The fellowship aims to increase the number of practitioners providing compassionate and competent geriatrics care in rural communities where specialty care is limited. Fellows receive education in various settings, including inpatient and outpatient care, hospice, skilled nursing facilities, rural ambulatory care, geropsychology day programs, inpatient geripsychiatry care, and pharmacology clinics. They benefit from educational offerings from multiple colleges and interact with learners from diverse backgrounds. Fellows also teach medical students, family medicine residents, and community members, and develop as learners and teachers through national networking opportunities and intensive training programs. Additionally, fellows undertake a scholarly project during their fellowship. Graduates will be equipped to provide competent geriatrics care in community, inpatient, and long-term care settings, and serve as trusted geriatrics consultants for their colleagues.
The fellowship aims to provide additional geriatric training to family physicians to help them acquire the skills necessary to meet the existing and future needs of rural and underserved areas. While the fellowship is based at the same location as a primary family medicine residency, it is open to both family medicine and internal medicine residents, as both are eligible for board certification under the ACGME.
Goals & Aims
- Provide additional training in geriatric medicine with an emphasis on rural geriatric care. The fellowship is available to family medicine physicians as well as internal medicine physicians who have successfully completed an ACGME accredited residency program. The fellowship will provide training to produce physicians to meet the healthcare needs unique to older adults, and especially for older adults in rural areas, in keeping with the mission of CCHS to train a rural physician workforce.
- Train fellows so that they achieve competence in the ACGME competencies and the Entrustable Professional Activities (EPAs) described in the Geriatrics Milestones 2.0 and EPAs project, in order to produce a well-rounded, competent geriatrics workforce.
- Equip fellows with the knowledge needed to be learners and teachers in their field, and provide them with opportunities for teaching in residency, medical school and community settings.
- Encourage fellows to be scholars in their field and to undertake scholarly activity to further the field of geriatrics and to add to an environment of intellectual curiosity in the college. Fellows will be given access to resources that encourage these scholarly endeavors.
- Involve fellows and community partners in development of a comprehensive geriatrics curriculum, and continuously assess the program to reflect current practices in geriatrics and to maximize educational benefit for the fellows.
- Provide fellows with opportunities to interact with other practitioners in the field through networking opportunities, development programs through professional societies, and through specialty specific conferences.ms: