The Ponce Health Sciences University School of Medicine MD program

The new curriculum is built around organ systems rather than separate science subjects. The dean says the aim is to strengthen understanding and retention by connecting classroom learning more directly with clinical practice. Science stays tied to the diagnosis, treatment and management of disease.

The school's March 2026 announcement says it will adopt a flipped classroom, which puts active learning ahead of traditional lectures. The 2026-27 attendance policy fits that model: it encourages every course to record its lectures and use class time for activities that apply the content. Those activities are also meant to give you feedback early enough to fix problems.

The same policy says PHSU does not generally require attendance at class sessions, and that in-person lectures should not be required where a course has recorded them. Course directors can still require in-person activities, such as exams, presentations, small groups, problem-based learning and laboratories. No more than five excused absences are given in one term. In the clinical years, you must take part in person in all clerkship activities.

The diagram of the new curriculum in the school's March 2026 announcement sets out six elements: medical knowledge, clinical reasoning, clinical skills, lifelong learning skills, interprofessional collaboration and professional ethics. Four linked themes sit beside them: research experience, quality improvement and patient safety, being bilingual, and telehealth and virtual care.

PHSU's sources describe both real and digital anatomy. The dean's message, on a page last updated in December 2025, says students combine a traditional cadaver lab with three-dimensional anatomical software. The MD technical standards, dated March 2024, expect you to take part in dissection of cadavers and to perform anatomical dissections.

The university's facilities pages, which cover all its locations, add 3D virtual dissections and digital anatomy tables, large screens that display the body in three dimensions.

The 2020-2023 catalog, which describes the curriculum now being replaced, said its Gross Anatomy course was taught by prosection and demonstration. In a prosection, someone else has already dissected the specimen, so you study it rather than cut it yourself. The same catalog placed the Gross Anatomy Lab in Building E on the main campus, with room for up to 17 tables.

At St. Louis, the university runs a body donor program, which gives its medical students donated bodies to learn from.

The program page places early clinical experiences in the first two years, and the curriculum announcement says clinical practice comes in from the early stages of training. A course series called Essentials of Clinical Care runs through all four pre-clerkship semesters.

Before clerkships you complete the required activities of the Introduction to Clinical Practice course, including a patient safety conference, CPR certification and safety training on universal precautions. You cannot enroll in required clerkships or clinical electives until you have done these.

On clerkships, qualified faculty supervise all patient care, and your responsibility is matched to your level of training. A list sets out the clinical experiences and procedures you need, and whether you should observe, assist or perform. You do nothing without a supervising faculty member or resident there in person, and students cannot write medical orders.

The 2026-27 Student Policy Manual says the MD is primarily graded on a Pass/Fail basis. Class rank still exists. The Registrar's Office works it out from numeric scores for your Medical Student Performance Evaluation (MSPE), the school's assessment of you for residency programs, and for graduation honors. The 2020-2023 catalog's grade table set Honors at 90 to 100, Pass at 70 to 89 and Fail at 69 and below.

To graduate you must pass all required courses, clerkships and electives, the Clinical Practice Examination, Step 1 (in three or fewer attempts) and Step 2 Clinical Knowledge (CK). You must also meet professional conduct standards. The Student Promotions Committee decides who advances.

Step 1 tests the science behind medicine and has been reported only as pass or fail since January 26, 2022. At the end of each semester you take the Comprehensive Basic Science Examination (CBSE), a readiness test from the National Board of Medical Examiners (NBME). You need a minimum CBSE score, revised each year, to be authorized for Step 1. Policy then requires you to take Step 1 by July 10 and pass it before clerkships.

You have three attempts at Step 1. If you fail, you must enroll in the Basic Science Review Course (SKD 091). You cannot spend more than a year in remedial courses or outside the regular curriculum, apart from approved medical leave. A third failure, or a year or more outside the curriculum, sends you to the Student Promotions Committee, which can consider dismissal.

Step 2 CK tests how you apply clinical knowledge to patient care. The school strongly recommends taking it by August 30 of the year you apply to residency, so your score is ready when the Electronic Residency Application Service (ERAS) opens. You need a pass by an annual deadline for PHSU to verify your rank list for the National Resident Matching Program. For a May graduation, your last chance is the last week of April.

In August 2026 the USMLE program announced a move to designated testing dates from January 2029, with Step exams offered less often each year. Its June 2026 announcement had named 2028. On the current schedule, a student entering in 2027 would sit Step 1 a few months after the switch, before clerkships start. The recommended Step 2 CK date would come the following year, also after the switch. These are projections, and the USMLE has encouraged schools to review policies tied to its exams, so PHSU's dates may change.

• Shelf exams are NBME subject exams in each clinical specialty. A minimum shelf score is required to pass third-year clerkships, and the shelf counts for 30% of the final grade. Each department sets its minimum from past PHSU results and NBME guidelines.
• If you miss the shelf minimum, you get an Incomplete and a second try at the same score. Pass, and the two attempts are averaged. Miss again, and you fail the clerkship.
• The Clinical Practice Examination (CPX) comes at the end of your first clinical year, with written feedback. If you fall short, you get guided learning during fourth-year required rotations, then a modified exam.
• The manual also names OSCEs, objective structured clinical examinations, among practical exams you may need to repeat. In an OSCE you move through timed stations, each testing one clinical task.
• If you fail one course, you remediate it in the summer on academic probation. If you fail two or more, or the same course twice, you may have to repeat courses or face dismissal.
• The program is designed for four years, with a maximum of six. You must complete at least 67% of the credits you attempt, counted cumulatively.
• You can appeal a final grade or a narrative assessment, the written evaluation of your work. You start with the course or clerkship coordinator within 30 days of the grade, then the department chair, then the Associate Dean of Medical Education, whose decision is final.
• If you are told to repeat a year or are dismissed, you have five working days to appeal in writing to the Dean of Medicine.

For Ponce students, the clinical years draw on the MD partner list on the school's Clinical Partnerships page. It covers hospitals, ambulatory clinics, migrant health clinics and VA Caribbean sites across Puerto Rico, plus two New York sites. The dean's message says students gain experience in both Puerto Rico and the mainland US.

The Clinics at PHSU is part of this. The partnerships page, under the older name PHSU Wellness Center, says it gives students hands-on experience in primary care, mental health and preventive medicine. The Clinics network runs from a main clinic in Ponce, with separate dermatology, dental and Adjuntas clinics, and hosts residency programs in dermatology, orthopedic surgery, psychiatry, rural psychiatry and rural family medicine. The Adjuntas clinic opened in 2026 with services including psychology and social work, partly staffed by Clinical Psychology practicum students.

Assignment works by group. The policy manual describes ten clerkship sequences for year 3 and nine for year 4. If your circumstances warrant a particular sequence, you can ask the Vice President of Student Affairs or the Clinical Coordinator before assignments go out. Once you have a site, you can ask the department chair to change it for a justified reason, but only to a site students are routinely assigned to for that clerkship.

St. Louis students follow the same curriculum table. The school's Clinical Partnerships page says they complete third- and fourth-year clerkships through its partnership with Mercy Health. The school's September 2026 announcement adds rotations at Humboldt Park Health, a 200-bed community hospital in Chicago, for St. Louis students from the 2029-30 academic year. A school news item on Match Day 2026 also describes a St. Louis graduate who rotated at SSM Health as well as Mercy.

• Site requests depend on whether the reason is valid and whether comparable sites are available. A reported conflict of interest with a teacher is a major reason to approve a change.
• Third-year hours: no more than 60 a week and 10 a day. Call ends by midnight, with exceptions for continuity of care, and comes no more than twice a week.
• Fourth-year hours: no more than 80 a week, averaged over four weeks. In-house call comes no more often than every third night on average and never runs past 24 hours. After 24 hours of in-house call, you get at least 14 hours free.
• Everyone gets one 24-hour period free each week, averaged over four weeks.

Electives fill much of year 4. The program page's table lists 24 weeks of electives, in blocks of 2 or 4 weeks, plus the Primary Care Selective and the unscheduled time described in Year 4. The electives policy says electives expose you to careers of interest and widen your options, and it encourages experience in more than one specialty.

Career counseling is offered at the mid-clerkship feedback session in each third-year clerkship. The PHSU-SOM Electives Manual describes the electives run by school departments at affiliated sites or by the Basic Sciences Department.

Away rotations are electives at another school. The electives policy, last reviewed in July 2023, says you will be oriented on applying to other LCME-accredited institutions through the visiting-student application service of the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC). It calls the service VSAS. Ask the school which service applies to your year. Department directors can also authorize other preceptorships, electives with an individual physician, if you give clear objectives plus the physician's CV and specialty board certification.

• You cannot do any required or elective rotation with a family member.
• You cannot do more than one elective with the same physician, unless you give a reason such as ongoing research.
• You cannot get credit for past experience, such as earlier research or clinic work.
• In the 2020-2023 catalog, off-campus electives needed approval from the department chair and the Clinical Coordination Office, and you could take at most six off-campus electives or selectives. Required rotations had to be at PHSU clinical sites or affiliated institutions.

Research at PHSU runs through the Ponce Research Institute (PRI), a nonprofit that provides the research infrastructure for its scientists. Research experience is also one of the linked themes on the new curriculum's diagram. PRI's site lists divisions including neurosciences, cancer biology, women's health, infectious diseases, clinical trials and health disparities.

PRI reports taking part in more than 275 Phase 1 to Phase 4 clinical trials, and it has a 10-year partnership with Moffitt Cancer Center in Tampa. The May 2025 PHSU-PRI conference drew 540 participants, including students. During clerkships, presenting at a conference needs permission from the clerkship director and the Vice President for Academic Affairs at least two weeks ahead.

The School of Medicine runs a PhD in Biomedical Science and a Master of Science in Medical Sciences (MSMS) as their own programs. The MSMS also acts as a safety net. If you enter in 2026 or later and leave the MD through dismissal or voluntary withdrawal in good academic standing, you may qualify to apply for it. You must have passed the pre-clinical courses within two years, and passed Step 1 or a Comprehensive Qualifying Examination, with up to three attempts.

The university's facilities pages cover all its locations. They list simulation labs, 3D virtual dissections and clinical case simulations, digital anatomy tables and libraries with print and digital collections. Student areas include lounges and kitchens. At Ponce, the library's second floor is open 24 hours a day with 72 individual study seats, and 10 small study rooms are also open around the clock. The St. Louis library is open 24 hours a day.

The 2020-2023 catalog placed the Standardized Patient and Simulation Laboratory Unit in Building O on the main campus, at 11,500 square feet. It also placed a Recording Studio for flipped-classroom material in Building E. The PHSU Academic Tower and Auditorium in Ponce hosted the May 2025 research conference. Preclinical syllabi sit on the online learning system Canvas, and clinical patient logs go in the clinical log system Med Hub.

PHSU's Counseling Centers offer free, confidential academic, personal and career counseling to enrolled students, plus crisis intervention, workshops and telemental health sessions. The model is mainly short-term, and counselors help connect you with outside providers if you need longer support.

Tutoring is also free. You can ask for it, or faculty, course directors or the Student Promotions Committee can recommend it. Tutors are advanced students approved by faculty for their proficiency in the subject.

The Language Support Program helps you build your English or Spanish for coursework, clinical rotations and research. It offers individual coaching, group workshops on grammar, public speaking and clinical communication, and bilingual peer tutors, online or on campus. St. Louis students can use it to learn Spanish.

For disability accommodations, you start with designated disability services staff and a certification from your healthcare provider, and a committee reviews each request. Examples include time and a half on in-class exams, and a 2021 policy lists clerkship order and location. You must request re-evaluation before years 3 and 4, so partner hospitals and clinical sites can prepare.

For careers, the Office of Student Affairs helps with study strategies, test-taking and residency planning. During year 3, and no later than the summer before senior year, you meet individually with the Associate Dean for Student Affairs, who writes your MSPE. Drafting starts in the May before senior year, class rank is added in August, and you can check the final version for errors before it is signed.

• Student groups include chapters of the Latino Medical Student Association and the American Medical Student Association, and specialty interest groups from cardiology to psychiatry.
• Honor societies include Alpha Omega Alpha, limited to one-sixth of each graduating class, and the Gold Humanism Honor Society.
• You arrange your own housing. The school provides information and support to help you find a place near the Ponce campus, including a Ponce Housing Marketplace and a guide to neighborhoods such as La Rambla and Centro Histórico.