A teaching hospital is a place for intensive care and short or long-term medical treatment open to all sorts of patients, which is operated by a university, medical school, or other institution of higher education, and which is used to train medical students. Medical students receive supervised clinical training alongside the hospital's patient-care services.

The hospital combines patient treatment with medical-student education. Operation by a university, medical school, or other higher-education institution is part of the definition.

A hospital merely hosting occasional trainees does not meet that stated operating condition. The teaching function does not by itself guarantee a particular quality of care.