Purpose: To help elucidate the costs of clinical education in ambulatory settings by determining the costs of one ambulatory family medicine clerkship.
Method: Prospective, ongoing, strict cost and time accountings for a required four-week, third-year family medicine clerkship were carried out from January 1995 to July 1996. Volunteer community preceptors' expenses were estimated using average family physicians' salaries as documented in the literature.
Results: The costs of this clerkship per student ranged from $959 when no clinical office teaching time was reimbursed to $2,713 when all clinical office teaching time was reimbursed.
Conclusions: This study documents, in detail, the costs of a mandatory family medicine clerkship. Questions arise about the reimbursement of volunteer community preceptors. The blueprint developed for assessing costs can be used with modifications by other schools and clerkships.