Categorical (4-year) Program

Clinical Base Program

Anesthesiology residency programs require a four-year continuum. The second, third, and fourth years are designated as clinical anesthesiology (CA-1-3) years and are devoted entirely to anesthesiology. The first postgraduate year (PGY-1) is designated as a clinical base (CB) year and is devoted to hospital-based clinical experience outside of the operating room. The purpose of this first year of the program is to allow the resident to become a proficient hospital physician in the broadest sense. This CB year may be fulfilled in many ways, such as a transitional program that includes various clinical rotations, a year of internal medicine, or a year in any other clinical specialty program.

The Department of Anesthesiology at Northwestern offers medical students a unique clinical base year that is planned as an integral part of the four-year continuum. It emphasizes internal medicine and critical care experience. Many residents find the opportunity to train continuously in a single program an attractive and convenient option.

The CB year optimizes the experience of the perioperative physician. The first ten months are devoted to four months of general internal medicine rotations, two months of medical intensive care, and single-month assignments to the emergency department, coronary care unit and cardiology inpatient service, hematology-oncology, pulmonary consultation, and to critical care medicine in the surgical intensive care unit. Clinical anesthesia rotations begin in May. An additional one to two months of critical care during the PGY-2 year is credited toward CB year requirements. This allows residents in the four-year continuum to have completed seven months of clinical exposure to intensive care medicine at the end of their required two-month CA-2 year critical care rotation.

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