Curriculum

Now Available: NAA Nutrition Curriculum Guide for Training Physicians

UT Southwestern's Nutrition Curriculum Guide with Web Resources

The curriculum at UT Southwestern Medical School is built upon a foundation of two years of classroom and laboratory sciences followed by two years of clinical clerkships in acute care and ambulatory care settings.   Recent revisions have focused on integrating coursework both vertically through the four years and horizontally among concurrent courses. Nutrition represents one of the threads of content being woven throughout the four years.

First Two Years	Biochemistry	Anatomy	Integrative Biology
	Pathology	Clinical Medicine
Clinical Years	Internal Medicine	Pediatrics	Obstetrics	Family Medicine
	Ambulatory Care: Internal Medicine, Family Practice or Women's Health	Selectives

First Two Years

The first two years of the curriculum include traditional lectures, as well as small group learning sessions. Psychiatry, Clinical Ethics in Medicine, Clinical Medicine, Pathology, Anatomy, Cell Biology, Medical Microbiology and Medical Neuroscience all utilize small group learning. Students learn basic concepts of nutrition in the biochemistry and pathology courses with lectures on genes and obesity, fat and water-soluble vitamins, and malnutrition. Popular diet book approaches to weight loss are assessed as students integrate principles of metabolism at the close of the biochemistry course.

The development of a Web Curriculum currently provides first and second year students with extensive materials supplemental to lectures, including test questions for self-assessment. Case-based teaching is incorporated in Clinical Medicine and Pathology in the second year. The Clinical Medicine course integrates computer presentation of case histories, laboratory tests, radiographs, and electrocardiograms with small group discussion. Case-based Pathology uses gross and microscopic images with overlays provided by computer. The case-based approaches of the Pathology and Clinical Medicine courses offer potential for incorporation of attention to nutrition.

Clinical Years

The third year students complete rotations in Internal Medicine, Surgery, Family Practice, Pediatrics, Obstetrics and Gynecology, and Psychiatry. In addition to a number of selected rotations in the fourth year, students each complete a Medicine Subinternship and an ambulatory care rotation in Internal Medicine, Family Practice or Women's Health. Computer-assisted instruction and small group discussions provide opportunities for students to apply nutrition principles in Pediatrics, Family Medicine, Obstetrics-Gynecology and Internal Medicine.