Leave of Absence Policy Guidelines
It is imperative that all medical clerks are in attendance for the required 6 weeks of the Obstetrics & Gynecology rotation. If an absence is unavoidable, the following steps must be taken in order to fulfill the time requirements.
Time off for illness: (including personal illness, or family illness).
- Time off for an illness will be assessed on an individual basis. Make-up time will be determined with each individual case.
Time off for personal reasons: (not including illness).
- Requests for LOA must be requested 6 weeks in advance provided in writing to Barbara Saunders, Coordinator, UGME, in the Department of Obstetrics & Gynecology. Decisions will finalized through Dr. Jenna McNaught, Director, Ob/Gyn UGME in consultation with the UGME Team. Once approval has been granted a formal request must be made by the clerk through the Undergraduate Medical Education Dept.
Conference Leave
- Generally, leave will be granted for clerks who are presenting at a conference, regardless of the medical specialty. The expectation is that any missed time will be made-up.
- Generally, clerks who are attending or presenting at an Obstetrics & Gynecology conference will have the time approved, without being required to make-up the time.
- Generally, time will not be granted for students who wish to attend a conference that is outside of the OB/GYN specialty.
Make-Up Time
- All clerks requesting time off for personal reasons must make arrangements with Barbara Saunders to make-up the time. By special arrangement, time can be made- up on non-scheduled weekend days, statutory holidays, or days during the clerk vacation. An extra on-call shift may suffice depending on the amount of time the clerk is absent.
- Until the days are made up and the clinical work assessed, the FITER will remain "incomplete".
Special requests for special circumstances must be requested in writing six weeks prior to the rotation. Send all requests to Barbara Saunders, Education Office, WS029 Women's Hospital, 787-2832 or email bsaunders@hsc.mb.ca
With the implemention of our present 2 weeks Clinic / 2 weeks Obstetrics / 2 weeks Gynecology schedule, your responsibilities are more clearly defined during your rotation. While you are on your 2-weeks Clinic service, you will not be On Call and so won't be pulled away from valuable clinic experiences. Your principal function is education, second, although highly important, is the service you provide.
- CTA session attendance is mandatory and protected time.
- Your Academic Half Day is mandatory and protected time.
- The Nurse Preceptorship day is protected time and you are excused from all other duties that day. DO NOT ATTEND ANY OTHER TEACHING SESSIONS OR CLINICS ON THIS DAY!
- Attendance at ALL TEACHING ROUNDS is expected, including post-call.
As deliveries are high priority, students will need to excuse themselves from teaching sessions and rounds if a patient they are following is ready for delivery. In the same way, students should not miss on O.R. for a didactic teaching session. While students cannot shirk their ward responsibilities, they should not miss a delivery or be late for the O.R. because they are rounding on patients. Patients can be seen before or after the O.R., even if it means they are seen in the afternoon. Any patient who requires special attention needs to be seen by more senior housestaff, either with or without a med student. Outstanding issues that will require more urgent follow-up should be clarified at the morning sign over and assigned to housestaff as appropriate. Students should ask their colleagues to check lab results, ultrasound reports etc. for them if they are going to be in the O.R.
We would ask you to be flexible and share the responsibilities with each other. In other words, it is reasonable to ask a colleague to check a hemoglobin for you while you are in the O.R. You will also need to learn how to use the time in between cases to see your patients.