Purpose
The impact of pre-medical anatomy coursework on medical school performance remains a topic of ongoing debate. While prior exposure is often assumed to provide an academic advantage, existing evidence presents conflicting findings. This study explores whether prior anatomy coursework, including the number of courses taken or tutoring experience, influences exam performance in medical school. The findings aim to guide curriculum design and improve pre-medical advising strategies.

Methods
Data were collected from 66 medical students categorized into four groups based on the number of prior anatomy courses completed: none, one, two, three, or more. Practical exam scores were standardized to percentages (0-100) to ensure comparability with written exam scores. Group mean scores were analyzed using one-way ANOVA to determine whether prior anatomy courses significantly impacted academic performance in medical school anatomy exams.

Results
Students with one prior anatomy course achieved slightly higher mean practical scores (82.5%) than those without prior anatomy coursework (79.7%). In contrast, students with two prior courses (77.3%) and those with three or more prior courses (77.5%) exhibited lower on average scores. Similarly, written exam scores showed no consistent advantage across groups, with mean scores ranging from 88.3 to 91.0. Statistical analysis using one-way ANOVA revealed no statistically significant difference among groups for either practical exam scores (F=0.610, p=0.611) or written exam scores (F=0.202, p=0.895).

Conclusions
This study found no statistically significant advantage of prior anatomy coursework on medical school anatomy performance. Marginal differences across groups suggest that early exposure to anatomy may have limited influence. These findings underscore the ability of medical school anatomy education to accommodate students with diverse academic backgrounds effectively.