Promoting Primary Care
Family Medicine Residency Program Expands Across the WI Border
P
atients in rural settings have less access to health care and are more likely to die from the five leading causes of death than people who live in urban settings. According to a report published by the Wisconsin State Legislature in 2016, 26% of Wisconsin’s population lives in rural areas, but only 14% of all physicians practice in these communities. The HealthPartners Western Wisconsin Rural Family Medicine Residency Program was launched in 2017 in response to the shortage of primary care physicians, especially in rural areas. HealthPartners Hospitals and Clinics are located across Minnesota and western Wisconsin and the healthcare organization is committed to providing quality care close to home. This new residency program provides training to Family Medicine residents in rural Wisconsin with the goal to increase the number of primary care physicians who practice in these communities. This demonstrates our commitment to the training and development of future medical professionals to meet the needs of our members and patients. The HealthPartners Western Wisconsin Rural Family Medicine Residency Program, led by Dr. Jeremy Springer and Dr. David DeGear, is a “1-2 rural training track” in which the first year is spent in a traditional high-acuity urban hospital and the second and third years are embedded in well-established rural clinics with critical-access hospitals. There are approximately 30 Family Medicine rural training track programs across the United States and these programs provide an opportunity for urban and rural hospitals and nonhospital
By Kelly Frisch, MD
24
March/April 2020
clinical settings to promote rural training by forming residency programs in partnership. Residents in the HealthPartners’ program spend their first year training in St. Louis Park alongside the residents in the Methodist Hospital Family Medicine Residency Program. In years two and three, the residents move to western Wisconsin to split their time between Amery Hospital & Clinic and Westfields Hospital & Clinic in New Richmond, which are both critical access hospitals. They learn the full spectrum of primary care from four family medicine preceptors at each location and experience rural practice embedded in the community. In addition to primary care training, HealthPartners consultants across the range of medical and surgical subspecialists provide specialty education. This program offers unique training in Geriatric Psychiatry in the dedicated inpatient facility as well as wound management. The curriculum also includes topics such as rural health policy and practice management. In June 2019, the first resident, Dr. Catherine Kress, started training in western Wisconsin and next summer two more residents will join her to train at Amery and Westfields Hospitals and Clinics. By 2021, four residents will train each year in these communities as a way to increase the
number of primary care physicians who practice in rural and underserved areas of Wisconsin. Many Family Medicine residency programs are based in urban settings and offer 4-8 week rural rotations, but this may not provide the education and experiences to prepare for rural practice. Studies show that residents practice where they train. There is good evidence that the more time spent training in a rural setting, the greater the likelihood of graduate placement in a rural community practice. According to a study published in American Family Physician in 2013, 56% of Family Medicine residency graduates practice within 100 miles of where they completed their residency training, 39% locate within 25 miles, and 19% stay within five miles of their training program. Recruitment for this program is focused on those medical students who want to live and practice in rural communities. This includes students who grew up in rural communities and/or want to practice in a rural setting. The HealthPartners Western Wisconsin Rural Family Medicine Residency Program is the first primary care GME program sponsored by the HealthPartners Institute which also sponsors GME training programs in Emergency Medicine, Occupational Medicine, Dermatology, Emergency Medicine Services, Hand Surgery, Pediatric Emergency Medicine, Medical Toxicology, Foot and Ankle Surgery as well as Advanced Practice Clinicians Fellowships in Emergency Medicine, Psychiatry, Hospital Medicine and Primary Care. The startup of the HealthPartners Western Wisconsin Rural Family Medicine Residency Program was supported by a generous grant from the Wisconsin Department of Health Services
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The Journal of the Twin Cities Medical Society
