Preparing for the Lurch into a Surgery Clerkship

Over our combined nearly 50 years as surgical educators, we have been asked many times by medical students how they should prepare for and function in a Surgery Clerkship. It is still easy for me (C.G.T.) to recall, as a medical student myself, having the same questions. While I had initially thought that the transition from college to medical school would be challenging, I quickly realized that the first few years of medical school were not as much of a transition as I had imagined. However, as the clerkship year approached for my medical school classmates and me, it was quite clear to us that we were about to enter an educational environment for which our prior years in college and medical school had likely not optimally prepared us. And, when the primary advice we were given about how we should function as medical students rotating through the clerkships was that we should "just live the life of the house officer," we realized that we had little to no idea what we were actually supposed to do once we began the clerkship year.