Integrating pathology and biology into medical education: current state and future directions

Pathology and biology are essential in the patient care. However, they suffer from a lack of attractiveness to medicine students. In order to gain insight and improve the visibility and attractiveness of these specialties, we designed a survey and submitted forms to medical students, laboratory medical staff, and clinical staff from the different hospitals and institutes attached to "Universite Paris Cite". The responses (363 students (response rate: 9.1%), 109 medical laboratory staff (25%), 61 clinical staff ( 10%)) confirmed the poor visibility of these specialties among students as well as the will of the medical laboratory staff to be more involved in the student's training. The development of partnerships between laboratories and clinical departments, which would allow medical students to spend short periods of time in related laboratories during their clinical internship, is a prospect for improving the teaching of these disciplines. The main expected benefits are to "discover a new specialty" and " to better understand the prescription of laboratory tests", which are crucial aspects for understanding the role of laboratory disciplines and their interaction with clinicians to improve patient care.