OB at the U

First of all, by way of dispelling stories of previous years about OB/GYN, the rotation as a whole is not nearly as soul crushing as some have made it out to be. The residents (at least this year) have all been great to work with, assuming you don't mind working hard.
Before you start the rotation. 1) You should get Powerchart access (pt. charting program for the U) if you don't already have it. This can be done by contacting IT at the U (google) and letting them know you're a medical student who needs to set up their account. 2) Sleep, or otherwise do whatever you need to do to bring your body up to speed for getting up at 4:00 in the AM. 3) On the first day, you have a series of lectures designed to orient you to the rotation, it's too much information to take in all at once, so write some of it down. Importantly, write down what your scrub locker number and combination are. On that point, during the aforementioned orientation, KPJ makes a point of telling you that it is unacceptable to wear your scrubs to and from the hospital (something about disease transmission, blah blah), one of the first things our chief said was, 'I know Dr. Jones doesn't want you wearing scrubs to work, but we get here at 5:00, and everyone wears scrubs to and from home.' So, do what you wish, but for me personally, the only saving grace when it comes to getting up at 4:00 in the morning is that I get to wear pajamas to work.
Typical work day: 1) arrive at 4:50, no later than 5:00. Meet up with the interns over on Labor and Delivery, drop your bags off there, and head over to 2N (postpartum wards). There, the interns print off an excel sheet that has all of the postpartum patients they need to follow on it with a very attenuated pt. history on each one, and some of the previous lab values. Split the patients up between the group of you, and see them with or without the intern (who also has to see your patients that morning) depending on their preference. Then, write a note (the format of which will be in your orientation materials) and have the resident look over and cosign your work. All of the patients need to be seen and have their notes written by 6:45, because of the mandatory attendance requirement for everyone at 6:45 board sign out, back on L&D. Scut work side note; one of the helpful things you can do here is ask, or figure out who is going home that day; everyone needs discharge paperwork filled out and put in their charts. (there are templates for this in your orientation materials as well). Then by 6:45 you head to L&D where the residents go through 'the board' (you'll understand when you get there) and talk about all of the patients currently on service or scheduled to come onto service that day. When that is over, interns and med. students head back over to 2N to present all of the patients they saw on morning rounds. (this is probably your best opportunity to shine during the rotation, so if your going to put your efforts in somewhere, this is probably the highest yield) You'll present at least one patient (likely more depending on how fast rounds need to go) to the chief and attempt your assessment and plan which will be looked over and most likely is 'continue post-op care' like 90% of the time. Then after rounds you all head back to L&D and sign up for patients on 'the board', introduce yourself to the patients you are following and do as much as you can to learn about their history and any complicating problems. Follow them throughout the day and hope that you get the opportunity to either be there/participate in their delivery or assist in the C-section. Additional side note, OB is unbelievably notorious for using acronyms for everything, so do whatever you need to, to get a handle on these early, it will help out. (there is a list of them in the orientation materials). Continue doing this, and whatever else you are asked to do (may not be much) until board sign out which happens at 5:30 during the week. This is essentially the same thing as the morning, except you are recapping the day for the residents coming on service for the night shift. After board sign out, linger just long enough to see if there's anything else that needs to be done, and then you're free to go home.
Call: you take call 5 times during your OB/GYN rotation regardless of where you do it. OB service takes call Sunday night through friday day, GYN is on from Friday night through Sunday day. IMC doesn't do student night call, the U does. If you take call during the week, you work during the day, stay on after board sign out, and work until the next morning. Protocol for making a graceful departure to the med student call room for some zzz's: work hard during the day and early evening, don't disappear for hours at a time, then you need to approach your chief resident and ask them if there's anything else that you can do, he or she should at that point either say 1) yes, do whatever the task is, and retry, 2) no, go to sleep, in which case you are golden until they page you, or you decide it is prudent to come back or 3) they say no, an nothing, in which case you can say well, if you don't mind I'm going to go to the call room for a little while, I'll be back soon, page me if you need me back here. (inevitably they don't need you and won't page you to come back, so if you're interested in helping with a c-section or doing a delivery yourself, you need to stay up).
Well, I know this is probably too much information for some, and not enough for others, but if you have other questions, feel free to ask me.
Note to my OB co-conspirators: feel free to add whatever you think is relevant.