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I think @sylvanthus did. I asked my school and they said that they wouldn't allow it, thank goodness.So maybe I'm wrong, but pretty sure my MEDICAL SCHOOL clerkships should be precepted by DOCTORS not NURSES.
Am I overreacting here? Anybody else had a similar experience?
Why stop with a single clerkship then? What is the importance of having physicians teaching future physicians?I don't think precepting a single clerkship if it was FM/IM/etc. is that crazy or bad just on virtue of them being an NP.
Why stop with a single clerkship then? What is the importance of having physicians teaching future physicians?
Yes I would rather not have a terrible preceptor but I still think it's completely inappropriate to have an np teaching medical students over a physician. You're paying to learn how to become a doctor from doctors. If you aren't learning from doctors, you need a refund because you aren't getting the full value of your education. I'm not saying that they have nothing to offer or that they can't teach but mid levels just don't have the same experiences or knowledge base and they don't perform the same functions. You don't see me teaching nurses how to do their job
I think that this is incomplete. Nobody is expecting an NP or any single preceptor to teach you how to be a doctor. Heck, I don't think most people are under the illusion that medical school teaches you to be a doctor. Education comes from educators. This isn't an apprenticeship. It is school. Thinking that the only people worthy of teaching medical students are physicians is problematic. How can you possibly judge that they have no roll because they have less experience or knowledge base, therefore they shouldn't play a roll in medical student education? There are highly competent NPs/PAs in many big hospitals. Do they take the place of a physician? No. Do they function as an extender, not a provider at their core job? Absolutely. But, can they effectively teach medical students and in some situations residents? Absolutely. Anyone that disagrees with that clearly has not spent enough time in a well functioning hospital.
The only question with regard to a student's education is can the educator teach them something that will further their education. Medical education isn't a bunch of classes that you take and you become competent. It takes years of experience and education coming from a lot of different angles to get a good education. People that fixate on the last two letters, and can't imagine a world where they have to be taught by people with less education then them are in for a rude awakening in the clinical world.
Even an NP who is capable of teaching their limited area of expertise is not qualified to assess a student's professional growth and progression. I have learned much from mid-levels, but they should never serve as a primary preceptor judging your overall performance.
Using the excuse that "other options were poor" is unacceptable. If the options are that poor, the rotation should not exist.
I think @sylvanthus did. I asked my school and they said that they wouldn't allow it, thank goodness.
You won't find any medical student here who disagrees that the clinical teaching of medical students should be led by physicians.
As with everything, it depends on the NP. There are a lot of NPs that I would prefer managing interns/medical students over certain MDs who it would otherwise fall on.
On average, your NPs are going to know a crap ton more than a new clinical medical student. Whether they went to medical school or not is largely irrelevant. Good preceptors/teachers are good preceptors/teachers. Especially when you talk about stepping into the clinical teaching realm, things are not as cut and dry as the last couple letters after your name.
Even an NP who is capable of teaching their limited area of expertise is not qualified to assess a student's professional growth and progression. I have learned much from mid-levels, but they should never serve as a primary preceptor judging your overall performance.
Using the excuse that "other options were poor" is unacceptable. If the options are that poor, the rotation should not exist.
Do you need an MD to assess whether an MSIII is performing at the level expected of him/her on a clinical rotation? Do NPs pass/fail the students at your school?
I don't disagree. Perhaps I'm misunderstanding how others are using the word "preceptor."
pre·cep·tor
(prĭ-sĕp′tər, prē′sĕp′tər)
n.
1. A teacher; an instructor.
2. An expert or specialist, such as a physician, who gives practical experience and training to a student, especially of medicine or nursing.
I'm viewing my prism through #1, while you're through #2. And that's totally fine!
So,All this is true (working as a team, etc), and I'm glad it worked out for you. However, you were short-changed in your education.
When you are on clinical rotations, you receive feedback on whether you are progressing to the standard required of a physician. The feedback that you get, both good and bad, assists you in assessing yourself and making adjustments as needed. When you spend all your time with a mid-level who "reports in" to an attending physician, you are not getting the benefit of a trained eye who can help you develop. At best, you can hope that the NP knows the attending well enough to make some kind of rough comparison of you to him. And you deserve better than that.
There are many things we can and do learn from non-physician staff. Feedback from them can be useful. However, you deserve an overall assessment of your performance, which you did not get. I'm glad that this experience was positive for you, but at the end of the day, it did not benefit you in the ways that really matter.
Agreed. People seem to think that the best evaluations only come from the attending.Completely untrue. I don't need an MD or DO degree to assess a student's ability to give a case presentation or interact with a patient in an OSCE assessment.
Do you need an MD to assess whether an MSIII is performing at the level expected of him/her on a clinical rotation? Do NPs pass/fail the students at your school?
Well now you're just being unrealistic.You're mixing up "an evaluation that helped me with my standing/scores" and "an evaluation that helped me grow as a physician."
I feel your pain with MDs who are poor teachers, poor evaluators, poor preceptors. I have had only a few (fortunately) but they were memorably painful and impacted me professionally long after I had left their service. I get the attraction of someone who is "easy" or "nice" or "friendly" when you're in the thick of the pain with horrible MD preceptors.
I don't get too worked up over mid-levels, because in my specialty, they work very well and there is minimal likelihood of the encroachment issues seen in the non-surgical and anesthesia worlds. But I do continue to believe whole-heartedly that we are different. That we have a way of thinking about medical problems that transcends diagnostic algorithms and experience, and is founded on a sense of ultimate responsibility for the outcomes our patients have. Our students, who are plunged into debt pursuing their educations, deserve the benefit of direct precepting by people who have the training and experience both guide their development and assess their progression through the lens of a fully trained and educated doctor.
When the MD teachers are bad, it's a terrible situation to deal with. But the answer is not to find nicer preceptors outside the field.
Right,Yes, my 6 years as a clinical med student and surgical resident, coupled with my 4 years of fully licensed independent general practice (supervising a couple mid-levels along the way) has left me "naive" and "ignorant." C'mon now...
None of us know what we don't know, and I think that there's an element of that operating for you right now. I hope that in 3-4 years, when you're deep in residency, you've found some mentors who serve as good models for how to think and be like a physician. Based on what you've written, you don't seem to be getting that now. I was miserable as a student, but I was never in a situation where I didn't have role models to learn from, even when they weren't nice people. I hope things get better for you.
good to know medical school is usefulAs with everything, it depends on the NP. There are a lot of NPs that I would prefer managing interns/medical students over certain MDs who it would otherwise fall on.
On average, your NPs are going to know a crap ton more than a new clinical medical student. Whether they went to medical school or not is largely irrelevant. Good preceptors/teachers are good preceptors/teachers. Especially when you talk about stepping into the clinical teaching realm, things are not as cut and dry as the last couple letters after your name.
Should NPs be doing an MD's job? No. But, I don't think medical education is solely an "MD's job". I had PhDs, PharmDs, nutritionists, MDs, DOs, PAs etc teaching me as a medical student. I learned more about how to be a good resident my intern year from our service NP than I did from any of our faculty. Did I learn any surgery from her? No. Did I learn any book knowledge? Not really, maybe a little. But, how to function in a clinical setting, even as a relatively advanced intern? Nobody was better.
Likewise, when I was an MS4 on an away rotation, there was a PA that essentially ran the minute to minute management in the SICU. I would rather have him teaching medical students than any faculty that was around for certain things. Managing every last bit of education, probably not. But, certain had a role to play.
I don't think precepting a single clerkship if it was FM/IM/etc. is that crazy or bad just on virtue of them being an NP.
good to know medical school is useful
Medical school is useful, but there are two things that are problematic.
#2 There is a crap ton to learn. You don't start learning to be a vascular surgeon from day 1 of medical school. You have to learn everything about medicine. I'm pretty sure that I learned the pediatric vaccination schedule for Step 2, Step 3, my peds rotation and my peds shelf. Something that if I were to ever need to know, I would google it because I sure as hell don't remember it now.
So how exactly do the NPs and PAs become competent enough with even less education?
I would not use the word 'competent' for most NP. They probably learn to follow algorithm. PA is legit though!So how exactly do the NPs and PAs become competent enough with even less education?
Did you tell her that she is wrong?I was precepted by an NP once early in 3rd year because the doctor was away for a couple days. She tried to teach me pathophysiology that was completely wrong. This was stuff that was super basic and even a 1st year medical student would know cold.
When the doctor got back she told me to forget anything the NP had tried to teach me. I noticed a huge difference in the thought process between the NP and the MD. It was night and day. The NP's was incredibly simplistic and formulaic. Learning from that NP would have been disastrous.
So can we just skip the extra school and do it their way? It would save us a lot of time and money.Experience.
I did but she insisted that she was right. I asked the MD later on, and the MD just rolled her eyes and told me to ignore anything that NP tried to teach me. Apparently everyone there knows this person is really incompetent but no one seems to care - which is scary. Clearly some NP schools have very poor standards.Did you tell her that she is wrong?
NP might be right when they say physicians are overeducated.😛So can we just skip the extra school and do it their way? It would save us a lot of time and money.