ENHANCING CANCER EDUCATION--MEDICAL AND NURSING STUDENTS

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DESCRIPTION: (Applicant's Description) The purpose of this proposed educational project is to improve the care of persons at risk for or diagnosed with cancer by improving the skills of primary care providers. This will be accomplished by providing an innovative educational curriculum that allows medical and graduate nursing students to participate in both combined and separate learning experiences. The learning experiences will be provided as part of the required curriculum and as elective coursework and will involve both classroom and clinical experiences. Prior to development of the proposal a three part needs assessment was conducted that provided the basis for the intervention. This needs assessment included an analysis of the current curricula related to oncology and administration of an objective oncology test in both colleges, as well as a national survey of learning objectives related to palliative care. The proposed project will have four main thrusts: 1) to increase cancer prevention and detection content in the Physical Diagnosis courses for first and second year medical students and in the two core assessment courses for graduate nursing students; 2) to provide faculty enhancement activities for faculty teaching in all of these courses, such activities to include workshops and individual consultation; 3) to support medical and graduate nursing students to take two joint summer elective courses designed to increase the skills of primary care practitioners in the areas of cancer prevention/detection and symptom management during cancer treatment; and 4) to teach third year medical students how to manage symptoms in terminally ill cancer patients and how to collaborate with other health professionals by providing didactic and clinical experiences at a local hospice with nurse-preceptors. Project evaluation will include both project activities and outcomes. Each individual aspect of the project will be evaluated and the success of the innovation will be measured by use of a previously piloted Oncology Knowledge Assessment Test.