Dr Lisa Barkley Offers Insight Regarding the Unique Aspects of the CDU Residency Program
“ What’ s written on the walls should be written in the halls,” as quoted by Dr. Barkley
With all of the residents from different disciplines together for the introductory training section during the first month, do you see that format as precedent-setting?
I think there’ s a lot of value in that format. It allows the residents to get a sense of the institutional values, and a sense of the community in which they serve. And I don’ t think you can get that if you don’ t take the time. From somewhere, there’ s always going to be a time challenge. I think that when they do that right in the beginning, some of our residents have said during the sessions that it really helps to ground them in why they are a resident working in a specific community. And they feel like they’ re lucky to have that opportunity.
There’ s also the challenge of other residents around the country who are in the hospital doing other things. But considering that residency training is years long, the few weeks that we take in the beginning, I don’ t think ultimately impacts them negatively on things that they may have missed in the first few weeks.
Why was this training approach deemed desirable?
Because today, you have to work across disciplines. That’ s not something that we do very well in medicine in general. When a family medicine resident meets a psychiatry resident at the beginning of their training, and they realize that they have common goals, and they can see some of the things that the other discipline does that their discipline doesn’ t, that will make them better team members as they move forward in their careers. What are the benefits?
They get to understand the community in a context to which in which their training occurs. And I think that when you are in a community safety net type program that’ s essential to your ability to address the issues, then everybody has a common understanding of principles of social medicine and health equity. The second thing, I think, is that they’ re better equipped to address health disparities because of this experience. Our thoughts are that they’ re going to apply that more in their practice and be better equipped to address health disparities.
Do you think that building camaraderie in the early training can make a difference long term?
I do, because it’ s not just that they are getting to socialize. They also are taking a course together. They are having discussion groups and they’ re doing community-based research together. They’ re doing community mapping exercises together. I think that interdisciplinary cross pollination as they do these activities is the thing that’ s going to impact them in the longer term in their careers, because they are going to have a better sense of what some of the other disciplines do, and how the other disciplines think about common problems. I think that will help them because we have to work together in referrals and in teams, as you go through your career. This experience provides a unique interdisciplinary experience that doesn’ t happen very often.
CDU College of Medicine | PG. 28