Block Directors
Thomas A. Whitehill, MD
Brenda Bucklin, MD

Block Coordinators
Janice Frary
Suzanne Bullard

Clinical Block
As part of the SOM curriculum change, the historic third year six-week surgical clerkship and one-two week anesthesiology selective are being combined into a new eight-week Perioperative and Operative care Block. This eight-week perioperative clerkship is a focused clinical experience that introduces the student to the principles of surgery, anesthesiology, and perioperative patient care. The block will be patient-centered in that students will follow their patients from admission to discharge, through the pre-op area, the operating room, the post anesthesia care unit (PACU), critical care locations (as necessary), the surgical wards, and the outpatient clinics. The clerkship is designed to equip students with the knowledge of surgical diagnosis and perioperative management that all physicians should possess. During this experience, the student learns pre- and post-operative patient care skills and participates in surgical decision making, anesthetic procedures, and operative procedures. In the operating rooms, the student is expected to be involved in the anesthetic as well as in the surgical management of the patient. This block will be the only exposure to anesthesiology for students during the formative third year of the curriculum. As such, it is essential that they do not feel that this is a surgical clerkship with a little anesthesia “on the side”. Rather, they need to understand that anesthesia and perioperative care are central to their patient’s experience and to their own learning.

While some students may not intend on becoming surgeons, attendance in the OR is mandatory for most of the rotation. Time spent in the OR will highlight surgical and anesthetic principles and fundamental techniques which are valuable to any physician, practicing any kind of medicine. Similarly, even those students that plan on a surgical career must understand that educational, ethical, and time-related factors may limit the amount of hands-on surgery that a student performs during this clerkship. During the clerkship, students will not spend on average more than eighty hours per week in required clinical and educational activities that include, but are not limited to, formal didactic teaching, hospital rounds and activities, out-patient clinic attendance, in-house or home call, and attendance at examinations.