A Proposal of a Student Run Clinic Medical School Elective to Improve Adherence to Postoperative Follow-Up

Patient nonadherence to healthcare follow-up appointments is an ever-growing problem leading to worsened health outcomes and increased morbidity and mortality. Social factors, namely lack of transportation, are commonly implicated as a cause for the lack of following up. Medical students make up a significant portion of the healthcare team but are mostly viewed as passive learners on clinical rotations and do not receive many active opportunities to engage in direct clinical care. Here, an elective for 4th year medical students where students operate a clinic and work alongside residents to hold virtual surgical follow-up appointments to assess for complications and monitor healing is proposed. This could potentially bypass many of the social barriers that patients face while giving students a more direct role in patient care and a focused educational experience while reducing stress on the physical healthcare clinic system.