Research CAMP: Research in Complementary and Alternative Medicine Program

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DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Clinical decision making should be based upon the best evidence available. Most often, this evidence comes from biomedical research. Thus, it is important that medical school curriculum contain the seminal scientific literature in its content, and that it teach all medical students how to critically evaluate research. The National College of Natural Medicine (NCNM) is committed to using a science-based curriculum to train naturopathic physicians and Chinese medicine practitioners. However, the current curriculum does not reinforce critical evaluation of scientific literature throughout the curriculum. In addition, most of the faculty members at NCNM have not been formally trained in critical evaluation of research, or in the conduct of biomedical research. Hence, the main goal of this project is to increase the research training content for our faculty and students. Our program has four specific aims. The first aim is to develop a research education curriculum plan and implement it in the NCNM doctoral program's curriculum-coursework and clinical experiences. We will strengthen and formalize research and EBM skills in didactic courses, then incorporate and integrate these skills throughout the program. Students will be trained to use scientific literature in formulating patient treatment strategies. The second aim is to train faculty in research content, skills, and teaching strategies. We will develop and implement two short-courses to introduce faculty to research concepts and teaching strategies. A team of "Vanguard Faculty" will be trained to assist each faculty member in the transformation of key lectures in their course. For the third aim, we will evaluate the impact of the research education initiative. We will evaluate faculty and student's knowledge and attitudes about having research in their courses. Finally, in aim four, we will disseminate Research CAM Program (R-CAMP) and collaborate with other institutions that have CAM research education initiatives. We will open enrollment in the short-courses to other CAM practitioners. In addition, we will offer content derived from our short-courses in workshops before several conferences, on DVD, or via webinar. We will also disseminate the strategy and process we use to other CAM schools who wish to implement similar programs. From these aims, we expect that future naturopathic physicians and Chinese Medicine practitioners will have an enhanced ability to critically evaluate biomedical literature, be more equipped to participate in clinical research and facilitate the integration of CAM and conventional health care delivery into a patient centered primary care approach.