Goals

General Goals

The overall goal of this clerkship is to provide the environment needed to have you develop into a humane, sympathetic, knowledgeable and sophisticated physician. Further, our aim is to teach you to apply the background in pathophysiology you acquired in the pre-clinical years to the diagnosis and management of surgical patients.

Specific Goals

Toward this end, the faculty will expect that you will learn to:

Obtain a complete history and perform an accurate physical examination in approximately one hour.

Formulate a differential diagnosis after obtaining a history and examining a patient.

Devise a scheme of reasonable and appropriate laboratory and other diagnostic tests leading to the establishment of a diagnosis; become familiar with the availability, cost, and limitations of laboratory and other diagnostic procedures.

Formulate a plan of therapeutic management for the patient; if surgical procedures are included in the plan, be familiar with the risks and alternatives.

Be able to represent the clinical information to others in a coherent, succinct manner.

Acquire and expand on a core of surgical knowledge, including developing an awareness of sources of information, their limitations and scientific merit.

Develop a sophisticated clinical judgment, applying your knowledge of pathophysiology to clinical surgery.

Learn to interact and deal with professional and nonprofessional personnel, patients and their families encompassing social, ethical, psychological and medical aspects of such interactions.