DO Clinical Rotations

[civ64]

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Hi,

I'm curious what DO clinical rotations are like. How much hands-on experience do you get? What is a typical day like in say surgery or OBGYN? And, what is the culture like? I know this might vary from program to program, but I'm curious if there are general differences between DO and MD programs.

Thanks!

 

[Elisabeth Kate]

This will depend entirely on your rotation site. You can't really make a comparison, except to say that at an MD school that has a teaching hospital, a lot of the rotations will be standardized (as in everyone will get the same experience). At a DO school, it's tougher to say. My OB rotation consisted of me, an attending, and a NP. It was great because I got to do most of the deliveries and all the gyn I wanted. But it also sucked because my attending wasn't a great teacher and there weren't any residents to learn from. Luckily, the NP was very good and she loved to teach. I learned a lot from her, even though she wasn't my preceptor.

 

[AMEHigh]

This is totally dependent on the school whether it be MD or DO.

At my school, sometimes we're on rotation with other MD students.

Once you go for interviews, you can ask them the general structure of their rotations.

 

[Dharma]

Read through the forums to get an idea of which schools tend to have better clinical education departments/rotations. Some schools have some serious issues in how they set up rotations with a wide range of variability in terms of quality even amongst one class (with some having great experiences while others end up in low volume procedurely light programs for a bulk of M3 and M4). You want consistency, not "oh I know a few people who loved it" while the majority took issue with the school. Avoid those schools that have a rep of pawning out students to locations all over the map bc they cannot handle their own and would rather rake in the government loans, without improving much along the way.

See trends in these forums regarding reputations. Odds are, if there is a common theme of complaints coming from students, it probably means there really are problems there... And you should seriously think twice about attending such places (and maybe even consider sitting out a year for greener pastures if your numbers and app will allow to do so).. The outliers who claim is not that bad are NOT the ones to listen to.

Which schools fit this description is up to you to find out. Just remember... You may be better off paying a few extra bucks to Find that solid clinical education. Years 3 and 4 matter most (bc 1 and 2 could be done from your mom's basement). Anyhow, Good luck. Happy huntings.

 

[ChrisGriffen]

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[AlbinoHawk DO]

Hi,

I'm curious what DO clinical rotations are like. How much hands-on experience do you get? What is a typical day like in say surgery or OBGYN? And, what is the culture like? I know this might vary from program to program, but I'm curious if there are general differences between DO and MD programs.

Thanks!

At my DO school we rotate with UCR, UCLA, Loma Linda and St. George's University. It's all very school dependent.

 

[Chiroptile]

Like everybody else said, it varies from school to school and from site to site.. I don't have as much experience as other posters here, just starting my third rotation on Wednesday. That said, my site offers one-on-one preceptorships. Both of my preceptors to date were MDs, and I don't see how surgery could have been any more hands on.. The first patient we had, he hands me a suture and tells me to start sewing..