Clinical Skills is structured in a longitudinal format with Clinical Skills Educators (CSEs) for the first three terms. Clinical Skills is the essential core of "doctoring" course. In each of the courses you will learn the fundamental skills necessary to become a skilled future practicing physician. These courses are designed to provide each of you as a medical student the opportunity to build the core knowledge and skills needed for patient care. Excellent communication skills, as well as proficiency in physical diagnosis and clinical reasoning are essential to quality patient care. The Clinical Skills courses are structured to guide you through the basic foundational steps to give each of you the skills and knowledge you will need to provide patient care. The first course begins with a focus on developing your communication skills; the aspects of the medical interview are outlined and through practice sessions with Standardized Patients your proficiency in this area are developed. The next phases of Clinical Skills add the elements of a basic core physical examination along with continued medical interview training. The courses are structured in a developmental format, advancing patient communication skills as well as increasing complexity with physical examination skills and oral and written presentation skills. Each session will build on skills learned in the previous session. During Clinical Skills 1: using the Calgary-Cambridge model as an outline, students will practice effective communication techniques with standardized patients.

Clinical Skills 2 starts with the Comprehensive Core Physical Exam. Standardized patients and peers are used when appropriate for practice. Students will continue to add to their communication skills and begin to organize the approach to the patient history, and focused history for symptom clusters will be introduced. The specific comprehensive Musculoskeletal Physical Exam will be taught during this course as well as the Complete Neuro and Cardio Physical Exam. Cardiac examination on Standardized Patients learning abnormal heart sounds and practice using simulation.

At the beginning of each first session in clinical skills new organ based course, an overview will be provided by the discipline specialist of the specific physical examination and clinical findings. The course continues with an overview and practice in advanced communication skills to enhance patient-centered care. Medical students will have the opportunity to practice negotiating a treatment plan, building a mutual plan of care, sustaining structure and flow to the patient encounter, and building a physician-patient relationship. During this course in-patient experiences and written histories and physicals with problem list is added. Students will also have the opportunity to practice oral presentations.
Each organ-based course will begin with an overview given by the discipline specialist covering the specific physical examination and clinical findings. Students will complete written formal patient histories and physical examinations according to their previous assignments. At the end of this Course Component you will have a final comprehensive OSCE examination. This is a comprehensive OSCE reflective of USLME CS exam.

This one-week elective will explore decision making theories as utilized in the medical diagnostic process. Foundational readings will include "Thinking Fast and Slow" by Daniel Kahneman, PhD which reviews the Nobel Prize winning research he conducted along with Amos Tversky, PhD, in the subject of behavioral economics. Students will then read "How Doctors Think" by Jerome Groopman, MD, which will discuss how our cognitive biases affect medical decision making. These readings will explore our many unconscious errors in reasoning, the development of "prospect theory" and behavioral economics, how we understand the concept of happiness, and how the quality of the doctor patient relationship can affect diagnosis and care provided. Students will complete a guided reflection on the readings and then apply the knowledge gained through their reading and refection as they complete all cases in the Aquifer Diagnostic Excellence Series.

This one-week elective addresses the "overuse of health care resources by providing strategies for physicians to build trust and address patient attitudes and beliefs that more care is not always better care." Curriculum focuses on evidence driven recommendations surrounding screening, diagnostic studies, preventive care, the patient centered medical home model, medication management. During this elective, students will be review the concepts of High Value Care and apply knowledge gained by completing all cases in the Aquifer High Value Care series. In addition to exposure to key articles and documents in the Choosing Wisely Campaign, student will choose 3 specific High Value Care Recommendations, go back into the literature, and complete guided reflections on what they discovered about the topic and how that will impact their future care of patients.