Preprofessional Studies Course Descriptions

SCPP 10101.  Medical Science from Birth to Death
(3-0-3)

First-year students only. The course will give an overview of the medical science behind the technological advances used in various clinical subspecialties, advances that raise ethical questions from the beginning to the end of life. It will provide students with an overview of the biotechnological advances that are in the news, reshaping the scientific culture of modern medicine, and challenging personal and societal human values. Fall.

SCPP 30300.  Introduction to Clinical Ethics
(3-0-3)

The focus of the course will be an examination of the advances in medicine over the last 30 years that have challenged traditional values and ethical norms, and the institutional processes and procedures in place that facilitate decision-making in the health care setting. It will include a sketch of the most recent advances in the various fields of medicine, followed by an examination of the clinical and ethical questions they raise and how they have affected the physician-patient relationship. Note: This course counts as a general elective. Fall and spring.

SCPP 30311.  Introduction to the American Health Care System
(3-0-3)

The course will begin with a short history of the American health care system and will be followed by a discussion of the major components of the system (patients, providers, payers), health insurance coverage, managed care programs, the movement for quality health care, physicians in the changing medical marketplace, health care expenditures, and academic medical centers. This course counts as a general elective. Fall and spring.

SCPP 46397.  Directed Readings - The Doctor
(V-0-V)

Permission required.  Readings focus on learning how patients, families, and healthcare professionals experience illness and healing, how the stories that patients tell become the basis for diagnosis and therapeutic response, what it's like to go through medical training and grow in identity as a physician, and the nature of the doctor-patient relationship and how it is changing. Fall and spring.  Note: This course counts as a general elective.