I am glad the bill includes training for internal medicine and pediatric physicians, as well as family practitioners. I am not certain the Family Medicine training program at the UW handles those other residencies, however, and this should be checked into. Family practitioners are not the only providers of primary care. Internists often handle the more complex, elderly chronically ill patients who tend to be the ones who would benefit most from the medical home model. The American College of Physicians (ACP) has long been an advocate of this model and has helped to develop it. Many internal medicine programs have long had two tracks, one, a primary care track; the other, termed 'traditional' with more hospital focus, often pre-specialization. You want to increase numbers in the primary care track. Pediatricians, of course, care for the sicker children in a community, as well as providing high quality preventive care for all patients under 18.
Thank you. I think the title of the bill should reflect this as well and be changed: "Increasing primary care residency positions."
Lisa Plymate, M.D., internist practicing in Washington state since 1978 - and still going! doing primary care