{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2026,4,10]],"date-time":"2026-04-10T00:41:34Z","timestamp":1775781694849,"version":"3.50.1"},"reference-count":16,"publisher":"Springer Science and Business Media LLC","issue":"1","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2024,3,26]],"date-time":"2024-03-26T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1711411200000},"content-version":"tdm","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0"},{"start":{"date-parts":[[2024,3,26]],"date-time":"2024-03-26T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1711411200000},"content-version":"vor","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0"}],"content-domain":{"domain":["link.springer.com"],"crossmark-restriction":false},"short-container-title":["BMC Med Educ"],"abstract":"<jats:title>Abstract<\/jats:title><jats:sec>\n                <jats:title>Background<\/jats:title>\n                <jats:p>Despite the central importance of physical examination (PE) skills to patient evaluation, early trainees struggle with its correct application and interpretation. This struggle may reflect the instructional strategies of PE courses which have largely ignored the clinical reasoning necessary to accurately apply these skills. The \u201ccore\u2009+\u2009cluster\u201d (C\u2009+\u2009C) is a recent approach to teaching PE to clerkship-level medical students that combines a basic \u2018core\u2019 exam with \u2018cluster\u2019 based on the student\u2019s hypothesis about their patient\u2019s clinical presentation. Our institution developed a novel C\u2009+\u2009C curriculum to teach PE to preclinical students. We aimed to assess the impact of this new curriculum on students\u2019 clinical skills and course evaluations in comparison to the traditional \u201chead-to-toe\u201d approach we\u2019d used previously.<\/jats:p>\n              <\/jats:sec><jats:sec>\n                <jats:title>Methods<\/jats:title>\n                <jats:p>This was a retrospective study comparing two consecutive medical school cohorts exposed to the new (C\u2009+\u2009C) and prior (HTT) curricula respectively. We studied two complete cohorts of first-year medical students at our institution who matriculated in 2014 and 2015. The 2014 cohort received PE training via an HTT approach. The 2015 cohort received PE training via a C\u2009+\u2009C approach. Outcomes included performance scores on a statewide clinical performance exam (CPX) and student course evaluations.<\/jats:p>\n              <\/jats:sec><jats:sec>\n                <jats:title>Results<\/jats:title>\n                <jats:p>We found no statistically significant difference in mean CPX scores between the two cohorts. However, student course ratings were significantly higher in the C\u2009+\u2009C cohort and students rated the C\u2009+\u2009C format as highly useful in clinical encounters.<\/jats:p>\n              <\/jats:sec><jats:sec>\n                <jats:title>Conclusions<\/jats:title>\n                <jats:p>The C\u2009+\u2009C curriculum appears to be as effective a method of teaching PE to preclinical students as the HTT approach and is better received by students. We believe that this approach more appropriately reflects the way PE is used in clinical encounters and may help students with diagnostic hypothesis generation.<\/jats:p>\n              <\/jats:sec>","DOI":"10.1186\/s12909-024-05191-x","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2024,3,26]],"date-time":"2024-03-26T13:04:09Z","timestamp":1711458249000},"update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1007\/springer_crossmark_policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":2,"title":["Core and cluster or head to toe?: a comparison of two types of curricula for teaching physical examination skills to preclinical medical students"],"prefix":"10.1186","volume":"24","author":[{"given":"LilyAnne","family":"Jewett","sequence":"first","affiliation":[],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"given":"Samuel","family":"Clarke","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"given":"Erin","family":"Griffin","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"given":"Aaron","family":"Danielson","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]}],"member":"297","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2024,3,26]]},"reference":[{"issue":"4 Pt 1","key":"5191_CR1","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","first-page":"1119","DOI":"10.1164\/ajrccm.159.4.9806083","volume":"159","author":"S Mangione","year":"1999","unstructured":"Mangione S, Nieman LZ. 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All data was collected as part of normal educational practice at the UC Davis School of Medicine. This study was conducted retrospectively using existing data that was de-identified prior to being provided to the investigators. The University of California Davis Institutional Review Board Administration waived the need for informed consent to conduct this study.","order":2,"name":"Ethics","group":{"name":"EthicsHeading","label":"Ethics approval and consent to participate"}},{"value":"Not Applicable.","order":3,"name":"Ethics","group":{"name":"EthicsHeading","label":"Consent for publication"}},{"value":"The authors declare no competing interests.","order":4,"name":"Ethics","group":{"name":"EthicsHeading","label":"Competing interests"}}],"article-number":"337"}}