Summer Extern Program

THE PROGRAM

The Summer Externship Program is designed to offer medical students who have finished their first year of school the opportunity to experience the specialty of family medicine early in their medical education. Each year a group of students from the University of Wisconsin Medical School and the Medical College of Wisconsin receive an externship as a way of gaining career-related experience and knowledge. More than twelve hundred medical students have been introduced to an actual family medicine experience since the program's inception in 1969. Funded by the Wisconsin Academy of Family Physicians-Foundation the Externship Program has proven its value as a way to encourage men and woman to become family physicians. Statistics show that the earlier medical students are exposed to a specialty; the more likely they are to select the specialty for themselves.

THE NEED

The need for family physicians in Wisconsin continues, particularly in rural and underserved urban area of the state. There are over 50 counties and small towns or villages in Wisconsin that qualify as federally Designated Health Professional Shortage Areas. These are service areas in which the ratio of the population to the number of physicians who provide primary care is more than 2500 to one.

PROGRAM SUCCESS

The Summer Externship Program provides experience and direction to students. They consistently rate the program as exceeding expectations or as exceptional. It is clear that the program instills a positive motivation for the selection of family medicine as a career choice early in their education. The effectiveness of the Extern Program in attracting students to the specialty of family medicine has been validated by a study done on Wisconsin medical students. The study revealed that less than 12% of non-externs chose family medicine as their specialty. Conversely, 23% of extern participants chose the specialty of family medicine. The almost 2:1 ratio clearly illustrates the early influence which the program has on its participants.

HOW IT WORKS

First year medical students spend eight weeks during the summer working, and often living, with a family physician. The physicians from throughout Wisconsin who volunteer as preceptors fill the role of partner, teacher and counselor. As part of the application process, students submit a short essay on why they want to participate in the externship program. An extern review team determines an appropriate match with a preceptor/location based on the students demonstrated understanding of program goals, interest in family medicine and appropriate match with the preceptor. Pre-funded rural and underserved sites receive primary placement in order to assure that the sites receive an extern.

The students work side by side with their preceptors gaining first hand experience in family medicine and learning the breadth of knowledge that is required of a family physician. This also provides the student with an example of a family physician's relationships with his/her patients, colleagues, community and family. Each extern receives a stipend. The stipend amount is dependent upon whether the externship is served in an urban or rural location.

Externship preceptors have proven their effectiveness in encouraging young men and women to become family physicians. A thorough program evaluation is conducted annually where both students and physician preceptors are surveyed. Many students have acknowledged acquiring a sense of direction after having been a part of the program.

Contact with the externs is maintained throughout their education with mentor programs which help to track their specialty choice and further sustain encouragement of a career in family medicine.

THE GOALS

• To provide first-year medical students with a means by which they can gain practical experience, indispensable preparation, and a rich appreciation of family medicine.
• To equip students with the confidence needed for the delivery of quality health care.
• To offer students a positive role model relationship which can provide an early and lasting influence on their medical career.
• To begin to develop the total physician by providing a means by which the student can integrate their academic training with actual patient care.
• To give primary care physicians the opportunity to teach and to better understand today's medical students, and their attitudes and perceptions of family medicine.
• To give the student an opportunity to experience life as a family physician in a specific community or family medicine setting.

SPECIAL ARRANGEMENT POLICY

The “official” summer extern program though the Academy will consist of the preceptors recruited, funding sources secured and students matched at each school. Requests for externships students, preceptors and funding sources outside this process will not be included in the summer extern program. The Academy will attempt to help facilitate placement or advertisement of the opportunity but will not administer any funding or make available any “official” preceptors. Such opportunities will not be considered part of the WAFP summer extern program.