science and clinical concepts throughout the curriculum
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Individual Opportunities
- Blocks of unscheduled time for individual or group study, elective coursework, and research
- Option of a fifth or sixth year of study and opportunities for earning joint degrees
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Scholarly Concentrations
- Area of academic focus, or "major," designed to ground the student's education in an area of passionate interest
- Enhance student satisfaction with the study of medicine and foster a lifelong commitment to investigation and cross-disciplinary thinking
- Strengthening of doctor-patient communication and clinical skills instruction
- Broad clinical science education in the first two years with early exposure to patient care and the practice of medicine
- Early entry into clinical clerkships
- Broader emphasis on doctor-patient communication, ethics, and the art of medicine
- Educators-4-CARE (E4C)
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The Educators-4-CARE (E4C) Program was established to enhance the development of medical students as skilled and compassionate physicians. E4C provides a formal curriculum aimed to foster the development of some of our core values – Compassion, Advocacy, Responsibility, and Empathy – from the beginning and throughout medical school.
Beginning in 2008, each incoming medical student will be matched with one of our Educator-4-CARE faculty, who will serve as a teacher, mentor, and colleague for the duration of the student’s time in our School of Medicine. Each Educator-4-CARE will teach and guide 5-6 students per class year in the following ways:
- During the pre-clerkship years, precept students once per week in the Practice of Medicine (POM) course, cultivating students’ acquisition and refinement of patient communication skills, physical diagnosis, clinical reasoning, and professionalism
- During the clerkship years, continue to provide guidance for students’ bedside clinical skills and professionalism through semi-monthly “Doctoring with Care” sessions in concert with the Translating Discoveries curriculum
- Write letters of reference as requested
- Collaborate with other E4C faculty, POM course directors, and Advising Deans to assist in students’ academic and professional development
- Participate in student milestone events and celebratory gatherings
Basic and clinical sciences and scholarly work are woven together throughout all years of medical education. The barriers among these disciplines are broken down by mixing elements of investigation, basic science, and clinical practice within individualized educational blocks called scholarly concentrations.

