Tatiana Smith (E-2023)
During the patient care phase at the University of Washington school of medicine, students travel all across the WWAMI region to complete their required clerkships. As a Wyoming Track student, I was guaranteed twenty-four weeks at Wyoming clerkship sites. This allowed me to take my surgery, pediatrics, OBGYN, and outpatient internal medicine clerkships at different Wyoming hospitals. Along with gaining experience and knowledge of these different specialties, I have had the opportunity to see how Wyoming physicians practice and address different healthcare barriers for their patients. There are several differences in how medicine is practiced in larger cities as opposed to rural communities, and having the opportunity to complete rotations across the state has provided me with a better understanding of what partnerships our community hospitals have with larger surrounding areas and where our patients are most commonly referred. This has allowed me to take these factors into consideration while completing other rotations in larger areas, and contemplate how I would address these situations as a future physician practicing in Wyoming.
