Goals & Achievements

Successful achievement of this goal is demonstrated through multiple metrics including faculty evaluations of student-patient interactions on clinical rotations and standardized patient examinations, and didactic year courses such as physical diagnosis and cross cultural counseling.  Areas accessed include patient centered history taking, physical examination, clinical reasoning, communication skills and cross cultural competencies. In 2017, preceptors rated our student patient care performance at 95.5% overall. 

The CUNY School of Medicine PA Program fosters patient-centered communication skills, structural competency, and practicing evidence-based, cost-effective quality care and system-based practice.

This goal is fostered from the onset of matriculation. During the “New Student Orientation” students engage in activities focused on promoting cohort and peer respect through team building activities. Students receive and review the handbook for academic policies and procedures during orientation and policy and requirements for students in the clinical year, which document PA Program expectations for professionalism, including our dress code. Our courses (Patient Interviewing, Preventive Medicine, Cross Cultural Competencies and Health Law and Economics) reinforce student, colleague and patient professionalism and ethics. In 2017, clinical preceptor evaluations demonstrated 97.1% of students exceed expectations in the area of professionalism. 

The CUNY School of Medicine PA Program aligns with the PA Profession tenets of professionalism and ethics. From the onset of matriculation throughout the entire program curriculum, PA faculty model these tenets and reinforce our expectations about these attitudes and behaviors.

In Fall of 2017, CUNY Med PA and MD students with CUNY School of Professional Studies RN students engaged in a pilot 5 session on line workshop, “Introduction to Inter-professional Collaborative Practice”. The IPE activities focused on the importance of understanding the IPE roles of other healthcare professionals, effective team work, communication, team based care, shared patient-centered problem solving and identification of barriers to care. Through patient cases, journal reading, videos and discussion boards, students have the opportunity to engage, reflect, evaluate and enhance their interdisciplinary teamwork skills and behaviors.  

Successful achievement of this goal is further demonstrated by students being trained by MD’s, PA’s, nurses, social workers, nutritionists and epidemiologists in courses such as: History of the Profession, Preventive Medicine, Medicine, Cross- Cultural Competencies in Counseling, Clinical Medicine one, two and three and Integrative Medicine.

Practical experience with interdisciplinary teams is achieved during clinical clerkships, which are located within New York City healthcare institutions with a wide range of healthcare professionals.

Activities within the CUNY School of Medicine, such as interdisciplinary health fairs, the mini medical school and school wide social activities and wellness sessions (mindfulness and Zumba) scaffold and support interdisciplinary learning. 

The CUNY School of Medicine PA Program provides our students with interdisciplinary healthcare team experience and is explicit about the important contributions of each member of a healthcare team.