Clinical Training Sites
DCH Regional Medical Center; University Medical Center and local nursing homes provide training in the skills and procedures necessary to diagnose and treat a wide variety of problems in patients of all ages.
Inpatient Training
DCH Regional Medical Center, the primary hospital for the Family Medicine Residency, is located adjacent to the campus on University Boulevard. It serves as a referral hospital for patients in west central Alabama.
- DCH Regional Medical Center has 658 beds.
- The Family Medicine program is the only residency at DCH Regional Medical Center.
- Available services at the facility include:
A level 3 nursery- Full pediatric services
- An intensive care unit
- A coronary care unit
- An open-heart surgical unit
- An oncology unit
- A dialysis unit
- Outpatient surgery
- Stroke unit
- DCH Regional Medical Center has been designated as a level II trauma center.
- Available state-of-the-art diagnostic services include:
- Computerized axial tomography
- Magnetic resonance imaging
- Lithotripsy
Tuscaloosa’s Veterans Affairs Medical Center is a second hospital training site for the Family Practice Residency. This complex, located in east Tuscaloosa, provides a busy general medical service as well as comprehensive psychiatric services.
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The VA Medical Center is a 655-bed hospital emphasizing neuropsychiatry. - The medical service includes:
- An intensive care unit;
- A pulmonary laboratory.
- The complex houses a nursing-home unit for geriatric patients
Clinical Training Sites – Ambulatory Care
The University Medical Center (link to the virtual tour of UMC on the new pages) is the ambulatory care center for the residency. Located on The University of Alabama campus, the University Medical Center provides an environment in which the attitudes and skills of family medicine are emphasized.
The center draws patients from a 50-100 mile radius, an area comprising Tuscaloosa, the university, and numerous small towns and rural communities in west Alabama. Experiences obtained at the center provide residents with training in a wide variety of patient problems, as well as the skills and procedures necessary to practice in a number of different settings.
- Two family medicine suites are the primary sites of care.
- New residents are assigned their own panel of patients, the size of which increases over the residency.
- Family Medicine faculty are always available in the
- Center for consultation.
- Patient care at the center is supported by:
- A full-service laboratory
- Radiologic services
- A variety of diagnostic services, such as:
- Ultrasound
- Endoscopy
- Colposcopy
- GXT
- Available outpatient experiences include:
- Obstetrics and gynecology
- Pediatrics
- Internal medicine
- Surgery
- Psychiatry
- Occupational medicine
- Outpatient surgery
- In addition to primary medical care, the center offers:
- Patient education
- Dietetic services
- Social services
- Patients requiring hospitalization are admitted to the program’s inpatient service at DCH Regional Medical Center.
- Private offices of practicing family physicians are the site of a one-month supervised ambulatory care practice experience. In addition, residents work in the offices of subspecialty practitioners during their subspecialty rotations.