Using the Clinical Prevention and Population Health Curriculum Framework to Encourage Curricular Change

The Healthy People Curriculum Task Force was established in 2002 to encourage implementation of Healthy People 2010 Objective 1.7: “To increase the proportion of schools of medicine, schools of nursing and health professional training schools whose basic curriculum for healthcare providers includes the core competencies in health promotion and disease prevention.” In 2004, the Task Force published a Clinical Prevention and Population Health Curriculum Framework (“Framework”) to help each profession assess and develop more robust approaches to this content in their training.During the 6 years since the publication of the Framework, the Task Force members introduced and disseminated it to constituents, facilitated its implementation at member schools, integrated it into initiatives that would influence training across schools, and adapted and applied the Framework to meet the data needs of the Healthy People 2010 Objective 1.7. The Framework has been incorporated into initiatives that help promote curricular change, such as accreditation standards and national board examination content, and efforts to disseminate the experiences of peers, expert recommendations, and activities to monitor and update curricular content. The publication of the revised Framework and the release of Healthy People 2020 (and the associated Education for Health Framework) provide an opportunity to review the efforts of the health professions groups to advance the kind of curricular change recommended in Healthy People 2010 and Healthy People 2020 and to appreciate the many strategies required to influence health professions curricula.