Women’s health education remains variably integrated across undergraduate medical curricula, often concentrated within endocrine and reproductive systems. For this study, women's health content was defined to include pregnancy, reproductive physiology, breast health, genetics, teratogens, and sex-specific disease patterns. To compare women's health representation across formats, we analyzed preclinical materials from Burrell College of Osteopathic Medicine (Burrell), which uses a systems-based spiral curriculum with daily synchronous and asynchronous instruction, and A.T. Still University - School of Osteopathic Medicine in Arizona (ATSU-SOMA), which employs a Case-Based Inquiry model organized around ScholarRx Bricks. Women's health content was identified across 171 Burrell sessions and 48 ATSU-SOMA Bricks. In both schools, the greatest proportion of women's health material occurred within combined endocrine–reproductive domains. At Burrell, the remaining women's health topics were distributed among breast health, genetics, and non-specific female references, whereas at ATSU-SOMA, additional women's health content appeared across nutrition, pharmacology/teratogens, genetics, autoimmune conditions, and non-specific female references. ATSU-SOMA incorporated women's health content across pregnancy and birth (25.7%), reproductive physiology (11.7%), and non-specific female references (52.3%), including epidemiologic notes about women’s higher probability of developing certain illnesses. Burrell demonstrated a different distribution, with women's health content concentrated in pregnancy and birth (65.5%), followed by breast Health (9.9%) and reproductive physiology (9.4%). Overall, women's health coverage was uneven between schools, with Burrell showing a more narrowly focused pattern and ATSU-SOMA demonstrating broader but more diffuse women's health placement across systems. These differences may reflect structural distinctions in content delivery between a systems-based spiral curriculum and a Case-Based Inquiry model. This abstract was presented at the American Physiology Summit 2026 and is only available in HTML format. There is no downloadable file or PDF version. The Physiology editorial board was not involved in the peer review process.
Somani et al. (Fri,) studied this question.