Physician Assistant Shadowing and Student Clinical Rotations
Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center offers diverse experiences for physician assistant students to gain skills necessary to practice as a physician assistant. Cincinnati Children’s offers limited opportunities to fulfill elective clinical rotations for students actively enrolled in a physician assistant program. All students must attend a program that has a current affiliation agreement in place with Cincinnati Children’s. If interested, please contact your physician assistant program clinical coordinator.
No student may contact any Cincinnati Children's employee or physician directly. Please have your clinical coordinator contact the APP lead for PA education at PAstudents@cchmc.org with requests and questions. Please place in the subject heading the following: “clinical rotation”, “student’s name”, and “school”. Include the following in the body of the communication: the department of interest for the clinical rotation (see options below), the timeframe for the rotation, and if you are a current employee at Cincinnati Children's. Please allow up to five to seven business days for a response.
Rotations available
- Cardiothoracic Surgery
- Orthopaedic Surgery
- Urology
- Liberty Surgical Services
- Neonatal Intensive Care
- Hematology (on hold)
Cincinnati Children's only has opportunities in these sub-specialty areas at this time and may only fulfill an elective clinical rotation. Limited rotations are available due to limited preceptor availability and restrictions that remain in place in some divisions following the COVID-19 pandemic. At this time, we do not have the capacity to offer general pediatrics rotations, however limited opportunities may become available in the future. Please check back periodically for updates.
To complete a student clinical rotation at Cincinnati Children's, an affiliation agreement must exist between Cincinnati Children's and your academic institution. Currently, we only have affiliation agreements with the programs listed below. Cincinnati Children’s does not have the capacity to add additional programs to this list at this time but may consider additions in the future.
To be eligible for clinical placement at Cincinnati Children's, you must be attending an affiliated program:
- University of Dayton
- Mount St. Joseph University
- Kettering College
- Ohio University
- Miami University
- University of Kentucky
- Butler University
- Gannon University
- University of Toledo
- Lake Erie College
- Lincoln Memorial University
- Trevecca Nazarene University
- Marietta College
- University of St. Francis
- Ohio Dominican University
- South College
- University of Findlay
- Midwestern University
Shadowing Opportunities with a Physician Assistant
PLEASE NOTE: We are offering limited shadowing opportunities three times each year (see application windows below). These opportunities are open to all individuals high school aged and above, regardless of Cincinnati Children's employee status. Historically we offered one-to-three-day shadowing opportunities, however we have scaled back due to volume of shadowing requests and limited PAs that are able to accommodate observers. Most shadowing opportunities are limited to one day opportunities.
If you are not in a degree program but would like to learn about other shadowing opportunities, visit our Job Shadow program. If there is interest in shadowing a physician assistant to fulfill shadowing hours as a prerequisite for a PA program or you are currently in a degree program, please contact the APP lead for PA education at PAstudents@cchmc.org.
- As a subject heading write: "Shadowing Opportunity: and 'your name'".
- In the body of the email you will need to include a paragraph addressing the question: “What do you hope to gain from this shadowing experience?”
- Attach your resume.
- Include dates you have FULL day availability.
- Pre-PA shadowing windows
- Spring (March 1 - April 30) - application window opens February 16 - March 29.
- Summer (June 1 - July 31) - application window opens May 18 - June 29.
- Winter (December 1 - January 31) - application window opens November 17 - December 29.
**NOTE: shadowing will not be offered outside of these windows unless otherwise approved by APP Lead for PA Education.
