title: Health Policy and Advocacy for New Mexico Medical Students in the Family Medicine Clerkship.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  Learners in medical education are often inadequately prepared to address the underlying social determinants of health and disease. The objective of this article is to describe the development, implementation, and evaluation of a Health Policy and Advocacy curriculum incorporated into our family medicine clerkship.
  
  
  METHODS
  We developed a Health Policy and Advocacy course for medical students within our family medicine clerkship. We evaluated the curriculum using a survey of our own design administered to students before and after their clerkship year. We created a mean score for each subscale that measured (1) physician's role, (2) knowledge, and (3) confidence in ability and calculated differences between the pre-survey and the post-survey scores for four medical school classes. We also conducted a focus group to get student input on the new curriculum.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Mean scores on the pre- and post-surveys were highest for the subscale regarding attitudes about a physician's role in health policy and advocacy and did not change over time. Scores for self-reported knowledge and confidence in abilities increased significantly from the beginning to the end of the clerkship year. Students were generally positive about the curriculum but had some concerns about finding time for advocacy in their future practices.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Training in health care policy and advocacy can be successfully implemented into a medical school curriculum with positive outcomes in students' self-reported knowledge and confidence in their abilities. Work remains on providing advocacy role models for students.
authors.affiliation: Department of Family and Community Medicine, University of New Mexico.
authors.forename: Martha
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Cole McGrew
authors.forename: Sharon
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Wayne
authors.forename: Brian
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Solan
authors.forename: Tiffany
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Snyder
authors.forename: Cheryl
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Ferguson
authors.forename: Summers
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Kalishman
mesh_terms: D001291:Attitude of Health Personnel; D002982:Clinical Clerkship / Q000458:organization & administration*; D003479:Curriculum; D005194:Family Practice / Q000193:education*; D005260:Female; D006291:Health Policy; D006801:Humans; D019359:Knowledge; D008297:Male; D009516:New Mexico; D010819:Physician's Role; D013337:Students, Medical / Q000523:psychology*