The Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine MD program

Each Phase 1 module contains all four curricular elements, led by Science in Medicine. Sciences such as anatomy and genetics run through the organ-system modules and return in the clinical phases. In the school's 2025 description of the cardiovascular module, you practice the heart exam on simulators, standardized patients (trained actors who portray patients) and your own clinic patients.

Health and Society looks at how individual, community, policy and system factors shape health, and each module shows how social conditions affect the diseases you study. Four threads get extra weight: digital health and data science, quality and patient safety, health equity and advocacy, and the business of medicine. Professional Development covers clinical ethics, medical humanities seminars, interprofessional teamwork and a leadership curriculum that ends with a self-assessment reviewed with a coach.

From Phase 2 the focus shifts to clinical medicine and professional development. SAM weeks continue, now preparing you for clerkships and electives, and once a month the whole class meets on a Friday afternoon to connect material across disciplines.

According to the school's undated faculty teaching page, afternoons carry most small-group work. PBL meets twice a week for two hours, 1 to 3 p.m. in M1 and 3 to 5 p.m. in M2. Clinical skills groups of four to eight students meet for two hours every week or every other week.

The same page lists Science in Medicine sessions as 50-minute lectures or 80-minute team-based learning sessions. Medical Decision-Making small groups meet about every other week in M1 (twelve sessions) and monthly in M2 (seven, mostly student-led). Hands-on ultrasound sessions of two to three hours come several times a year.

Phase 1 policies cap required activities at an average of 28 contact hours a week per module, including required pre-reading and videos but not your own study. Optional classroom sessions are recorded, so you can choose whether to attend. Sessions built on participation, or with patients or guest speakers, are compulsory, and you must attend more than half of each type of small group in a module. Exams usually fall on a module's final Friday, and you get up to five personal days a year.

In Phases 2 and 3, duty hours are capped at 80 a week averaged over four weeks, with no more than 16 consecutive hours caring for patients, plus up to 2 for handoffs. You get at least eight hours off between shifts and, on average, one day off a week. You may miss at most two days of a four- or six-week clerkship and three days of an eight-week one, and up to three days of a four-week elective for residency interviews.

Anatomy is taught inside the Phase 1 organ-system modules. A February 2022 school news article describes the approach: rather than dissecting donor bodies yourself, you mainly study prosections, specimens that have already been dissected. Teams rotate through lab stations that pair the specimens with clinical cases, medical imaging and histopathology, diseased tissue seen under the microscope.

The article also describes hands-on ultrasound and HoloAnatomy, Case Western Reserve University software that shows body structures as 3D holograms through Microsoft HoloLens 2 headsets. Students can sign up for optional dissection sessions with each organ module. In the fourth year, students preparing for surgical or procedural specialties can return to the lab to dissect, and the 2026-27 catalog lists an Advanced Clinical Anatomy elective.

Later documents mostly agree. The March 2024 anatomy-lab policy describes sessions with few students and no dissection. An archived 2025 Phase 1 page, however, says musculoskeletal anatomy was reinforced partly by dissection. Expect prosection-based teaching, with dissection as an option rather than the core method.

Donor bodies come through the Anatomical Gift Association of Illinois, which supplies all of the state's medical schools. At the end of anatomy lab, students hold an Anatomy Closing Ceremony that honors the donors with prose and music.

Clinical training begins in your first week, when you are assigned to an ECMH, a primary care practice. You help care for patients, many of them high-risk, under a faculty preceptor.

The undated admissions FAQ describes a half-day about every other week. The March 2026 graduation policy counts visits instead: 12 in Phase 1a and 12 in Phase 1b. Phase 2 has 14 plus a two-week Integrated Primary Care block, and Phase 3 has 10 from 2026-27.

ECMH sites range from Northwestern Medical Group practices in the Galter, Lavin and Arkes pavilions and city neighborhoods to community health centers such as Erie Family Health Centers. A few lie just outside the city.

Responsibility grows. Archived 2024 pages describe Phase 2 students writing their own assessments and plans, and Phase 3 students moving toward managing complex chronic patients independently. The Community Health Advocacy Initiative (CHAI) offers longitudinal, hands-on training and mentorship in community engagement and advocacy.

Assessment is competency-based, tied to eight Feinberg competencies such as patient-centered medical care. Formats include multiple-choice, oral and practical exams, evaluations from peers and nurses, and objective structured clinical examinations (OSCEs). In an OSCE you rotate through timed stations, interviewing or examining standardized patients while being scored. Your transcript shows block and clerkship grades, not individual exam results.

Phase 1 is pass/fail. Each block of two to four modules gets one grade from a composite of its assessments. Modules of four weeks or more give feedback at the midpoint, and every module has practice exams. If your block score falls below the pass mark, you agree on a study plan with faculty and can still earn a Pass by remediating within the year.

Clerkships are graded honors, high pass, pass or fail, except the longitudinal ECMH and Transition to Residency, which are pass/fail. Grades draw on faculty and resident assessments, exams, end-of-rotation OSCEs in several clerkships, professionalism and evaluations from team members. Clerkships of four weeks or more include a face-to-face midpoint meeting that reviews your clerkship log, the record of required patient encounters.

Core clerkships end with an NBME subject exam, a national multiple-choice test often called a shelf exam. The pass mark is the 10th percentile of the latest national cohort. If you fail, the clerkship stays Incomplete until you pass a retake within six months, and you earn no more than 5 points for that part of the grade. A third failure means a Fail and referral to the Student Promotions Committee.

You must pass USMLE Step 1 and Step 2 CK to graduate. Step 1, on the basic sciences behind medicine, has been reported pass/fail since January 26, 2022; Step 2 CK tests clinical knowledge. If you have not taken Step 1 by the end of the six-week consolidation block, you join an Advanced Knowledge Consolidation Module for up to six more weeks. If you fail Step 1, you can finish your current clerkship but cannot start another until you pass a retake, due within three months.

In August 2026 the USMLE program announced a move to designated testing dates from January 2029, with Step exams offered less often each year. This replaced a 2028 start announced in June 2026. Feinberg's 2027-28 calendars are not yet posted. On the current schedule, projected from the 2026-27 planners, an August 2027 entrant would take Step 1 around April 2029 and Step 2 CK by the end of August 2030, both after the change. USMLE has urged schools to review when students must test, so this timing may change.

• Your assessments collect in an electronic portfolio. You review it yearly with your college mentor in M1 to M3, and a faculty committee reviews it before clerkships and after the core clerkships. These reviews can lead to an educational support plan but stay off your transcript.

Clinical training is concentrated in Chicago, mostly at the six hospitals below, led by Northwestern Memorial Hospital, the primary teaching affiliate. Northwestern Medicine's outpatient sites across the city add clinic experience. The school says Feinberg faculty oversee you at every site and your role in each discipline stays the same.

The Jesse Brown VA, a 200-bed acute care hospital with four community outpatient clinics, can host students in all four years, and a free shuttle runs daily from campus. Stroger, a 450-bed teaching hospital at the center of Cook County Health, is one of two OB/GYN clerkship sites. The admissions office says third- and fourth-year students may choose OB/GYN and other rotations there.

The family medicine department's electives cover urban underserved and rural family medicine in Chicago and the western suburbs.

The ECMH director and clerkship directors assign sites, letting you rank preferences where possible. You travel by university shuttle, public transportation or your own car. Travel may be reimbursed, up to $40 per one-way trip, for shifts before 6 a.m. or after 9:30 p.m. (or the last VA shuttle) and for sites hard to reach by transit.

On the traditional MD you need 20 weeks of electives, including at least one four-week clinical elective. MD/MBA, MD/MPH and MD/MA students need 16 weeks, and MD-PhD students in the Medical Scientist Training Program (MSTP) need 4. Four-week electives are graded honors, pass or fail, except the Global Health elective, which is credit or no credit. Two-week selectives, short introductory rotations with no prerequisites, are credit or no credit, and up to three count toward the total.

Electives start in Phase 2, so you can try specialties early. The 2026-27 catalog runs from cardiology, radiology and pediatric subspecialties to Culinary Medicine, Medical Spanish, LGBTQ+ Health, Medical Informatics and NUvention: Medical Innovation. No more than 12 weeks may be in one discipline.

Away rotations are electives at other medical schools. Many host schools take applications through the Association of American Medical Colleges' (AAMC) Visiting Student Learning Opportunities (VSLO) system, which you can use from your Phase 2 year. Away rotations count only if you register with Feinberg at least four weeks ahead, which also puts you under the university's malpractice insurance. Feinberg students get first access to electives before visiting students.

Global health rotations need advance approval from the Associate Dean for Student Affairs and the Robert J. Havey, MD Institute for Global Health, and are generally not approved in countries with US State Department travel warnings. The institute offers structured experiences in the summer after M1 and electives in Phases 2 and 3, with travel grants available. Electives run at institutions in high- and low-income countries, including Bolivia, China, France, Germany, Japan, Mexico, Senegal and Uganda.

Phases 2 and 3 also allow flex time, unscheduled weeks for research, longitudinal requirements or residency interviews, up to 8 weeks in any 16.

Research is built in through the AOSC. In M1, sessions cover research ethics, finding a mentor and possible projects, and you write a proposal. Later you work with your mentor and a small-group faculty leader, and can take 2 to 12 weeks of research elective credit in M3 and M4.

The AOSC ends when you submit a first-author manuscript to a peer-reviewed journal, or a research thesis, by January of M4. A global health research project can count. MSTP, MD/MPH and MD/MA students are exempt, and the admissions FAQ says MD/MPH students do a public health project instead. The funded T35 program offers 8 places for 8 to 10 weeks of research in the summer after M1, in fields such as diabetes and kidney disease, and counts as the AOSC.

The Research Intensive Scholarly Emphasis (RISE) program funds a full extra research year, usually after M2 or M3, with historically 10 to 15 places. You receive the standard predoctoral stipend of about $35,000, usually shared between your mentor and the school, plus a $1,250 professional development fund. The year counts as 4 weeks of research elective credit.

The MSTP, Northwestern's MD-PhD, takes seven to eight years in three stages. You complete Phase 1 of the MD and Step 1, spend three or more years on PhD research, then return for Phases 2 and 3 with reduced clerkship requirements. You choose a thesis adviser from over 400 graduate faculty in 36 departments after three four-week lab rotations. Five MSTP colleges of about 28 students meet every Friday.

Two master's degrees can fit inside the four years through part-time evening study on the Chicago campus. The MD/MPH covers biostatistics, epidemiology, research methods, behavioral health, health equity and health communication, with a public health practice project and a thesis-style project. The MD/MA in Medical Humanities and Bioethics has eight courses, two tutorials and a capstone, with core classes one evening a week. Its usual plan is four years part-time, with a five-year full-time option.

Two more degrees add about a year; you apply in M3. For the MD/MBA with Northwestern's Kellogg School of Management, Kellogg's current page, with 2026-27 application rounds, says you enroll in the summer quarter after M3 and spend about a year on the Evanston campus. Feinberg's undated admissions FAQ instead describes a year in Kellogg's MS in Management Studies program in Chicago, then evening classes during M4. The MD/MS in Health Services and Outcomes Research is a full-time year between M3 and M4, ending in a manuscript submitted for publication.

The Outpatient Simulation facility works with more than 1,200 trainees a year, mostly Feinberg medical students, using standardized patients. It has 15 exam rooms with video recording and an observation room. There are also seminar rooms, a computer lab, a skills lab with a cardiac simulator called Harvey, and trainers for ear, breast, pelvic and male urological exams. It is part of Northwestern Simulation, the school's simulation center in McGaw Pavilion, which also has clinical and surgical simulation and virtual-reality spaces.

The anatomy-lab policy refers to the Tarry basement laboratory, where air quality has been tested during classes. The Galter Health Sciences Library provides study space and resources.

In M1 you join a college of about 20 students led by a faculty mentor, according to the undated admissions FAQ. Your mentor coaches you but does not grade you, since the school separates mentoring from assessment. A current school page describes the colleges as a social and academic community throughout medical school, and the societies as groups where students connect over shared interests.

The MSTP's mentoring page says every medical student is assigned a society with college mentors. A March 2010 school news article described four colleges per class and four societies named for historic graduates, such as Mary Thompson and Howard Ricketts; treat that old account as background. You also get an AOSC adviser and a research mentor, and in M3 you choose a clinical faculty member as your career adviser.

The academic support team offers study coaching, individual study plans, workshops and help with module exams, shelf exams and USMLE preparation. MD-PhD students and third- and fourth-year students who have finished Phase 1 serve as peer tutors. The monthly Personal Transition to the Profession course covers topics such as work-life balance and coping with mistakes, and an ombudsperson helps resolve mistreatment complaints in confidence.