Selected Podcast
GME Program Featuring the Family Medicine Program
Dr. Carrie Bacon gives an overview of the GME family medicine program, what the training entails and how it benefits the community.
Featured Speaker:
Carrie Bacon, MD
Carrie Bacon, MD is the GME Program MD for Family Medicine. Transcription:
Melanie Cole (Host): Welcome, today we’re talking about the graduate medical education program featuring the family medicine program and my guest is Dr. Carrie Bacon. She’s the Program Director for Family Medicine Residency Program at Temecula Valley Hospital. Dr. Bacon, I’m so glad to have you with us today. Please tell us the mission of the Family Medicine Program.
Dr. Carrie Bacon (Guest): Our mission is to develop family medicine physicians who provide holistic patient and family centered care, delivered in transformative ways to improve patient and population health outcomes in a cost effective manner.
Host: What a great program. So give us a little bit of an overview of family medicine training. What’s involved for the residents? What are looking for them to be really proficient at and what does a typical day look like?
Dr. Bacon: Family Medicine as a specialty cares for patients over their lifetime so from infants through teenagers to adulthood to geriatrics so the training has to cover all those aspects of a patient’s life and this includes OB care too and delivering babies and taking care of newborns. So the training is quite broad and it spans across all those different areas.
Host: Then tell us a little bit about the curriculum, and when you say that it’s so broad, what are some of the mainstays of study and areas that you like people to concentrate on. Do they sort of pick an area where they concentrate more? Maybe a little bit more on OB or a little bit more on pediatrics?
Dr. Bacon: So there’s core curriculum requirements for a family medicine residency program and it includes taking care of adults in the inpatient setting as well as pediatrics in the inpatient setting, obstetrics but what’s really important longitudinally over the program is what’s called the continuity clinic, and at the continuity clinic, the residents will take care of the patients. It’s usually a half day per week during their first year and goes up to 4 to 5 half days per week during their third year where they do outpatient ambulatory care focusing on preventative services, dealing with chronic medical illnesses, and the variety that would present to a primary care physician.
Host: So expand on that a little bit. What’s the day like for them when they get into the program? What do you expect of them throughout the day? What are you looking for personality wise, interaction with patients, tell us what the day looks like.
Dr. Bacon: The first year, what we call the PGY1 year, it’s probably the most intense year of training. They have 4 months doing inpatient medicine. They also do intensive care unit 4 months. They do newborn nursery, NICU, obstetrics, emergency medicine, cardiology, outpatient peds, and surgery. So there’s no time for electives during that first year because they have multiple core requirements that need to be completed. Those requirements continue into the second year and the third year, but they do have options to do elective time, and during that elective time they can choose to focus more on a particular area. So if they are really interested in women’s health or obstetrics, they can do more time doing that or if they want to focus more on pediatrics, they can do more time in that. So there is a little bit of flexibility during those later years to develop a focus, and then if they choose a particular area where they really want to specialize, they can actually do fellowships in sports medicine, in obstetrics, in palliative care, so that’s kind of the course that they follow, but as far as what we’re looking for, we’re really looking for residents that are eager to learn and eager to work hard but also have balance in their life. Wellness is a huge factor and maintaining their joy in their practice, and so we really want to support that as well, especially with all the problems with physician burnout and impairment, so we’re trying to build in fun time for them as well. It’s really important that they feel support from the faculty that are involved in the program and from their peers in the program.
Host: And I was even going to bring up physician burnout. It’s such a huge problem these days, and so that’s great what you’re doing to support them. Along those lines then Dr. Bacon, tell us what its like at TVH. Tell us about the faculty and instructors, you know what are you all like for these residents?
Dr. Bacon: My message to the faculty is really to be supportive coaches to the residents. So feedback is huge from the faculty to the residents on their performance, and it’s a new – this program is brand new so everybody is learning. The faculty are incredibly though excited about having residents and the community, the city of Temecula is incredibly excited. They actually had a special event for us during orientation with our inaugural class and we did our community coat ceremony just recognizing the start of this important class and this program for this community.
Host: Well along those lines, please tell us how does this benefit the community?
Dr. Bacon: I think one thing that’s incredibly unique about Temecula as a city is the support that the city has had to this program, and this part of Riverside County like the rest of Riverside County needs more high quality primary care physicians, so that’s a known fact for the city and for the community. As far as what we plan to offer to the community in addition to high quality, empathic, great physicians is bringing a level of scholarly activity to the community. So another key element for our residency program is doing research and performance improvement projects. Family Medicine has the expectation that they do at a minimum at least 2 research projects. So they’re going to look at areas at the hospital, areas in the community, where they can do different projects to improve the overall health of the patients and the community.
Host: Well that certainly is much needed, really all over the country. So wrap it up for us Dr. Bacon, what would you like the listeners to know about the family medicine residency program of the UHS Southern California Medical Education Consortium?
Dr. Bacon: What I would like the community to know is our goal is to really produce incredible physicians for this community, improve the care that this community receives and improve the quality of care that they get specifically through Temecula Valley Hospital.
Host: It’s great information Dr. Bacon, thank you so much for coming on and telling us about the graduate medical education program at TVH and I think it’s great for the community to hear. Thank you again for joining us. That wraps up this episode of TVH Health Chat with Temecula Valley Hospital. You can head on over to our website at temeculavalleyhospital.com for more information and to get connected with one of our providers. If you found this podcast informative, please share on your social media and share with your friends and family, that way we can all learn from the experts together and don’t miss all the other interesting podcasts in our library. Physicians are independent practioners who are not employees or agents of Temecula Valley Hospital. The hospital shall not be liable for actions or treatments provided by physicians. This is Melanie Cole. Thanks so much for listening.
Melanie Cole (Host): Welcome, today we’re talking about the graduate medical education program featuring the family medicine program and my guest is Dr. Carrie Bacon. She’s the Program Director for Family Medicine Residency Program at Temecula Valley Hospital. Dr. Bacon, I’m so glad to have you with us today. Please tell us the mission of the Family Medicine Program.
Dr. Carrie Bacon (Guest): Our mission is to develop family medicine physicians who provide holistic patient and family centered care, delivered in transformative ways to improve patient and population health outcomes in a cost effective manner.
Host: What a great program. So give us a little bit of an overview of family medicine training. What’s involved for the residents? What are looking for them to be really proficient at and what does a typical day look like?
Dr. Bacon: Family Medicine as a specialty cares for patients over their lifetime so from infants through teenagers to adulthood to geriatrics so the training has to cover all those aspects of a patient’s life and this includes OB care too and delivering babies and taking care of newborns. So the training is quite broad and it spans across all those different areas.
Host: Then tell us a little bit about the curriculum, and when you say that it’s so broad, what are some of the mainstays of study and areas that you like people to concentrate on. Do they sort of pick an area where they concentrate more? Maybe a little bit more on OB or a little bit more on pediatrics?
Dr. Bacon: So there’s core curriculum requirements for a family medicine residency program and it includes taking care of adults in the inpatient setting as well as pediatrics in the inpatient setting, obstetrics but what’s really important longitudinally over the program is what’s called the continuity clinic, and at the continuity clinic, the residents will take care of the patients. It’s usually a half day per week during their first year and goes up to 4 to 5 half days per week during their third year where they do outpatient ambulatory care focusing on preventative services, dealing with chronic medical illnesses, and the variety that would present to a primary care physician.
Host: So expand on that a little bit. What’s the day like for them when they get into the program? What do you expect of them throughout the day? What are you looking for personality wise, interaction with patients, tell us what the day looks like.
Dr. Bacon: The first year, what we call the PGY1 year, it’s probably the most intense year of training. They have 4 months doing inpatient medicine. They also do intensive care unit 4 months. They do newborn nursery, NICU, obstetrics, emergency medicine, cardiology, outpatient peds, and surgery. So there’s no time for electives during that first year because they have multiple core requirements that need to be completed. Those requirements continue into the second year and the third year, but they do have options to do elective time, and during that elective time they can choose to focus more on a particular area. So if they are really interested in women’s health or obstetrics, they can do more time doing that or if they want to focus more on pediatrics, they can do more time in that. So there is a little bit of flexibility during those later years to develop a focus, and then if they choose a particular area where they really want to specialize, they can actually do fellowships in sports medicine, in obstetrics, in palliative care, so that’s kind of the course that they follow, but as far as what we’re looking for, we’re really looking for residents that are eager to learn and eager to work hard but also have balance in their life. Wellness is a huge factor and maintaining their joy in their practice, and so we really want to support that as well, especially with all the problems with physician burnout and impairment, so we’re trying to build in fun time for them as well. It’s really important that they feel support from the faculty that are involved in the program and from their peers in the program.
Host: And I was even going to bring up physician burnout. It’s such a huge problem these days, and so that’s great what you’re doing to support them. Along those lines then Dr. Bacon, tell us what its like at TVH. Tell us about the faculty and instructors, you know what are you all like for these residents?
Dr. Bacon: My message to the faculty is really to be supportive coaches to the residents. So feedback is huge from the faculty to the residents on their performance, and it’s a new – this program is brand new so everybody is learning. The faculty are incredibly though excited about having residents and the community, the city of Temecula is incredibly excited. They actually had a special event for us during orientation with our inaugural class and we did our community coat ceremony just recognizing the start of this important class and this program for this community.
Host: Well along those lines, please tell us how does this benefit the community?
Dr. Bacon: I think one thing that’s incredibly unique about Temecula as a city is the support that the city has had to this program, and this part of Riverside County like the rest of Riverside County needs more high quality primary care physicians, so that’s a known fact for the city and for the community. As far as what we plan to offer to the community in addition to high quality, empathic, great physicians is bringing a level of scholarly activity to the community. So another key element for our residency program is doing research and performance improvement projects. Family Medicine has the expectation that they do at a minimum at least 2 research projects. So they’re going to look at areas at the hospital, areas in the community, where they can do different projects to improve the overall health of the patients and the community.
Host: Well that certainly is much needed, really all over the country. So wrap it up for us Dr. Bacon, what would you like the listeners to know about the family medicine residency program of the UHS Southern California Medical Education Consortium?
Dr. Bacon: What I would like the community to know is our goal is to really produce incredible physicians for this community, improve the care that this community receives and improve the quality of care that they get specifically through Temecula Valley Hospital.
Host: It’s great information Dr. Bacon, thank you so much for coming on and telling us about the graduate medical education program at TVH and I think it’s great for the community to hear. Thank you again for joining us. That wraps up this episode of TVH Health Chat with Temecula Valley Hospital. You can head on over to our website at temeculavalleyhospital.com for more information and to get connected with one of our providers. If you found this podcast informative, please share on your social media and share with your friends and family, that way we can all learn from the experts together and don’t miss all the other interesting podcasts in our library. Physicians are independent practioners who are not employees or agents of Temecula Valley Hospital. The hospital shall not be liable for actions or treatments provided by physicians. This is Melanie Cole. Thanks so much for listening.