About the internship

At SDNeurosurgery (SDN), we work with all students of any year.  Our goal is to provide our Interns with real-life experience working in an active medical practice.  We help our Interns who become Staff get into graduate programs, medical schools and start their own health-related careers.  

As an SDN Intern, you will be expected to immerse yourself fully into the daily workings of the SDNeurosurgery Practice. SDNeurosurgery is a neurosurgical practice specializing in surgical care for complex trauma of the neurological system and spine.  SDNeurosurgery is currently part of the United Medical Doctors group.  As an Intern and Staff, you will be working with all physicians from both UMD and SDNeurosurgery.  

As an Intern and Staff, you will be called on to work outside of normal working hours and to meet the demands of a Practice that is by its nature very fluid.  This can involve considerable changes day-to-day with scheduling, meetings, and tasks.  We will provide you with constant training, but you will be expected to perform and execute without supervision and be able to think well on your feet.  If an unstructured environment without clearly defined roles and boundaries is difficult for you, then this Internship may not be right for you. The Internship requires a tremendous amount of clerical work, demanding customer service, and a lot of travel for our physicians as there are multiple clinics in various locations.  

At the end of your time with us, you will have acquired a breadth of experience, knowledge, confidence, and personal growth that will help you with your medical school application process. Our goal is to help you gain the confidence and expertise to do well in your interviews and personal statements, and ultimately to get your acceptance into the program of your choice. During your time with us, you will practice and master the 15 core competencies required of incoming medical students. For this reason, it is imperative that you dive deep in the Practice so that you can be well prepared for medical school.  

Our Internship program goes beyond volunteering at a hospital or passively shadowing a physician. We will give you many responsibilities and have high expectations of you to do well, including showing up punctually and doing meticulous professional work. If you apply yourself, you will come to love working in the Practice. If you do not get to this point after 3 months or 6 months and certainly by 9 months, you should not continue with the Internship or pursue a Staff position.  You should not do an Internship if your goal is just to get a letter of recommendation. You will be evaluated at different points in time and we will continue or terminate your tenure based on your performance.   

The workload for part-time Interns is at least 15 hours a week. For full-time Interns, it is 40 hours a week.  We will assign you to a department where the Department Leads will supervise and train you. You must show up for work on time, attend all training, and complete all work assigned to you in a timely manner. You must be professional, respectful, responsible, and HIPAA compliant. You must not put the Practice in jeopardy in any way. We expect you to make mistakes, but we also want you to learn from them and strive to do better for yourself and the Practice. After several months, we will rotate you to a different Department so that you can be exposed to all facets of being in a medical practice.