Folklor/Edebiyat, vol.27, no.108, pp.993-1011, 2021 (Scopus)
Wearing a white coat, which represents the acceptance of the medical school students to the profession, is the first transition rite in the medicine. The ceremony, where faculty members dressed students up in white coats, and the Hippocratic oath is read, ends after a cocktail and photoshoot. The article focuses on the White Coat Ceremony in the medical profession, based on interviews with Eskisehir Osmangazi University Faculty of Medicine physicians, students, and their families. In the ceremony, the practices of dressing the students in the white coat by the faculty members and Hippocratic oath were discussed with their structural and functional characteristics. As a result of the determinations and evaluations, it has been seen that the ceremony is functional in terms of the acceptance of physician candidates to the profession. Faculty members congratulate students on their entry into the medical profession while dressing them in their white coats. The annual repetition of the ceremony, which has its own rules and order, is functional in terms of ensuring continuity and transferring the rules of medical ethics to the students. It is ensured that the physician identity of the students is formed by the speeches about the sublimity of the medical profession and the sanctity of health. Students become empathetic with the Hippocratic oath. Families who experience the ceremonial entry of their children into a respected profession are proud as well, and they agree with each other emotionally.