Physician Training Component

Medical schools are being challenged to produce physicians capable of successfully navigating complex health care systems and coping with exponentially increasing biomedical knowledge, all in the face of diminishing resources and competing curricular priorities.

The UC College of Medicine has responded to this challenge with the development of a four-year, patient-centered curriculum that fully integrates basic clinical and scientific principles. The classical format of two years of didactics followed by two years of clinical experience has been replaced by a curriculum built on evidence-based instruction methods. For more information about the clinical curriculum, please visit the College of Medicine's Medical Education webpage. 

For more information about Cincinnati Medicine, please also visit the MD Admissions website.

To learn more about the University of Cincinnati College of Medicine from current MedCats, check out UnsCripted.  UnsCripted is a podcast by and for UC medical students with a wide range of subjects from what to do the summer before your first year in medical school, to careers in medicine.

Preclinical Years

Students join traditional medical students at the UC College of Medicine to complete the first two years of medical school. Following successful completion of basic science coursework, students prepare for the first step of the United States Medical Licensing Exam (USMLE Step 1).

In preparation for the PhD work, students also participate in lab rotations. Rotations are completed the summer before entering medical school, and the summer between M1 and M2. To further prepare for PhD training, students participate in a Biomedical Science Seminar Series (Journal Club), as well as bi-weekly meetings with faculty mentors and graduate program directors to expose students to the wide variety of research fields available at UC and Cincinnati Children's. More information can be found at Medical Student Education.

Clinical Biennium

After successfully defending the PhD thesis, students rejoin the medical school as third-year medical students. Over the next two years students will complete five required core clinical clerkships from Internal Medicine, Surgery, Pediatrics, Obstetrics and Gynecology, Family Medicine, and Neurology and Psychiatry, as well as two Acting Internships and several primary care or specialty electives. 

During the final year, students are required to complete a senior research project. The project may be in the field of medicine the student has chosen to pursue, or may be a continuation of the student’s thesis work.  

Upon graduation, students receive both an MD and a PhD, and most go on to pursue academic careers around the country.