All candidates must meet health and technical standards to be admitted to, participate in, and graduate from RVU-MCOM. Because the DO degree signifies that the holder is a physician prepared to enter postgraduate training programs (residency programs), RVU-MCOM graduates must have the knowledge and skills required to function in a broad variety of clinical situations and must be prepared to provide a wide spectrum of patient care. A candidate for the DO degree must have abilities and skills in the areas described below and meet the standards described as an obligation to patients and society.
Reasonable accommodations will be made as required by law; however, the candidate/student must be able to meet all technical standards with or without reasonable accommodation. Please refer to the section on the Americans with Disabilities Act. The use of a trained intermediary necessarily requires that a candidate’s judgment be mediated by someone else’s power of selection and observation and is not a permissible accommodation. Enrolled students who are unable to meet these standards may be asked to appear before the Student Performance Committee and may be subject to dismissal.
Immunizations
Students must satisfy all requirements for immunizations at the time of admission and throughout their medical school career. Failure to do so will prevent matriculation or, in the case of an enrolled student, lead to dismissal. For specific information, please see "Health Records/Immunizations" of the Student Educational Records section of this Handbook.
Observation
Students must be able to obtain, gather, and synthesize information in didactic and clinical settings. This includes but is not limited to lectures, lecture supplemental materials, labs, physical exams, interviews, and raw diagnostic representations of physiologic data (e.g., radiology images, echocardiogram, ECGs, lab results, microscopic images). Students must have the individual capacity to assess a patient and evaluate findings accurately. These skills require the use of vision, hearing, and touch, or their functional equivalents.
Communication
Students must be able to communicate with others to elicit information, to detect changes in mood and activity, and to establish a therapeutic relationship. Students must exhibit interpersonal skills to accurately communicate with others. Students must be able to clearly, accurately, and sensitively record information obtained through communication. Students must demonstrate effective communication, participation, and collaboration with all members of a multidisciplinary health care and educational team across various communication mediums (e.g., in-person, Zoom, written). English is the primary language of the RVU DO curriculum, and students are expected to have a level of proficiency that eliminates language as an access barrier.
Motor
Due to the clinical nature and the training of an Osteopathic physician, all students must have coordination of both gross and fine muscular movements, balance, and equilibrium. All students must have the capacity to perform tactile examinations and osteopathic manipulative techniques in a manner that ensures patient and provider safety. Students must have the capacity to experience, collect, interpret, and understand tactile diagnostic exercises and manipulative treatments. Examples of this in the curriculum may include (but are not limited to):
- Maneuvering a patient during diagnosis and treatments, including being able to lift or maneuver
at least 40lbs - Reaching around a patient to perform certain techniques
- Bracing/stabilizing a patient’s mass during treatment
- Meeting isometric forces approximating 20lbs
- Providing high velocity thrust over 1 cm of distance under control while maintaining palpatory
discretion - Utilizing exam equipment effectively and safely (including but not limited to ultrasound probe,
otoscope, stethoscope, sphygmomanometer)
Intellectual, Conceptual, Integrative, and Quantitative Abilities
Students must possess conceptual, integrative, and quantitative abilities, including measurement, calculation, reasoning, analysis, and synthesis. Problem solving, the critical skill necessitated by all RVU programs, requires these intellectual abilities. In addition, students must be able to observe and comprehend three-dimensional relationships and to understand the spatial relationship of structures. Students must be able to be present, engage, and participate in all required activities to the extent necessary to achieve all activity objectives and outcomes. Students must be capable of extended periods of intense concentration and attention.
Behavior and Social Abilities
Students must have the emotional health required for full use of their intellectual abilities, the exercise of good insight and judgment, and the prompt completion of all responsibilities attendant to the demands of the educational program. Students must have the capacity to develop mature, sensitive, and effective relationships with members of the internal and external RVU community (e.g., peers, faculty, staff, patients, health care professionals). Students must be able to successfully function as part of a healthcare team and participate in a multi-disciplinary environment. Students must be able to accept constructive feedback, demonstrate accountability and take personal responsibility for improving personal performance and team interactions. Students must be able to tolerate physically and mentally taxing workloads and to function effectively under stress. They must be able to adapt to changing environments, display flexibility and professionalism, and have the capacity to function successfully and perform in the face of uncertainties inherent in the clinical nature of the RVU DO program. Due to the tactile nature of Osteopathic education, students are required to participate both as patients and as trainees in the curriculum (e.g., OPP laboratory, PCM laboratory) and examine/be examined by their peers.
Ethical and Legal Responsibilities
Students must maintain, demonstrate, and display high ethical and moral behaviors commensurate with being a productive, compassionate, professional member of society in all interactions (e.g., faculty, staff, peers, patients, the public). Students are expected to have the cognitive ability to understand the legal and ethical aspects of their chosen profession and the capacity to act according to the relevant laws and ethical standards.
Physical Interactions
As an osteopathic medical student, you will be expected to touch people of different genders, races, and body types as part of your required training to become an osteopathic physician. Reciprocally, you will also be expected to be touched by other RVU medical students as part of physical assessment and treatment skills training during osteopathic clinical skills labs. In addition to ADA accommodations, exemptions to this requirement may also be granted based on religious accommodations.