Undergraduate medical students in North America are not receiving adequate concussion education, study finds

By Claire Holmes. This article was initially published in our Concussion Update newsletter; please consider subscribing.

Dr. Nick Gardner and Dr. Neil Heron from Queen’s University Belfast published a scoping review in the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health; this review evaluates the evidence for how well medical students are taught about concussions. The goal of this article “was to thematically present all the data available on undergraduate concussion education” and propose new strategies for medical student training. Seven papers were chosen using various criteria (e.g., undergraduate population, primary research, etc.) and only included articles since 2010 to reflect current teaching patterns. “All seven papers were published in North America, with five papers recruiting medical students from single institutions (n = 590) and two papers surveying universities.” 

The review concluded that undergraduate medical students in North America are not receiving adequate concussion education. Gardner and Heron recommend that medical schools “ensure that all medical undergraduates are being provided with concussion-specific education” and present this information through “problem-based learning and clinical rotations,” especially primary care and emergency medicine rotations. 

The authors note that “Canadian medical schools have shown an upward trend in the quantity of teaching about concussion-specific teaching: from 0.57 to 2.65 [total hours during medical school] between 2012 and 2018.”

Further research could reinforce the claims made by Gardner and Heron – particularly if investigators study a broader geographical area – and provide more insight into the implementation of concussion education for medical students.