Original research: programme evaluation: an anthropological look at the clerkship

Members of the Departments of Medical Education and Medicine sought to design a study that would produce an accurate, detailed description of the nine-week medicine clerkship. An anthropological research approach was adopted to develop a richly detailed, composite picture of the clerkship experience from the student's perspective. The results indicate the value of this approach under selected conditions, as discussed in the article. While it is impossible to prove a direct causal relationship, several problems identified during the study have since been alleviated.