Undergraduate Program Report

Summer is here, pre-clerkship classes have wrapped up, 3rd year clerks are looking ahead to electives and CaRMS, and the 4th years have graduated and are waiting with excitement to start residency July 1st!

A sincere thank-you to all faculty who have participated in Undergraduate education activities during the 2020-21 academic year! The pre-clerkship years have seen a new curriculum implemented the past 2 years with a greater focus on generalism. Clerkship has been renewed and now includes 8 weeks total of Family Medicine – 4 weeks of “FM core” at one of the six full-time academic centres and 4 weeks of “FM Plus” based in community and rural/regional sites.

As we build on our success and look ahead to the 2021-22 academic year, below are a few updates and reminders:

  • Pre-clerkship is anticipated to be delivered using a hybrid in-person and virtual (synchronous and asynchronous) model. Small groups, clinical skills, and anatomy lab learning, longitudinal clinical experience, research and quality improvement projects are expected to be in-person. Large group learning is planned for virtual delivery.
  • 4th year electives will all be “home-based” electives with no visiting electives from other schools. Please make every effort to accommodate requests for fall 4th year electives and promote Western’s program and family medicine as a career.
  • Requests to take on 1st and 2nd year students for the Longitudinal Clinical Elective (LCE) will start over the summer. The anticipated start date is January 2022. The LCE is a flagship course in the pre-clerkship program and a great opportunity to expose all medical students to family medicine and the importance of generalism.

I would also like to extend a HUGE thank-you to Michele Vanderspank, the Undergraduate program coordinator, who has the gargantuan task to organize preceptors and schedule all the medical students into clerkship, electives, LCE, clinical methods, etc. Michele will be going on a maternity leave in August – we wish her all the best and can’t wait for her to return!

Wishing everyone a safe and happy summer – Scott McKay, Undergraduate Education Director, smckay28@uwo.ca.