Internal Medicine

Primary Care Residency Program

The University of Kentucky offers a unique program to provide residency training in Primary Care Internal Medicine. As the demand for primary care general internists increases, there is increased recognition of the need for high quality generalist training. The Primary Care Residency Program at the University of Kentucky strives to provide a well-developed, structured curriculum to prepare our primary care residents for practicing the specialty of generalist internal medicine in both urban and rural inpatient and outpatient settings.  Those choosing this track are not obligated to do Primary Care post residency.  

Our Primary Care program offers training experiences uniquely required to practice general internal medicine, including:

• instructional and clinical learning activities that are fully integrated with our traditional medicine training curriculum.
• excellent preparation for practicing general internal medicine in a managed care environment in urban and small community settings.
• community-based rotations to prepare you for expanding opportunities for internists in private practice and rural communities.
• nearly 50% of total training time during 2nd and 3rd years are in ambulatory settings.
• board pass-rate of >95% for the past ten years.

Our graduates are well-trained in common ambulatory problems they will encounter in their future practice as general internists in addition to the traditional core training in internal medicine provided by the hospital-based rotations. In addition to resident noon conferences with traditional core medicine topics, the primary care residents participate in a two-year curriculum reviewing ambulatory primary care topics, including:

• Hopkins modules, covering topics that complement their noon conference, morning report and other traditional learning activities, conference, morning report and other traditional learning activities.
• Four - six (depending on the year) months scheduled in Ambulatory Care, rotating in a variety of traditional internal medicine specialty as well as non-internal medicine clinics.
• Small group workshop series during the Ambulatory Care rotation, reviewing medical economics and practice management, and a variety of outpatient topics.
• One month each year in a community-based rotation, practicing general internal medicine side by side with private practice physicians. These rotations are among the highest rated rotations by our residents.
• Primary Care Chief Residents who are responsible for organizing bimonthly meetings consisting of journal clubs, test questions or other educational activities.

Rotation Descriptions

The Primary Care Residency Program and traditional Categorical program are fully integrated and as such many rotations are common to both.  These include UK Wards, VA Wards, Good Samaritan, MICU, CCU, Neurology, Morehead offsite for interns, and Consults.

Rotations unique to the Primary Care tract include:

Ambulatory Care

The Primary Care Track offers a variety of Internal Medicine subspecialty clinics and non-Internal Medicine clinics.  Examples of non-Internal Medicine clinics include; Sports Medicine, ENT, Urology, Rehab Medicine, Dermatology, Ophthalmology, Neurology, Palliative Care, Psychiatry, Geriatrics, and Podiatry.

One evening each week during the rotation each resident is assigned to work at the Salvation Army Clinic which is a free clinic run by medical students, but staffed by UK faculty.

First Year - Ambulatory Care (AC) month is a complete emersion into the continuity clinic experience.  While on AC  you will have 8 continuity clinics per week.  Two half days are allotted for program tasks (PBLI, Hopkins Modules, etc.)

Second Year - AC month consists of 4 continuity clinics and 4 subspecialty clinics with each month rotating among all the medicine subspecialties. 

Third Year - This year consists of 6 1/2 days of continuity clinic and 2 1/2 days of non-medicine specialties (Sports Medicine, ENT, Psychiatry, Derm, Allergy).  The majority of this year (5 1/2 months) is spent in outpatient Ambulatory Clinic.

Off Site Rotations

In the 2nd and 3rd years each Primary Care resident does a one month offsite, outpatient rotation in a rural town with in a one hour drive from Lexington.  Often, the preceptors at these rotations are former graduates of our UK residency program which helps ensure the quality of the teaching.  This allows our resident to see the business side of a private practice and the challenges/limitations of being in a rural setting.  One site, Cynthiana, is a Medicine-Pediatrics practice which allows our residents to see adolescents.  

Women's Health

Within the primary care tract is a more specific curriculum regarding Women's Health. This gives the resident more gender specific experience from faculty whose passion is Women’s Health. After your initial intern year in primary care, you may choose to have one of your two continuity clinics in the Center for the Advancement of Women’s Health in each of the next two years. Your ambulatory care rotation can be customized to allow you to experience gynecologic office procedures under the guidance of experienced physicians. Pre-clinic conferences are also specifically designed with the care of women in mind. Additionally, there is an elective in Women’s Health for the third year to further your knowledge.

For more questions concerning the Primary Care Residency Program, please contact:

Jacqueline S. Gibson, MD, FACP
Professor of Medicine
Primary Care Residency Program Director
Department of Internal Medicine
jsgibs2@uky.edu

Linda White
Program Coordinator
900 South Limestone
304 B Charles T. Wethington Bldg.
Lexington, KY 40536-0200
859-323-9918
lindawhite@uky.edu