Family Medicine & Community Health Elective Course Description

This elective is very flexible and guided predominantly by the student’s individual interests in preventive medicine. The elective has 2 components: one clinical and one research. While a Type C elective, the student will have many opportunities to work with clinicians in a variety of clinical areas with an eye toward the student’s interests. The overarching goal of the clinical component is to provide students with an overview of the basic principles and practice of preventive medicine and public health, and to improve students’ knowledge and skills in selected areas of clinical preventive medicine commonly encountered in primary care practice, including:

• Nutrition counseling;
• Evaluation and management of dyslipidemias; and
• Tobacco cessation.

The student will be required to do a small research project (which may build, if relevant, on their Capstone project) to develop the basic skills required to evaluate the effectiveness and quality of the delivery of preventive services in the primary care setting, including:

• Review and evaluation of evidence supporting proposed approaches to preventive services;
• Design and analysis of surveys of clinical providers and patients; and/or
• Development and presentation of recommendations for improving the quality of preventive services.