Abstract
Purpose: To design an outcome‐based curriculum in disaster medicine for undergraduate, fellowship and postgraduate level students in Canadian medical schools. Methods: Based on the results of a systematic review of peer‐reviewed journals indexed in Medline, Healthstar, ERIC, or EMBASE for courses taught in medical schools in disaster medicine, a survey of Canadian medical schools, review of reference texts, articles provided in the European Master in Disaster Medicine and content from the Disaster Medicine On‐Line Course, the authors proposed an outcome‐based disaster medicine curriculum. Results: The Canadian Medical Survey demonstrated strong consensus among all of the respondents for the undergraduate curriculum in disaster medicine. The top five topics recommended in order were: pandemic, EMS (emergency medical service) and disasters, disaster management, natural disasters and hospital disaster planning. For the fellowship curriculum in disaster medicine, there was consensus within groups and divergence between groups for the recommended topics. The top five topics recommended were: hospital disaster planning, disaster management, EMS and disasters, pandemic and natural disasters. The recommended modes of delivery in rank order were: workshop format, on‐line and didactic lectures. Conclusion: A Canadian medical school disaster medicine curriculum requires a longitudinal teaching strategy with basic concepts and terminology taught at the undergraduate level with graduated complexity at the fellowship and postgraduate levels. At all levels, the curriculum design should be outcome‐based.