12 Tips for Including Disability Awareness within Undergraduate Medical Education Curricula

MedEdPublish (2016). 2024 Sep 18:14:32. doi: 10.12688/mep.20329.2. eCollection 2024.

Abstract

Disability is extremely common, and there is a need for high quality medical school curricula on working with persons with disabilities. The goal of disability training is to provide the proper knowledge and skills to address the unique needs of PWD, mitigate health disparities, and help shape more compassionate and informed physicians. This article presents 12 tips to incorporate disability training into undergraduate medical education. These tips emphasize the inclusion of PWD in all stages of the curriculum, interprofessional education, experiential learning, and exposure to a range of disability types. By leveraging these tips, educators will be able to create effective learning opportunities and improve the future healthcare of PWD.

Keywords: Americans with Disabilities Act; Disability awareness; Interprofessional education; Undergraduate medical education.

Grants and funding

The author(s) declared that no grants were involved in supporting this work.