| Summary: | Abstract Introduction The Acting Internship (AI) experience is designed to encourage senior medical students, regardless of desired future specialty, to be the interns for their patients. AIs carry patients independently of interns and have access to technology and other resources in order to successfully do so. They call consults, speak to attending physicians and families, and work all shifts with their teams. To facilitate this, they receive targeted didactic sessions on topics designed to foster the knowledge and skills they need to become effective interns, as well as active monitoring from the site director to provide support, encouragement, and motivation. Methods Twice weekly, the site director conducted hour-long didactic sessions with students to discuss intern-related topics drawn from the Clerkship Directors in Internal Medicine Subinternship Curriculum including common pages, insulin management, electrolytes, empiric antibiotics, health care system navigation, and ABG and EKG interpretation during resident conferences in order to maximize the students' availability on the floor. Once the rotation was completed, students were emailed an anonymous electronic survey to solicit feedback on the experience. From July 2012 to April 2013, 43 students completed AIs at our institution. Results Thirty-six were US medical students, two were Caribbean medical students, and five were US osteopathic students. Thirty-seven rotators (86%) completed the anonymous electronic survey about experience. The average overall rating for AI was 4.69 on a 5-point scale. Notably, 88.9% of rotators strongly agreed that the goals and objectives of the rotation were clearly identified; 88.9% strongly agreed that the didactics were well-organized, interactive, and high-yield; 86.1% strongly agreed that they were encouraged to be autonomous; and 80.6% strongly agreed that their supervising physicians included them in the decision making for their patients. However, only 58.3% strongly agreed the number of patient that they cared for were adequate and only 58.3% strongly agreed that they received timely and frequent feedback. Discussion The AI was viewed positively by rotators, especially in terms of increasing confidence of rotators towards effectively navigating internship in the future. The AI effectively promotes a sense of autonomy, shared decision making, and active learning amongst our rotators, evidence of us meeting key curricular objectives and sufficiently meeting our various stakeholders' needs.
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