To understand the current situation of health education contents as well as the differences in their requirements between clinical medical students and clinicians, and to provide reference for the optimization of health education curricula for medical students.

A stratified sampling method was adopted to select 511 medical students (303 females and 208 males) from a medical university, and the survey results of 436 clinicians (144 females and 292 males) were taken as reference. Differences in the degrees of need between clinical medical students and clinicians were compared by chi-square tests.

There were statistical differences in needs between clinical medical students and clinicians regarding drug compliance, smoking cessation intervention, balanced diet, application of Chinese traditional rehabilitation medicine, mobile health technology education, exercise rehabilitation guidance, and theory of health promotion (P<0.01). With regard to drug compliance, smoking cessation intervention, and exercise rehabilitation guidance, the proportions of clinical medical students’ needs were just 87.1%, 82.2%, and 81.2%, respectively, but for clinicians the proportions reached up to 96.3%, 93.8%, and 92.8%, respectively. Whereas, there were no statistical differences for mental stress management, chronic infectious disease health education, and acute infectious disease health education (P>0.05).

There is still a big gap between medical students and clinical doctors when it comes to the knowledge of chronic disease management and healthy lifestyles; clinical medical students have not yet realized the importance of such knowledge and skills. Therefore, the strengthening of course construction for clinical medical students is suggested.

Health education; Physicians; Students