The University of Calgary Longitudinal Integrated Clerkship (UCLIC) Class of 2014 Orientation held in Pincher Creek on April 15 - 16. Eighteen students gathered to learn more about the program, and life as a rural physician.
The UCLIC is for third year medical students from the University of Calgary who are interested in rural medicine. Students will go through a 36-week community rotation in the communities of Canmore, Crowsnest Pass, Drumheller, High River, Pincher Creek, Rocky Mountain House, Sundre, Yellowknife and Taber.
The students can take the traditional route that will place them in 4 week blocks of practice in an urban setting for 36 weeks, or this program that puts them in a single placement for 36 weeks. Dr. Peter McKernan from the Crowsnest Pass has been a Preceptor with the program for the last four years and says that a few of the differences between the two modes makes a large difference. "They really bond to the community," he said, explaining that the students get to see individual patients through 9 months of treatment.
According to Dr. McKernan, everyone in the program is closely monitored with all the same testing as their urban compatriots, and "Test a higher satisfaction rating than those that take the urban program." The desire is that by exposing medical students to rural medicine more will choose to practice in rural locations, helping to solve the rural physician shortage in Alberta. McKernan was happy that the orientation was held in Pincher Creek because "It is good for both the Preceptors and the students to see the communities."
In Pincher Creek Celina Horne and Lincoln Forester will be staying for the program working in both the Pincher Creek Clinic and the hospital where Dr. Tobias Gelber and Dr. Lena Derie-Gillespie will be the Proctors for this program. This is the last program these students take before they begin their residency.
Related link:
Rural Integrated Community Clerkship
Corrected for accuracy.
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