Family medicine residency learning style

[bubbletea47]

Whats your learning style as a FM resident? Given that broad scope, how can you ensure after your residency you're well equipped to handle most cases that come through your door? I will be starting my residency in FM soon, and it is not at any of the 'top universities' or locations, so I guess I am just worried about not seeing everything I need to be seeing and was curious what learning methods different people utilize to ensure they are successful once in independent practice

[MDinCanada]

following

[medigeek]

Read a lot and find some niches. Learn enough so you can manage most things on your own/minimize referrals. I've done Uworld for internal med and FM in addition to MKSAP. I know attendings several years into practice who still "study" routinely. 

However, there's going to be a balance. You can do clinic with inpatient/ED but you probably won't be also doing Ob and other stuff while being excellent at all of those. There's just no way to keep up with literature in every single area nowadays. But ultimately strive to be the most well read doctor. 

[Wachaa]

Surprisingly, what walks through your door in day to day practice is very different depending on your practice location and work type.

For example: urban vs rural, affluent neighborhood vs not, hospital vs clinic.

The good news is that each program across Canada is fairly consistent in terms of how many weeks dedicated to each block, as well as elective time.

I'd favor choosing electives that meet your goals. For example, all my electives were done in urban family practice community clinics because that's where I knew I would practice once residency was over. Other people picked rural, and some people chose ICU, etc since they were going for ER+1. Some did more maternity care, whereas I did the absolute minimum.

Even on blocks such as Internal/ Surgery/ OB/ Ortho, etc, I tried to get as much time working with preceptors in their clinics as much as possible. That way I would see more cases (eg. 4 office presentations vs 1 hour of a single surgery case in the OR). I'd also see the variety of cases that family doctors would refer to specialists.