M.D. Program

M.D. Program

Program Overview

The UMKC School of Medicine offers an opportunity for medical education to students who have obtained, or will soon earn, a baccalaureate degree. This program is the M.D. Program. Students interested in the M.D. Program must apply for admission between May 1 and August 1. If selected for admission, students will begin coursework in January.

Clinical Experience and Physician Interaction

Students join a group of 10 to 12 fellow medical students, called a docent team. Early and continued contact with a team of clinical physicians, known as docents, builds student capacity for clinical judgment. Docent teams include a docent, a clinical pharmacologist, a clinical medical librarian, an Education Team Coordinator and other health care professionals.

Half a day every week for three-and-a-half years, students assist with outpatient care in continuing care clinics at two of our partner hospitals. This clinical assignment provides a continuity of patient care, as well as a wealth of clinical experience, and allows students to work with full-time, hospital-based staff, including physicians, nurses and residents.

Students practice skills through the use of state-of-the art simulators that replicate the human body and human conditions.

Two months a year for the last three years, students join their full docent team for daily ward rounds called DoRo, or docent rotation.

New students are paired with a senior partner who serves as another mentor, allowing advanced students to take additional responsibility. Peer and self-evaluations are used to augment student education and training.

Research

Students have the opportunity to work with faculty in both clinical and research settings. Students involved in research have the opportunity to present their findings each spring at the annual Student Research Summit, and funding is available to support student research projects. The Office of Research Administration facilitates student research programs as well as coordinates supplemental research lectures and seminars.

Service

Students at the UMKC School of Medicine have the opportunity to develop community partnerships, provide community service and reflect upon their experiences. Students participate in service-based programs, such as the Sojourner Clinic, a free outpatient clinic developed and managed by medical students, and the Kansas City Free Eye Clinic.

Core Competencies

Our curriculum utilizes experiences with patients, peers and faculty in clinical settings that develop students who are passionate about medicine. Students learn the skills and attitudes for compassion, honesty and integrity which receive the same priority as scientific  and technical skills.

To further develop these skills and attitudes, the School of Medicine uses the following core competencies as the foundation for all educational experiences, as well as the selection of new students.

Interpersonal and communication skills are crucial to a successful doctor-patient relationship. Through immediate and ongoing patient interaction, our students learn to engage with patients, families and other members of the health care team. Our graduates are able to establish a therapeutic relationship with patients, regardless of age or cultural background, and are able to communicate in an effective manner.

It is important for both medical students and graduates to have an acute sense of professional behavior during interactions with others in clinical, academic, and co-curricular activities. Students master the professional behaviors of respect, compassion and empathy, altruism, honesty, excellence and accountability. In addition, our students are taught the value of moral reasoning and ethical judgment and learn to identify ethical issues in medicine, evaluate ethical choices, and recommend and defend those choices. Our graduates have the ability to recognize individual patient value systems, while integrating moral reasoning and ethical judgment in the care of patients without compromising their own ethical integrity.

The medical knowledge students gain during their four years of medical training allows our graduates to apply both basic and clinical science to understand, explain and solve complex, multi-system problems. Our students receive four years of outstanding clinical education that sets them apart from other medical school graduates, allowing our students greater opportunity to evaluate problems from multiple perspectives and to identify an appropriate and rational solution to address those problems. Additionally, our graduates are able to apply the knowledge, skills and concepts from all scientific perspectives to overall patient care.

By acquiring practice-based learning and improvement skills, including how to access and evaluate medical information, students learn how to provide effective up-to-date patient care. Learning how to use evidence-based medicine and skills related to patient safety and continuing quality improvement furthers students’ development into graduates competent in practice-based learning.

Through systems-based practice, our graduates are able to actively incorporate psychological, social, cultural and economic factors that influence both individual patients and communities. Our graduates have an increased awareness of the role diversity plays in the context of health care, and use this awareness to benefit patients and serve as better health advocates.

Through a variety of teaching and learning strategies, students acquire the attitudes, knowledge and skills required for patient care through time-honored data gathering methods of history-taking and the physical examination, appropriate use and interpretation of tests, identification and in some instances administration of needed procedures, formulation of diagnoses and companion management plans using clinical reasoning and problem-solving skills and provision of patient education. They learn how to care for the full range of patient problems – acute, chronic, emergent, preventative, rehabilitative – in inpatient, outpatient and continuing care settings.

Curriculum

M.D. students enter the medical program and enroll in the Human Structure Function series in January and remain in the program for 52 consecutive blocks. Three distinct curriculum plans have been devised, which allow M.D. students to proceed through the curriculum along one of three possible tracks. Two tracks provide the M.D. students with five blocks of time during which they do not formally enroll. The first track allows M.D. students to elect the five-block leave of absence immediately following completion of USMLE Step 1, and the second track provides for a five-block leave of absence midway through the clinical clerkship sequence. The third track allows M.D. students to complete their 52 blocks of continuous enrollment in December, and does not provide any break during the program other than one block of vacation time per year of enrollment.

Year 1
BMS 9296Human Structure Function I6
BMS 9297Human Structure Function II5
BMS 9298Human Structure Function III5
BMS 9311Medical Microbiology5
MEDICINE 9220Fundamentals Of Medical Practice IV5
MEDICINE 9308Clinical Practice of Medicine I3
MEDICINE 9312Pathology I: General Pathology, Genetics, and Immunology10
MEDICINE 9383Continuing Care Clinic5
MEDICINE 9385Introduction to Pharmacology2
MEDICINE 9390Clinical Correlations5
Year 2
MEDICINE 9309Clinical Practice of Medicine II5
MEDICINE 9313Pathology II: Systems-Based Pathology and Pathophysiology11
MEDICINE 9401Internal Medicine/Docent Instruction Yr 410
MEDICINE 9408Pharmacology10
MEDICINE 9471Family Medicine5
MEDICINE 9472Behavioral Science in Medicine5
MEDICINE 9482Patient, Physician, Society I2
MEDICINE 9483Continuing Care Clinic5
MEDICINE 9484Patient, Physician, Society II2
MEDICINE 9485Ambulatory Care Pharmacology2
Year 3
MEDICINE 9501Internal Medicine/Docent Instruction Yr 510
MEDICINE 9503Pediatrics Rotation10
MEDICINE 9505General Surgery Rotation10
MEDICINE 9506Obstetrics-Gynecology Rotation10
MEDICINE 9570Family Medicine Preceptorship5
MEDICINE 9571Psychiatry Rotation5
MEDICINE 9583Continuing Care Clinic5
MEDICINE 9585Prescribing for Special Populations2
Medical Humanities/Social Science Elective5
Year 4
MEDICINE 9601Internal Medicine/Docent Instruction Yr 610
MEDICINE 9678Emergency Medicine5
MEDICINE 9683Continuing Care Clinic5
MEDICINE 9685Rational and Safe Drug Prescribing2
Electives 130
Total Credits222

Student Learning Outcomes

Please click here to review the Student Learning Outcomes

 Graduation Requirements

Approval of each student’s curriculum plan is contingent on the following expectations:

  1. Continuous enrollment in the School of Medicine for 52 blocks (including four blocks vacation).

  2. Four vacation blocks (one per 13 block period) during the 52 blocks of enrollment.

  3. Successful completion of 34 blocks of UMKC School of Medicine credit for graduation.

  4. Participation in Fundamentals of Medicine IV (MED 9220) concurrent with participation in Human Structure Function.

  5. Enrollment in all required School of Medicine rotations and courses with students in Years III through VI of the six-year program including the Patient Physician Society Series and Self-Paced Pharmacology Series.

  6. All students will be required to complete a one blocks humanities/social sciences course in the last two years. Any alternative must be petitioned.

Applying for Admission

Please click here to visit the program website for information regarding:

  • Applying for Admission
  • Admission Requirements
  • Council on Selection (Admissions Committee)
  • Technical Standards
  • Costs & Financial Aid

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Please visit the M.D. Program website for additional information regarding this program: http://med.umkc.edu/md

UMKC School of Medicine
Office of Admissions, M1-103
2411 Holmes
Kansas City, MO  64108
Phone: 816-235-1870
Fax: 816-235-6579
Website: med.umkc.edu
Email: medicine@umkc.edu