The Medical Education Project: An Example of Collaboration Between Parents and Professionals

Abstract

Traditional medical education has been faulted for inadequacies in the teaching of mental re-tardation and absence of information on families of children with disabilities A group of parents and physicians in Vermont collaborated on a project to improve medical students perceptions of persons with mental retardation and their families as part of a required course during the pediatric rotation of the third vear of medical school Ratings of students expectations of the capability of persons with mental retardation shifted in a positive direction on a pre, post measure Qualitative results also confirmed the value of informal, experiential interactions between students and families during the course The relation of this training to other curricular reforms and further parentprofessional collaborations are also discussed.