Medical schools now sell credentials, not knowledge, scholars argue

Gone are the days when rigor in medical school weeded out the weakest links. When it comes to med schools today, credentials are the commodity, students are the consumers.

Michigan State University physiology professor Stephen DiCarlo and research assistant Heidi Lujan recently wrote in Advances in Physiology Education that administrators and students are both “increasingly considering preclinical medical education as a market.”

“Preclinical medical education has lost its way,” they wrote. “In fact, it seems that preclinical medical education has forgotten its mission and has become focused on assembly line efficiency and profits.”