Program Overview

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Four-Year Doctor of Medicine Program

The program for the four-year Doctor of Medicine (MD) degree consists of a 157-week curriculum. Many students complete the program in four calendar years. Students who matriculate into the MD program in January complete four years of instruction over a four-and-a-half year period due to the scheduling of the clinical sciences portion of the program. The program is divided into 10 terms requiring five academic years of study.

Program Structure

• The first two years cover the basic sciences and are completed on the True Blue campus in Grenada.
• Students have the option to enroll in the St. George's University of Grenada School of Medicine/ Northumbria University Program, which offers the first year of basic sciences on the campus of Northumbria University in the United Kingdom.
• The last two clinical years are completed at the University's clinical centers and affiliated hospitals in the United States, the United Kingdom, and/or Grenada.

The Basic Sciences

The first two years of the Doctor of Medicine program involve training and instruction using an integrated organ systems-based curriculum.

Year 1 of the Basic Sciences

• Focuses on clinical integration of normal structure, function, and behavior.
• Covers major organ systems, including musculoskeletal, cardiovascular, pulmonary, renal, endocrinology, reproduction, digestion and metabolism, and nervous system and behavioral sciences.

Year 2 of the Basic Sciences

• Builds a spiral element into the integrated curriculum by integrating abnormal structure, function, and behavior around the organ systems.
• Threads basic sciences knowledge, clinical skills, ethics, and health promotion throughout the second year.
• Students spiral back through the organ systems covered in Year 1, adding layers of clinical knowledge, skills, and professional behaviors during Year 2.

The Clinical Years

The St. George's University approach to clinical education provides students with the opportunity to learn medicine in some of the best and best-known hospitals in the world.

Clinical Centers

• Located in the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, and Grenada.
• Designated by the University as clinical centers, which are hospitals or groups of hospitals able to provide at least four of the five core rotations and offer sub-internships, primary care training, and elective rotations.

Clerkships

• Conform to the curriculum, course descriptions, and educational goals of St. George's University School of Medicine.
• Monitored carefully through site visits and faculty meetings.
• All core rotations and sub-internships must be taken only in those hospitals with which the University has an active, written affiliation agreement, and in which there are appropriate St. George's University clinical faculty members.

Clinical Curriculum

The third year of the four-year medical program consists of 42 weeks of core rotations.

Core Rotations

• 12 weeks of Medicine.
• 12 weeks of Surgery.
• 6 weeks each of Psychiatry, Pediatrics, and Obstetrics/Gynecology.
• These core rotations traditionally form the educational foundation for all medical students regardless of future specialty.

Additional Requirements

• Four to six weeks of family medicine.
• A four-week subinternship.
• A four-week medicine elective.
• 24-26 weeks of additional electives, in order to graduate.

Family Medicine Rotation

• Focuses on learning aspects of acute medical problems commonly seen in outpatient settings.
• Includes respiratory, cardiovascular, gastrointestinal, psychiatric, and genitourinary illnesses, as well as hypertension, diabetes, pain management, and common mild musculoskeletal injuries.

Subinternship

• Continues the educational goals and objectives of the core rotation but at a higher level of responsibility.
• Subinterns share patient responsibility and participate in regularly scheduled night and weekend calls.

Electives

• Offered at the University's Clinical Centers and affiliated hospitals.
• Additional electives are available at hospitals outside the University system, but these are subject to the review and approval of the Dean of the School of Medicine.
• Students who seek licensure in the United States should carefully note that the licensing boards of some states require that students take electives only at affiliated hospitals.