When a medical student interviews for our residency program we ask them, “Why us? What made you apply to the UA Family and Community Medicine Residency Program?” On the flip side, our applicants ask us, “What makes your program special? Why do you continue to work at this residency program?” The answer to both sets of questions is the same: our mission! We are a mission-driven program, with the goal of preparing full-spectrum family physicians from diverse backgrounds dedicated to social justice and health equity to provide family-centered, community-responsive care for rural, underserved, and vulnerable populations.
Our work has never felt more important. The Association of American Medical Colleges estimates a shortfall of nearly 43,000 primary care doctors by 2030. The U.S. Census Bureau estimates the U.S. population is expected to grow by about 2.3 million people each year between now and 2030.
Our community and family medicine residents inspire us to evolve as a program to best address the social injustices within our communities. Thus, we are committed to attract talented residents who want to learn the best of medicine, how to become change agents that address dysfunctional systems that negatively impact the health of our patients and our communities, and how to build and invest in primary care relationships with their patients. We developed a "Community Medicine Track" for select residents to spend more time in our Mobile Health Family Medicine Clinic, and to dedicate their resident scholarly project to a community medicine quality improvement initiative. Our interdisciplinary refugee clinic continues to operate at the Banner – University Medicine Family Medicine Clinic at South Campus, and has expanded to the Banner – University Medicine Family Medicine Clinic at Alvernon. To address the ever-growing opioid use disorder epidemic, all residents are trained in medication assisted treatment for opioid use disorder and rotate through an Addiction Medicine block.
At times (especially during the COVID pandemic), residency education and delivering the highest quality of care within a primary care setting while operating in an overworked and strained health care system, seemed to be increasingly difficult. So, we have added programming to help our residents build skills in resiliency and preventing burnout.
A gift to support our Residency Education Fund will help us continue to support our residents' education, by enabling us to recognize them for the work that they do, and to help them learn skills of resiliency, teamwork, and self-care through year-round activities that build community and boost morale. Thank you for your support of our program and our phenomenal residents, who daily remind us of what it means to be a physician that is mission-driven, exemplifies high-integrity and is committed to making the lives of their patients and the health of our communities better. Donate here [this will be linked]