Clinical clerkship

Clinical clerkships encompass a period of medical education in which students – medical, nursing, dental, or otherwise – practice medicine under the supervision of a health practitioner.^[1]

Medical clerkships

For medical students, clerkships occur after the basic science curriculum, and are supervised by medical specialists at a teaching hospital or medical school. Typically, certain clerkships are required to obtain the Doctor of Medicine degree or the Doctor of Osteopathic Medicine degree in the United States (e.g., internal medicine, surgery, pediatrics), while others are elective (e.g., dermatology, pathology, and neurology).

The intent of the clinical clerkship is to teach the medical student the fundamentals of clinical examination, evaluation, and care provision, and to enable the student to select the course of further study. During the clinical clerkship, the medical student will interact with real patients much as a physician does, but their evaluation and recommendations will be reviewed and approved by more senior physicians.

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