Course Description
This is the core internal medicine clerkship which serves as a prerequisite for most other medicine courses and clerkships. Students participate in the care of both hospitalized and ambulatory patients, refine their skills of history-taking and physical examinations and to learn to care for a variety of illnesses. Daily rounds and conferences are held. A final examination for this course is given on the last day of the clerkship, and consists of multiple choice questions and computerized patient management problems.
Format
The clerkship is 12 weeks in length. Medical students at most sites have three four-week blocks—two inpatient and one outpatient. Most Seattle-based students rotate to a combination of two sites over the 12 weeks. Some sample site combinations are listed below. Students going to WWAMI sites will generally spend 4-6 weeks in Seattle and 6-8 weeks at their WWAMI site.
The course is designed with 1/3 of the experience in the ambulatory setting. This may be concurrent with the inpatient experience, at most WWAMI sites, or it may be as a separate 4-week ambulatory block. For those with four weeks of ambulatory medicine, students have 10 to 12 sessions as primary care providers, in which they are involved in diagnosis and management of patients. Students work up three or four primary care patients each week. With an additional six to eight ongoing patients, students are exposed to about 10 to 14 outpatients each week.
Sites include hospitals and clinics in Anchorage AK, Billings MT, Boise ID, Jackson WY, Missoula MT, Montesano WA, Seattle WA, Sheridan WY, Spokane WA, Wenatchee WA, and WRITE sites.