Thursday, May 03, 2007

Areas of Concentration

Residents: Areas of Concentration will be offered in the 2007-08 academic year. Residents may choose to complete ONE formal area of concentration. Guidelines are below. The AOC draft document for Advanced Obstetrics is available for individual customization and was distributed by email. You may email me for additional copies. Additionally, you may use that document as a template for designing AOCs in other curricular areas. Options may include (but are not limited to): Integrative Medicine, International Health, Academic Family Medicine/Research, Sports Medicine, Geriatrics, etc.

Please contact me if you would like to discuss or have any further questions. I hope that some of you will choose to complete AOCs this upcoming year.

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The Association of Family Medicine Residency Directors recommend individual Areas of Concentration (AOC) to provide a common framework around which residents, program directors, and faculty may design additional, optional training for an individual resident that is above and beyond the core training in family medicine.

Guidelines for Individual Areas of Concentration

A. Written program of study including competency-based goals and objectives. Evaluation measures should be included.
B. Faculty mentor is to be identified and the resident will review their progress periodically with their faculty mentor.
C. Suggested time frame is 4 to 8 months duration. Focused blocks of time (4 week block electives) and/or longitudinal components are possible formats. Specific time frames will vary based on goals and objectives as chosen by the resident.
D. Scholarly Project – must be presented at least locally, although presentation at the state or national level is encouraged. (Resident is responsible for funding travel and other related expenses. Use of discretionary funds is allowed.)
E. Resident will attend a CME meeting in the AOC. (Resident is responsible for funding travel and other related expenses. Use of discretionary funds is allowed.)
F. Resident will present a critical appraisal of a current journal article in their AOC.
G. Quality outcomes should be demonstrated and documented in the AOC with case logs, patient outcome data and faculty reviews of resident competency, as appropriate to the AOC goals and objectives.
H. A letter summarizing the training completed will be written by the Program Director for placement in the resident’s portfolio and attached to the final residency completion letter.

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