The University of North Dakota School of Medicine and Health Sciences MD program

Phase 1 has eight units. Units 1 and 2 cover cells, genetics, tissues and metabolism, and Units 3 to 8 each take a group of body systems, ending with the endocrine and reproductive systems. Every unit pairs basic sciences, such as anatomy, histology, physiology, pathology and pharmacology, with clinical sciences, such as history taking, examination, ethics and clinical reasoning.

Three longitudinal threads, Medicine and Society, Pharmacology and Therapeutics, and Research Methods and Practices, are built into every organ-system unit. Topics such as social determinants of health, cultural competency and care across the lifespan recur in the clinical science strands of several units.

Once clerkships start, teaching moves to hospitals and clinics, with rounds, conferences and lectures around your patient work. Two required digital badges, in interprofessional collaboration and telehealth, are earned across all three phases and appear in the Medical Student Performance Evaluation (MSPE), the dean's letter that goes with residency applications.

In Phase 1 your PCL case takes about six hours of small-group work each week, and a first-year student in the school's July 2025 news described small-group time almost every day. For one five-week stretch you also attend the Interprofessional Health Care course on Tuesday evenings, 5:30 to 8:30 pm.

The Phase 1 scheduling policy, last reviewed in September 2025, caps scheduled sessions plus the estimated time needed to prepare for them at 70 hours a week, averaged over a unit. It assumes about two hours of preparation per scheduled hour, ranging from none to three.

On clinical rotations the duty-hours policy caps your week at 80 hours, including in-house call, and gives you at least one day in seven off, averaged over four weeks. In-house call can average no more than every third night over four weeks. A duty period may not run past 24 hours, plus up to four more for handovers or education, with no new patient care. You get at least 8 hours off between duty periods and 14 after in-house call.

If you choose ROME, its guidance for the planning meeting with each new preceptor treats call every third night as the norm and sets aside half a day a week for study and research.

Anatomy is taught within the Phase 1 units, alongside histology, embryology, physiology and pathology. Each unit's multiple-choice exam includes questions from laboratory sessions in gross anatomy, histology, microbiology and pathology.

The Deeded Body Program, which has served North Dakota for more than 50 years, receives body donations for teaching under the state's Uniform Anatomical Gift Act, and lists medical students among those it serves.

In the Phase 1 summers, the four-week elective Advanced Medical Anatomy (BIMD 9602) takes two students at a time into the Grand Forks anatomy lab. You dissect cadavers to record variations in human anatomy, at least 40 hours a week. You also prepare a poster for the Frank Low Day research symposium, and a manuscript if you find a significant variation.

Advanced Human Anatomy (BIMD 9501) is a senior elective in Grand Forks for two to five students in Phase 3 periods 10 and 11. You thoroughly dissect a region or system you choose, match it to clinical images, then give a 30-minute capstone seminar with an oral exam.

Clinical skills start in Unit 1 with history taking and interviewing, and Unit 2 adds the core physical exam and vital signs. Through Units 4 to 6 you practice the musculoskeletal, neurologic and cardiovascular core exams with SPETAs, and Unit 8 adds genitourinary and breast exams and Foley catheter insertion. The school says your hands-on training in the Simulation Center starts in your first month.

A summer elective can bring real patients earlier. The four-week GREAT elective (Going Rural Elective early in Academic Training) places five students, one per site, with a family physician in Grafton, Devils Lake, Jamestown, Dickinson or Hettinger. You follow care from emergency medical services through hospital, clinic and long-term care. Grafton, Hettinger and Jamestown offered free student housing for June 2026.

Unit 8 ends with a Clinical Skills Bootcamp: surgical scrubbing, airway management, intravenous and intraosseous access, running a Code Blue as a team, electrocardiogram review and basic lifesaving certification. Clerkships then open with a three-day Launch into Clerkships in late February of year 2.

On clerkships you are assigned patients under supervision. In obstetrics and gynecology you assist at vaginal deliveries, cesarean sections and gynecologic surgery, and in neurology you interview, examine and present two clinic patients and write each up formally. By the end of Phase 2 you should be able to do procedures such as phlebotomy, suturing, lumbar puncture, nasogastric tube placement and cast application.

In Phase 1 you are assessed several times in each unit, and staff also observe your small-group participation and professional behavior. Your medical sciences grade averages mid-unit and end-unit results, each combining a multiple-choice exam, a case exam of essay-style tasks on clinical vignettes and an NBME exam. Doctoring skills are tested in video-recorded assessments. The NBME, which co-sponsors the USMLE, also writes the clerkship subject exams.

Grades are Honors (H), Satisfactory (S) and Unsatisfactory (U), and each course's syllabus defines how they are awarded. A U puts you on probation with a remediation plan; once remediated it becomes S/U, which counts toward graduation. Courses such as the REMS and GREAT electives, Step 1 Prep, the quality improvement course and Transition to Residency are graded Satisfactory or Unsatisfactory.

Clerkship grades follow a school-wide formula, and changing it needs approval from the Undergraduate Medical Education Committee. The NBME subject exam, the end-of-clerkship test known as the shelf exam, counts 30 percent, the preceptor's evaluation 50 and other assessments 20, such as surgery's weekly quizzes and oral exam. Without other assessments the exam counts 40 percent and the evaluation 60, as in neurology, where the shelf pass mark is 57 equated percent correct. Honors requires the department's minimum scores on the exam, the evaluation and the overall grade, adjusted yearly so about 20 percent in each clerkship earn it.

Each phase is a gate. You need a pass on the Gateway Examination, a standardized exam given at intervals during Phase 1, to enter Phase 2 and sit Step 1. You take Step 1 in Phase 2, after week 3 of your own four-week Step 1 Prep block and within two weeks of finishing it. You must pass it, and Phase 2, to enter Phase 3. Step 2 CK follows the eight-week Step 2 Prep course in Phase 3, and you must pass it and Phase 3 to graduate. The degree is expected to take four years, with six the limit.

Step 1 centers on the sciences basic to medicine and Step 2 CK on clinical knowledge. Step 1 has been reported only as pass or fail since January 26, 2022, while Step 2 CK still gives a three-digit score. 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, the Class of 2029 starts Phase 2 with Launch into Clerkships on February 24-26, 2027, then Rotation 1 on March 1. Projected forward, a 2027 entrant would start Phase 2 around March 2029 and Phase 3 around late April 2030, so both exams would fall after the switch. Dates for that class are not yet published.

• Clinical skills are also tested in the Clinical Skills Proficiency Review OSCE, a Phase 2 requirement.
• If you fail a clerkship shelf exam, you can retake it once, within four months or before Phase 3 begins, whichever comes first. Failing the retake means a U, and you then repeat half the clerkship's clinical time and pass the exam.
• Near misses are rechecked. A case exam is re-graded by other experts when your unit grade falls between 73.0 and 74.45 percent and a case exam scored under 80 percent. A doctoring skills video scoring under 79.45 percent is re-scored.
• Failing a Step exam means probation and a remediation plan, and failing after a second attempt leads to a hearing before the Medical Student Academic Performance Committee.
• Away rotations are graded on the host school's scale.

Phase 1 is in Grand Forks for everyone. The clinical phases are based on four campuses, each with its own campus dean and office: Northeast (Grand Forks), Southeast (Fargo), Southwest (Bismarck) and Northwest (Minot). Separate lotteries in year 1 assign your campus for each phase, Phase 2 in the first trimester and Phase 3 in the third. Each student is given a random number and ranks the campuses in order of preference, and places are filled in number order.

A 24-hour window after each lottery lets you request a trade, and the Office of Student Affairs & Admissions pairs matching requests at random. Later trades must be even swaps you arrange yourself, with nothing of value changing hands, until the end of year 1 for Phase 2 and of year 2 for Phase 3. You can also formally ask for a different campus for personal reasons at any time. In Phase 3 at least 16 weeks must be on your Phase 3 campus, to prevent overcrowding, and your campus dean's office arranges electives on other UND campuses.

Clerkship formats differ by campus. Internal medicine in Grand Forks is four weeks on the hospitalist service and four in clinics, all at Altru Health System. In Fargo it is four weeks on a Sanford Health teaching service and four with a clinic preceptor. In Bismarck it is four weeks on the teaching service plus two two-week blocks with internists or subspecialists. Traditional surgery and neurology clerkships run in Grand Forks, Fargo and Bismarck, and pediatrics on all four campuses.

Students training in the Minot region take their third-year clerkships through MILE, with neurology spread over three months. The Phase 2 page describes MILE as 44 weeks, including a four-week rural family medicine rotation, and the admissions curriculum page also gives 44; the surgery department's page says 48.

If you apply for ROME, its co-directors and the director of the Educational Resources department review your record. ROME's own pages give 20 to 24 weeks, while the Phase 2 and admissions curriculum pages say 20 to 28. Every site gives credit in family medicine, internal medicine, obstetrics and gynecology, and pediatrics. The ROME overview adds surgery credit everywhere except Devils Lake. The surgery department notes that some sites need part or all of surgery done on an urban campus, where you also complete your remaining clerkships.

Phase 1 has 10 weeks of electives: two weeks in November of year 1 and four weeks each in June and July. Summer electives are filled by lottery from the preferences you submit. Summer 2026 options included REMS research, GREAT, Advanced Medical Anatomy, Geriatric Medicine in Fargo, Introduction to American Sign Language, Pulmonary Pathogens and Death Investigation in North Dakota.

In Phase 2 you take two 2-week electives. The Phase 2 electives page, still headed 2025-26, lists a Specialty Exploration Elective on each campus, a virtual Caregiver course and Interprofessional Collaboration II, plus two options only for ROME students. You can also request elective days in specialties outside the core clerkships, such as dermatology during internal medicine: up to two per 8-week clerkship and one in the shorter ones.

In Phase 3 you may take no more than four electives in one specialty, counting the sub-internship. Within those four, at most two can be general electives in the specialty and two in one subspecialty, or three if you give up a vacation month.

Rural family medicine sub-internships run in towns such as Hettinger, Jamestown, Oakes, Wahpeton, Grafton, Devils Lake and Park River in North Dakota, and Ortonville, Morris, Perham, Benson and Staples in Minnesota. Other options include point-of-care ultrasound in each campus's emergency departments, wilderness medicine in Bismarck and a psychiatry sub-internship at the North Dakota State Hospital in Jamestown.

Global Health & Underserved Populations (MED 9555-03), taken after clerkships, combines Mission of Hope in the Dominican Republic with food pantry and homeless shelter work in Fargo and Grand Forks and tribal health. The catalog also lists a family medicine elective at the Fort Yates Indian Health Service (IHS) facility, marked not available for 2027-28.

Away electives at other schools go through the Visiting Student Learning Opportunities (VSLO) system or your campus dean's office. Domestic ones should be at LCME-accredited programs or at residency sites accredited by the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education (ACGME). International electives can be UND-sponsored, with Australia given as an example, arranged through VSLO or approved individually, and you write a reflection afterwards. You must be in North Dakota during Match week.

The Joint M.D./Ph.D. in Biomedical Sciences is run with the School of Graduate Studies. You first gain a place in the M.D. program, then apply for the Ph.D. no later than the end of your first year. The program pages and the 2026-27 Academic Catalog give a minimum of six years of full-time study; the university's M.D. program page says both degrees take about seven.

Under the catalog, final admission comes after the first two years of the M.D. curriculum and a pass on Step 1, and those two years count as 44 of the Ph.D.'s 90 credits. The Ph.D. needs original research and a publicly defended dissertation, and the requirements page expects at least one first-author peer-reviewed paper before the defense.

The M.D./M.P.H. adds a Master of Public Health and takes five years. The M.P.H. coursework, usually about a year, comes between Phase 1 and Phase 2 or between Phase 2 and Phase 3, on a leave of absence from the M.D. Clinical Epidemiology counts for 3 M.P.H. credits, and a Phase 3 research elective can count toward the M.P.H. Integrative Learning Experience.

When you return from that leave you join a later class and are not guaranteed your original campus locations. The first three M.D./M.P.H. graduates finished in May 2024.

Within the M.D., REMS-I, a two-week November elective, covers research training and helps you find a mentor. REMS II and III give eight summer weeks of lab or clinical research at about 40 hours a week, with a poster at the Frank Low Day research symposium encouraged. In Phase 3 the senior research elective (MED 9510), offered on all campuses, can be taken twice, for eight weeks in total.

An optional Research badge, open from the Class of 2028, records research skills at three levels, from fundamentals to mastery.

In Phase 1 you study in the school's 325,000-square-foot building in Grand Forks, opened in July 2016 and designed for collaborative and interprofessional learning. It holds a gross anatomy laboratory, a live animal vivarium, the Simulation Center and eight spaces the school calls learning communities, where students from all its health programs mix.

The Simulation Center uses high-fidelity manikins that talk, cry, breathe, bleed and respond physiologically to treatment, while actors play patients and families. After each scenario you debrief by reviewing your performance on video. The Southeast Campus, which moved to a new location in Fargo in late April 2025, has its own UND Simulation Center alongside its clinical departments and library resources.

The Center for Student Success & Well-Being supports you academically and personally: learning strategies, mental health resources and referrals, personal and professional development, and early identification of students who need help. The Office of Student Affairs & Admissions runs workshops on time management, study and test skills, and campus deans and faculty help with individual courses and clerkships.

Career advising runs through all four years and uses the Careers in Medicine program of the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC). Your Phase 2 campus dean, or a designated career counselor on the Fargo campus, is your career advisor throughout the program. In Phase 1 your academic advisor is the associate dean for the medical curriculum; in Phases 2 and 3 it is your Phase 2 campus dean. That dean also writes the Noteworthy Characteristics section of your MSPE. You can instead ask, in writing to the Office of Student Affairs and Admissions, for another campus dean or the associate dean for student affairs and admissions to write it.

One admissions page describes 11 individual meetings with a physician advisor; the school's 2023 table of advising activities lists a required session in each of the 12 trimesters. Phase 1 also includes panels of clinical chairs and residency program directors and presentations on ROME.

INMED's support runs from seventh grade through professional school. Medical students in INMED get tutoring, social and cultural events, emergency loans and an honoring ceremony at the UND Indian Association powwow each spring. CLIMB, a pre-matriculation program, helps INMED students admitted to UND's medical program settle in before classes start.

INMED also helps students on Indian Health Service scholarships gain experience through IHS externships at IHS facilities, and has helped many place at their home reservations. A Tribal Advisory Board, appointed by all 26 tribal governments in North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska, Montana and Wyoming, guides the program, which has supported more than 280 American Indian physicians to graduation.