Student perceptions of the care of children: impacts of pre-clerkship pediatric and primary care clinical teaching.

Background: Pediatric clinical skills teaching sessions provide an early opportunity for students to be exposed to the medical care of children. This report describes second and third year medical students' perceptions of and attitudes towards working with children before and after the pediatric clinical skills teaching sessions, and the experiences of those students precepted by pediatricians only compared to those students working with a combination of pediatricians and family physicians.

Method: A 13 question survey was voluntarily completed before and after teaching sessions.