Beyond Flexner: Medical Education in the Twentieth Century

by Barbara M Barzansky, Norman Gevitz

For decades, educators, historians, and social commentators accorded major responsibility for the reform of medical education in the United States to the Flexner Report of 1910. More recently, historians have begun to challenge the impact of the Report and the desirability of the changes attributed to it. This volume takes the themes articulated in the Report and traces their development. With each theme being discussed by a specialist in the subject area, the book provides a comprehensive review of medical education in the twentieth century.



These themes, many of which have not been discussed in other books, include the basic sciences, the clinical curriculum, women in medicine, black medical education, and sectarian medical education. In addition, the volume includes chapters on the evolution of the health care delivery system, trends in financing medical education, the use of outpatient settings for clinical education, the current status of the medical curriculum and needed changes, and health manpower needs. The work concludes with a chapter discussing the current proposals for change and how they relate to the problems and reforms of the Flexner era. The work will be of interest to medical school administrators, policy makers, and faculty members as well as to practicing physicians.

264 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 22, 1992

Reviews

[Sydney Robertson · Rating 4 out of 5]

This edited collection calls into question the many different faces of Abraham Flexner's treatment of American medical education. I appreciate the way in which this collection both reinforces and complicates the emphasis on science-based education in a career field that is fundamentally humans helping humans.

A great secondary source to explain the multi-faceted implications of a primary source.