Tufts University (School of Medicine)

Today a physician must be master of many universes-- at ease in the sub-cellular realms of our DNA and in a community clinic; facile with computerized virtual reality and with the fiscal realities of managed care. The medical professionhas come a long way from the healing arts debated by Aristotle and Plato. Now it is ground through the mill of public opinion in the top daily newspapers, in best-selling novels and in movies and on television. As the mystique surrounding the noble profession has faded, the mission before today's healers has become increasingly complex and demanding.

What kind of education can prepare the doctors of tomorrow for this rugged terrain? Tufts University School of Medicine and the Sackler School of Graduate Biomedical Sciences offer the scientific rigor and the range of curricula and programs demanded by an environment of radically changed health care and research.

For more than one hundred years, Tufts University School of Medicine has been a national leader in medical education. Today, it continues to offer one of the most substantive and innovative medical curricula in the country, including training in business, communication, public health and technology.

Through the years, Tufts University School of Medicine has created many innovative and influential programs in medical education. For example, TUSM was a pioneer in combining traditional teaching methods with Problem-Based Learning , which focuses on self-directed learning and the development of active inquiry and critical reasoning skills. We also have developed a unique cadre of combined-degree programs by which students can attain an MD/PhD; MD/MPH; MD/MBA in Health Management; MD/MALD with the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy, or a BS/MS/MD in Bioengineering through collaboration with Tufts College of Engineering. In addition, we have established a Center for Learning whose goals are to promote quality and consistency for all TUSM educational activities; to provide a center of excellence that will unite and strengthen the Tufts teaching enterprise; and to act as a catalyst for curricular innovation, evaluation and research at all levels of medical training.

The mission of Tufts University School of Medicine is to promote human health. We will fulfill our mission by emphasizing rigorous fundamentals while stimulating innovation as we: educate, in a dynamic learning environment, physicians, scientists, and public health professionals to become leaders in their fields; contribute to the advancement of the sciences basic to medicine through discovery, research, scholarship, and communication, and join with our partner institutions to provide the best care to our patients and communities.

The Tufts University School of Medicine is located in five adjoining research buildings and a teaching and administrative building, the Arthur M. Sackler Center for Health Communications. The newest addition is the $65 million Jaharis Family Center for Biomedical and Nutrition Sciences. Opening ceremonies for the nine story, 180,000 sq. ft. building were held on November 1, 2002.

The School's main entrance is at 145 Harrison Avenue in downtown Boston. These buildings contain the classrooms, laboratories, offices, and research facilities of the basic sciences departments and some of the clinical faculty, as well as the offices of the medical school administration and corollary services. Posner Hall, one block away on Harrison Avenue, is a combined residential and educational facility.

The medical school campus shares a downtown neighborhood with the Tufts-New England Medical Center, Boston's Asian-American community, and Boston's theater district. Historic Boston Common and Beacon Hill are within easy walking distance. A limited number of dormitory style rooms are available in Posner Hall. However, most students prefer to live in apartments in and around greater Boston. An efficient public transportation system connects the greater Boston area and its environs.

Tufts is affiliated with a diverse group of teaching hospitals across Massachusetts and one in Maine. Included among these are our major academic affiliates: Baystate Medical Center; Caritas St. Elizabeth's Medical Center; Faulkner Hospital, Lahey Clinic; Newton-Wellesley Hospital; and Tufts-New England Medical Center.

Tufts University School of Medicine (TUSM) offers a “liberal arts of medicine” curriculum, where students receive an outstanding core education and are well prepared to enter any field of medicine –whether it is research, primary care, academic medicine, or specialty care, and where the primacy of compassionate care and the importance of community service is balanced by the teamwork and lifelong learning skills necessary for today’s medical practice.

Recognized as a leader in curricular innovation and known for clinical teaching excellence, TUSM offers a highly supportive, student-centered learning community comprised of teaching faculty who are accessible from the classroom to the clinic and an administration that is open and responsive to student needs.

The TUSM “hybrid” curriculum uses a full array of teaching methods best suited to achieve specific educational goals of the four-year curriculum, including interactive lectures, small groups, labs, standardized patient exercises, and extensive on-line resources such as TUSK. Curricular themes such as evidence-based medicine, genetics, and geriatrics and broad-based topics such as ethics, professionalism, and communication skills are woven throughout. Course content is well integrated within each academic year (horizontal integration) and across the four years (vertical integration), featuring extensive clinical correlation with the basic sciences. Courses and programs such as Interviewing and Selectives provide students with clinical experiences beginning from the first semester of medical school. TUSM’s long-standing Problem-Based Learning program (PBL) is coordinated with the preclinical coursework and provides the foundation for team-learning, evidence-based medicine, critical thinking, problem-solving, and lifelong learning.

Teaching faculty are active participants in the systematic approach to curriculum review. Faculty receive ongoing course feedback through student representatives, evaluation summary reports, and peer feedback through the comprehensive review process conducted by the Curriculum Committee.

Course and clerkship directors review and revise evaluation instruments annually to ensure that the instruments adequately assess the overall quality and effectiveness of the course or clerkship, particularly specific changes or initiatives that were introduced during the academic year.

TUSM offers a four year curriculum leading to the degree of doctor of medicine as well as several combined degree programs: MD/MPH, MD/PhD, the MD/MS in engineering, a joint program with the School of Engineering, an MD/MBA in Health Management in collaboration with Northeastern University, Boston and Brandeis University, and a MD/MALD with the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy. The School of Medicine also offers three free–standing programs: a master of public health degree offered in collaboration with the School of Arts and Sciences and the Gerald J. and Dorothy R. Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy and has four tracks that include: a Bachelors/MPH offered with the School of Arts and Sciences, a JD/MPH offered in collaboration with Northeastern University School of Law, a MS in Nutrition/MPH offered with the Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy, and DVM/MPH offered with the School of Veterinary Medicine. The school also offers as a master of science in health communication and a master of science in pain research, education and policy in collaboration with the Health Institute/NEMC. In fall 2004, TUSM enrolled approximately 700 full-time students in first professional degree programs (MD, MD/PhD, MD/MBA, MD/MALD, and MD/MS) and approximately 40 full-time students in graduate degree programs (MS and MPH).

Each student who comes to Tufts University School of Medicine has his or her own reason for attending medical school. It may be that you are good in science, it sounds exciting, your uncle is a physician, you want to help people, you want a career of lifelong learning, research, or teaching.

At Tufts, we take the mission of teaching seriously. We are constantly seeking ways to improve and keep current what we offer students; expand clinical opportunities; integrate clinical and basic science classes, emphasize critical thinking, teamwork, and compassionate care; address the impact of managed care; and broaden career options through a unique variety of special combined degree programs. We also take seriously the students we teach, providing them the individual attention not only to survive but thrive in medical school, by creating a supportive, noncompetitive atmosphere for learning.

Tufts' innovative, multimedia TUSK provides extremely accessible, interactive computer-aided instruction in ways never before seen in medical schools, and it is just one example of Tufts' responsive medical curriculum that emphasizes cross-course integration of material, problem solving and clinical correlations and applications. Other areas of the Tufts curriculum that are the result of a constant striving to meet students' needs include:

* Five combined-degree programs, offering an M.D. and a second degree
* An integrated curriculum
* Problem-based learning which emphasizes critical thinking
* Clinical education in an extensive and diverse network of health care sites
* A comprehensive student and peer course evaluation process that is used continually to improve curriculum and teaching
* An emphasis on teamwork, not competition

Medical education at Tufts would not be complete without its vital--and growing--research community. Faculties from Tufts' Sackler School of Graduate Biomedical Sciences, as well as clinical faculty, have earned international attention and respect in their fields. But Tufts Medicine also is known, especially among biomedical scientists, for fostering an atmosphere of collegiality and collaboration across specialties and even across institutions.

Last, but not least, Boston has a symphony, a Pops orchestra, ballet, professional sports, an aquarium, history, parks, museums, a zoo, and incredible restaurants, and there are more students per square mile than probably any city on earth.

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School of Medicine Medical School Location

School of Medicine Courses

Tufts Medical School offers a unique opportunity for students to supplement their core curriculum by sampling a wide range of experiences starting in their first semester. Traditionally, during a student's first and second year, there is little exposure to various clinical venues. Through the Selective Program, students can select from a broad spectrum of various disciplines and practice settings to gain an early introduction to clinically-based medicine and related areas. Past years' students have found the Selective Program an invaluable means by which to partner with faculty role models and advisors and to identify possible future career paths.

All medical students are required to participate in the Selective Program during their first two years of medical school. The main goal of the Selective Program is to expose students to areas beyond the basic medical school curriculum. Participation in four selectives is mandatory; one of the four selectives must be a Community Service Learning (CSL) selective. Students are assigned selectives by means of a lottery system consisting of assigned lottery numbers for all blocks and a form that students complete prior to each block-choice deadline. This form allows students to rank-order their choices for selectives from the Selectives Catalog. To help students make their selective choices, evaluations of past selectives are made available for students to review in the Office of Educational Affairs (OEA).

Each selective block is equal to one selective credit.

Continuation of a selective for a second block is not encouraged and will only be granted under exceptional circumstances. First, the Selective Director must approve the request two (2) weeks in advance of the lottery deadline. Approval by the Selective Program Director will depend on how students describe what additional benefit they seek to attain and/or how the continued selective will complement what they have already learned along with a signature of the Selective Preceptor.

No retroactive credit for Selectives will be granted. The Selective Course Director prior to beginning your participation in the experience must approve all selectives. Your application for continuation of a selective must be approved 2 weeks before the lottery deadline.

YEAR 1 COURSES :

- Epidemiology/Biostatistics
- Cell Tissue and Organ Biology
- Molecular Biology
- Immunology Nutrition
- Biochemistry
- Interviewing
- Problem Based Learning
- Selectives
- Clinical Anatomy
- Physiology
- Human Growth and Development
- Physical Diagnosis I: Clinical Skills
- General Pathology
- Problem Based Learning
- Selectives

YEAR 2 COURSES :

- Introduction to Pharmacology
- Hematology/Oncology
- Medical Genetics
- Neuroscience
- Population Medicine-Part I
- Pathophysiology (Musculoskeletal)
- Psychopathology
- Microbiology
- Systemic Pathology (Musculoskeletal)
- Addiction Medicine
- Problem Based Learning
- Selectives
- Systemic Path
- Pathophys
- Pathophysiology
- Pharmacology
- Population Medicine
- Physical Diagnosis II
- Evidence Based Medicine
- Selectives

YEAR 3 COURSES :

- Medicine Clerkship
- Surgery Clerkship
- Obstetrics/Gynecology Clerkship
- Pediatric Clerkship
- Psychiatry Clerkship
- Fall Interclerkship
- Spring Interclerkship

YEAR 4 COURSES :

- Family Medicine
- Neurology
- Ward Service
- Other Electives

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