Teaching Clinical Pharmacology

Over the past few years the teaching of Pharmacology and Clinical Pharmacology has taken a backseat in most medical schools. The oft given reason is the complexity of the subject overwhelming the undergraduate student, and the limited knowledge requirements of a fresh Physician - 'a Physician doesn't need to know everything about every drug'. This is a reductionist approach which reduces the entire process of therapeutics and prescribing to matching the names of disease with recommended drugs! Many of these recommendations to reduce the load of Pharmacology on medical students come from senior Physicians who simply ignore the fact that their own expertise is built brick by brick over decades. They may not remember the basics of a particular process or drug but every small bit of knowledge adds to the expertise we build up over our entire careers.

Younger physicians are usually overwhelmed by the amount of information they are expected to remember. The availability of digital point of care educational and prescribing resources has definitely helped in the prescribing process. This ease though comes at a cost. For most Physicians understanding the reason behind a prescription decision has always been of paramount importance. We always question - Why are we doing this and not that? Point of care resources provide hundreds of references for their recommendations, but do we ever go back and read those references? We place an implicit trust in these recommendations. And they mostly feel right to us. If something is misplaced, we tend to sense it. This comes from our training and experience. Lack of either is detrimental. Cutting down on the teaching of Clinical Pharmacology will handicap the Physicians in the long run. It has been said, sarcastically, that Physicians are now just providers of medicines, which have been made by a company and recommended by a professional organization. This reduces the Physician to nothing more than a licensed prescriber. Physicians are foremost, academics and scientists who work to alleviate suffering. To try to reduce the academic training to simplify training for the profession is to undo the centuries of hard earned respect and reputation.