DOI: 10.25282/ted.1912691 ISSN: 1303-328X

Evaluating Alignment of Undergraduate Pediatric Curricula in Türkiye with the National Core Curriculum 2020

Saliha Şenel, Işıl İrem Budakoğlu, Nazmiye Çelik, Özlem Coşkun
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Objective: Medical schools should build their curricula on a strong framework of core competencies developed at the undergraduate level. Program evaluations play a key role in determining, improving, and enhancing the adequacy of planned educational programs. This study aims to assess the alignment and overlap between the undergraduate pediatric curricula of medical schools in Türkiye and the competencies and content areas defined in the National Core Curriculum for Undergraduate Medical Education 2020 (NCC-2020).Methods: This cross-sectional descriptive study included 26 medical schools in Türkiye. Data were collected electronically. In the first stage, comparison lists were developed in consultation with subject matter experts. Pediatric curriculum content from each institution was transferred into Microsoft® Excel, and alignment with NCC-2020 was evaluated using these reference lists. The filter function in Microsoft® Excel was used to organize, categorize, and analyze the data.Results: The overall alignment of the undergraduate pediatric curricula of the participating medical schools with NCC-2020 was found to be quite low (20.47%). The levels of alignment with NCC-2020’s lists of ‘Core Diseases/Clinical Problems,’ ‘Clinical Symptoms/Findings/Conditions,’ ‘Basic Medical Practices,’ and ‘Behavioral, Social, and Humanities Sciences’ were 31.69%, 15.38%, 22.60%, and 2.41%, respectively.Conclusion: The study revealed low levels of alignment between the undergraduate pediatric curricula of medical schools and the sublists of NCC-2020. Enhancing the curricula particularly in “Basic Medical Practices” and “Behavioral, Social and Humanities Sciences” and simplifying NCC-2020 with the inclusion of elective modules is recommended to improve integration into medical education.

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