All in the Family

My Family Medicine rotation just ended this past Friday with a nice exam. More about that later. Let me tell you how this, my fourth block of my third year, unfolded. Family Medicine is an interesting specialty. It is one of the primary care fields, which means that a Family Physician (FP) is going to be the first doctor that a patient sees once they are sick. If they need imaging, a more intensive workup, or their problem is out of the scope of general medicine, then the FP will refer the patient to the proper channels. But don't for a minute think that FPs have it easy. They have to cover the fields of internal medicine (aka: adult medicine), pediatrics, and OB/Gyn (the OB part is optional, not all FPs will deliver babies, but they will at least refer you to an OB if that is what you need), and some specialize in sports medicine or geriatrics. So in essence, FPs cover medicine and health from the cradle to the grave.

While I was on this rotation, my experience was just as varied as an FPs schedule. I was rotating through Crozer's Family Medicine Residency Program, so I worked with attendings and upper year residents. Also, for the first time, I was rotating through with students from Drexel, UMDNJ, and PCOM. My time there was split between two different offices, one big (12 exam rooms), one small (4 exam rooms), and I also spent a week in a nearby hospital. So most of my time was spent seeing patients in the office for sick visits, well visits, follow-ups, etc. Interspersed throughout the office time were some other activities. For instance, I spend one morning with the nurse practitioner going on home visits to people who were home-bound. On another morning I worked with the medical assistants and honed my skills in taking vital signs and running labs. I also learned how to draw blood for lab tests (something I hadn't learned on my previous rotations). A couple of my afternoons were spent visiting patients in a nearby nursing home. And one day per week was spent in lectures (I even had to prepare two lecture presentations to present in front of my peers).

Now, about the exam. At the beginning of this rotation, the clerkship director told us that that the shelf exam for this rotation was ridiculously hard, and there was no point in studying for it. Well, most of us students still felt compelled to try to do some preparation for the exam. I managed to get some reading done every night, and I also did some practice questions. Don't forget, I've also already taken the shelf exams for Medicine, and Pediatrics. These were very good preparation for the Family Medicine exam. So, for the first time, I actually thought the shelf exam was very straightforward -- not easy, but manageable.

Overall, I liked this rotation. I've never considered Family Medicine as a career, and I still don't think it is for me, but I enjoyed the residents and some of the attendings very much. They are a very fun group. I guess you could say that they made me feel like part of the team or... family.