Lately, integrating liberal arts and basic medicine is being discussed in various fields. The discussion stresses the shift from the teaching method that attempts to stuff students with knowledge, as many of us have hitherto done, to the one that teaches students important principles repeatedly and encourages them to learn voluntarily, so-called active learning. The shift from passive learning to active learning directs us to a new medical education where students are required not just to acquire knowledge (I know xxx) but also to perform based on the knowledge (I can do xxx). In addition, medical schools are to follow the model core curriculum, which was revised in 2017. Taking into consideration the changes in international public health and medical systems, it notes that the medical school curriculum should train students to have practical clinical abilities with which they respond to citizens' needs for ethics, medical safety, team medical care, regional inclusive care system, healthy longevity society, etc. While medical schools are expected to make such a transformation from the traditional approach, they need to meet the international certification standards, which require students to engage in clinical practice for at least 1/3 of their six-year medical education. It is not an exaggeration to say that it is impossible for us to continue traditional lecture-style classes covering the same contents of liberal arts and basic medicine. Instead, we should actively integrate the curriculum.
Pharmacology is a broad science (1) representing a comprehensive summary of anatomy, physiology, and biochemistry from a viewpoint of the action mechanism of drugs, on one hand, and (2) relating various clinical practices from a viewpoint of therapeutic drugs for different diseases in clinical medicine, on the other. Benefiting from the contents of (1) and (2), it can and should integrate well with other fields of study in the curriculum.