An integrated course in occupational medicine. A proposed teaching program based on the new organization of the degree course in medicine and surgery]

The curriculum of Italian Medical School of the Faculty of Medicine has been recently renewed at a national level. Considering the numerous innovations introduced, a new role has been attributed to the teaching of occupational health, particularly occupational medicine. Occupational Medicine is usually regarded as a part of community medicine and, despite the fact that occupational disease may be in decline in industrially developed countries, the increasing concern regarding environmental pollution related health effects, stress the relevance of the methodologies already formulated within the occupational health disciplines. Of all environmental factors, occupational medicine has contributed largely to the knowledge about the health effects of occupation and its role in the complex problem at work related to today's medical students as a way of introducing the appreciation of worldwide environmental effects and how to measure, monitor and modify them. In this article the content of the occupational health course is revised and according to the principles of modern medical pedagogy, the teaching is divided in primary and secondary objectives and organized to the resolution of real problems. The importance of the relevant evidences of clinical occupational medicine is discussed and their insertion into other clinical disciplines is proposed. The knowledge of distribution, recognition, management and prevention of the major occupational diseases is a final target of the teaching. The introduction of innovative teaching methods such as factory visits, case history discussion or role playing exercises is suggested as an integrated, multidisciplinary approach able to promote the preventive attitude of students. The efficacy of the teaching has to be evaluated with appropriate methods every time, to verify both informative and formative aspects.