What's Different About Our Program?

The RPSM is unique in the close collaboration of all three primary care specialties: Family Practice, Pediatrics and Internal Medicine. Residents in all three disciplines work and learn together in a variety of clinical seminars and social medicine courses. Each discipline brings special strengths to these conjoint learning experiences. The developmental perspective of pediatrics emphasizes health promotion, anticipatory guidance, and disease prevention; the problem-focused approach of internal medicine emphasizes differential diagnosis and rigorous critiques of the scientific evidence; and the contextual perspective of family medicine emphasizes relationships and interactions between doctor, patient, and family.

Emphasis on Community-Oriented Primary Care

In addition to practicing in the outpatient and specialty clinics of the hospital, residents build their own practices in an ambulatory care setting in the community, away from the hospital. There, supervision is provided by full-time primary care attendings, each of whom has an appointment on the Montefiore staff. Emphasis is placed on the relationship between primary and community health care.

Health Care Team Experience

Residents are trained to be members of health care teams that include nurse practitioners, nurses, social workers, nutritionists and psychologists. Team members share the responsibility for delivering and coordinating care to families who are, themselves, part of the health team.

The Partnership System

After the first several months of training, each resident joins with another in his or her track to share responsibility for one house staff position. While one member of the partnership fulfills the in-hospital obligations of the residency, the other meets the ambulatory care responsibilities and participates in program-related activities. Partners share responsibility for their continuity practices.

Social Medicine Curriculum

Few residency programs offer as much training in social medicine and community health. Core rotations in Medical Spanish, Epidemiology and Community Assessment, and Understanding the Health System are expected, and a social medicine project is required.

Complementary Therapies

At our health centers acupuncture, shiatsu, biofeedback, and herbal therapies are offered and integrated with primary care. Electives are available to residents interested in behavioral medicine, meditation, acupressure, and other therapies derived from non-allopathic medical and healing traditions.