As they prepare for residency and the ultimate goal of becoming a doctor, University of Michigan medical students now have more opportunities to personalize their education and make meaningful impact in their area of interest.
The Branches — the third and fourth year of the medical student curriculum — offer learners a personalized educational phase that they can tailor with the help of advisors, mentors and coaches. Branches help give students more options to learn and grow.
The four Branches are: Diagnostics and Therapeutics, Patients and Populations, Procedure-Based Care, and Systems and Hospital-Based Care.
Progression through the Branches includes: Discovery (choosing a clinical focus and creating impactful pathway for their career), Focus (honing clinical skills and incorporating foundational science into care) and Finishing (develop into an educator/clinician who is ready for residency on Day 1).
The Office of Medical Student Education has produced a 1-page informational flyer on “Branches in the Medical School Curriculum,” and a series of brief videos on this topic, and others, that further explain important aspects of U-M’s medical education program.
The Liaison Committee on Medical Education (LCME) — the group responsible for reaccreditation of the medical school’s M.D. degree — had planned to visit in April; however, the site visit was postponed by the COVID-19 pandemic. The LCME is planning a virtual site visit for July 8-10.
To learn more about the LCME self-study and upcoming site visit: https://medicine.umich.edu/medschool/about/lcme-self-study