Description and outcomes of a baccalaureate level clinically oriented gross anatomy course

Abstract

While many universities offer some type of anatomy course at the baccalaureate level, training in clinically oriented human anatomy with a dissection component has traditionally been restricted to advanced degrees in the medical, dental, and veterinary fields. The University of Cincinnati College of Medicine (UCCOM) offers a Bachelor of Science degree in Medical Sciences to train students with a strong interest in pursuing a career in healthcare. In 2018, a human gross anatomy course was added to the curriculum that includes both lecture and lab (dissections) components and focuses on clinically relevant anatomy and medical imaging. The purpose of this study is to 1) describe the development of the course and 2) to determine if undergraduate students are able to perform at a comparable level to medical students in the content area of clinical anatomy. The latter goal was achieved by blueprinting examinations related to the limbs for the undergraduate and medical school courses at UCCOM using Bloom’s taxonomy and then comparing performance between the two groups of students. A total of 70 and 39 lecture‐examination questions for undergraduate and medical students were analyzed, respectively. Practical examinations were also considered for the limbs region.Results demonstrate that undergraduate students perform almost identically to medical students on lecture examination questions that target the first three levels of Bloom’s Taxonomy (remember, understand, and apply). Application level questions are, however, more challenging for undergraduate students as they scored ten percent lower, on average, compared to medical students. On practical examinations, undergraduate students averaged seven percent lower than medical students. Higher‐order practical examination questions are more challenging for undergraduate students as they averaged nearly 15% lower than medical students. The average discrimination index of higher‐order practical exam questions was also larger in the undergraduate course at 0.55 compared to 0.27 with medical students. Overall, these results suggest that undergraduate students have the capacity to perform at a comparative level to medical students on advanced, clinically‐relevant gross anatomy material. However, some undergraduate students may be less equipped to handle higher‐order assessment questions.