An interdisciplinary approach to case-based teaching: does it create patient-centered and culturally sensitive providers?

This investigation explored whether teaching a case-based seminar influenced dental students' perceptions of the importance of various factors for diagnosis and treatment planning. In addition, the effects of an interdisciplinary approach to case-based teaching were analyzed. During the winter semesters 2004 and 2005, 204 second-year dental students participated in a case-based comprehensive care seminar. The students were randomly assigned either to a section with a behavioral science instructor present or to a section without a behavioral science instructor. At the beginning and end of each semester, the students evaluated the importance of various factors for diagnosis and treatment planning in self-administered questionnaires. This seminar increased students' importance ratings of subjective oral health-related factors (such as dental fear) and diversity-related factors (such as the patient's ethnicity/race) from the beginning to the end of the semester. Students in the section with a behavioral science instructor rated the importance of behavioral and diversity-related factors higher than students in the section without the behavioral science instructor. These findings suggest that interdisciplinary, case-based teaching increased students' appreciation of the complexity of patient care and of a patient-centered, culturally sensitive approach to diagnosis and treatment planning.