DO Medical School Rotations Comparison Question

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I've recently been accepted to some DO schools and it seems that the one of the most important thing that differentiates schools are their rotations. Since I have not started medical school yet, I'm a little unclear about how rotations work, so sorry if I come off as completely ignorant.

I am interested in matriculating into WCU-COM, they are pretty primary care based, so I am worried that the rotations will not expose me to other areas of medicine. I would like to rotate through every field, even if I am not interested in pursuing it, such as surgery; WCU's clinical rotations are as follows:

Required and Assigned Rotations Family Medicine two-month block
Emergency Medicine two-month block
General Internal Medicine two-month block
Pediatrics–Neonate two-month block
General Surgery two-month block
Osteopathic Principles and Practice one-month block
Women's Health one-month block
Clinical Medical/Surgical Subspecialty three one-month rotations

Elective Rotations
There are 4, one-month elective rotations to be selected by the student and approved by the WCU-COM Associate Dean, Clinical Sciences. These elective rotations are restricted as follows:
• One month must be a medicine elective.
• One month must be a surgical elective.
• Two months are unrestricted electives with WCU-COM approval.

I would consider Western U to be pretty non mission based and interested in producing physicians in all fields, so I will compare their rotations with WCU-COM. I won't paste it, but it is here: http://prospective.westernu.edu/osteopathic/clinical

I noticed that WesternU offers clinical rotations for: Internal Medicine Specialty, Psychiatry, and I saw that AZCOM has a geriatrics rotation that are not seen at WCU-COM.

Would I be getting these rotations if I attend WCU-COM? Also, are third year CORE rotations the same at all DO schools? I really would like to get the most comprehensive clinical rotations, even in fields that I am not currently interested in. When would you rotate thru things such as anesthesiology, neurology, gastroenterology, etc? How does WCU's rotation plan look?

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Required and Assigned Rotations Family Medicine two-month block
Emergency Medicine two-month block
General Internal Medicine two-month block
Pediatrics–Neonate two-month block
General Surgery two-month block
Osteopathic Principles and Practice one-month block
Women's Health one-month block
Clinical Medical/Surgical Subspecialty three one-month rotations

Elective Rotations
There are 4, one-month elective rotations to be selected by the student and approved by the WCU-COM Associate Dean, Clinical Sciences. These elective rotations are restricted as follows:
• One month must be a medicine elective.
• One month must be a surgical elective.
• Two months are unrestricted electives with WCU-COM approval.

I would consider Western U to be pretty non mission based and interested in producing physicians in all fields, so I will compare their rotations with WCU-COM. I won't paste it, but it is here: http://prospective.westernu.edu/osteopathic/clinical

I noticed that WesternU offers clinical rotations for: Internal Medicine Specialty, Psychiatry, and I saw that AZCOM has a geriatrics rotation that are not seen at WCU-COM.

Would I be getting these rotations if I attend WCU-COM? Also, are third year CORE rotations the same at all DO schools? I really would like to get the most comprehensive clinical rotations, even in fields that I am not currently interested in. When would you rotate thru things such as anesthesiology, neurology, gastroenterology, etc? How does WCU's rotation plan look?

I think you will find that most of the CORE rotations at most medical schools will be pretty close. However, I agree that the WCU rotation schedule has a few more primary care rotations that you would not necessarily see elsewhere do to the difficutly in finding a rotation for tons of students. So I went to LECOM and we didn't have neonate or women's health rotation or a set OPP although we got plenty in family practice. We had to do a rural/underserved and psych which I don't see on your list.

As far as your other questions:
Anesthesiology would be elective on fourth year
neurology is a subspecialty of internal medicine
gastroenterology is a subspecialty of internal medicine
similar would be cardiology, nephrology, geriatrics, ICU derm, ophtho

Trust me you will get enough rotations and may struggle to find enough subjects to fill all your electives/medical electives/selectives/

If you can get into a derm rotation; do it, very difficult to find as they are few and very popular.

I did two pathology rotation electives: one in the hospital on at the county coroner's office. I also did two rural/underserved. one in the poor inner city and one with native american clinic. I split a 4 week elective: two weeks of oncology and two weeks of radiology. I did a surgical elective in general surgern and urology. It will all fall into place and you will be well rounded. All medical school rotations are close since the goal is for you as the student to get the most exposure so you can decide what to do for your career.