East Kentucky Family Medicine Residency Program
Mission
The mission of the UK Department of Family and Community Medicine, East Kentucky Family Medicine Residency Program in Hazard, Kentucky is to select and train family medicine residents who will practice as physicians in rural areas. The training is designed to prepare residents for meeting the unique demands of a rural practice and provide quality care in rural settings.
Community-Based, University-Administered
The residency program is a community-based, university-administered program accredited by the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education and American Osteopathic Association and approved for four residents in each postgraduate year.
Dual accreditation of training allows the residency to attract graduates of all three Kentucky medical schools and continue its record of success in placing graduates in rural areas. Applicants with an interest in rural practice and with ties to rural Kentucky are strongly considered for admission to the residency. The result is that the majority of graduates have chosen rural practice, mainly in Kentucky.
Rural Medicine Curriculum
Committed to improving health of rural people, the faculty has implemented a well-functioning curriculum that addresses the intricacies of rural medicine. The curriculum not only provides the residents with excellent training in the diagnosis and treatment of disease, but also emphasizes community-oriented primary care, which is vital to rural medicine.
The UK North Fork Valley Community Health Center, the residency’s model clinic, emphasizes quality of care in an environment that provides multi-disciplinary education to residents, medical students, nurse practitioner students and other health care professionals. Community health centers are required to deliver preventive and primary care services to patients regardless of their ability to pay.
The Eastern Kentucky Veteran’s Center (EKVC) is a 120-bed long-term care facility that opened in March 2002. The residency program is responsible for the medical direction of EKVC and residents follow their own patients as part of the geriatric curriculum.
The residency’s primary hospital facility, the Hazard ARH Regional Medical Center, includes a 208-bed medical and surgical hospital, a 100-bed psychiatric hospital, and a large outpatient facility. A variety of sophisticated diagnostic and treatment services are available at the medical center. The hospital serves patients from southeastern Kentucky, a service area that includes more than 150,000 residents. The active and consulting physicians represent a wide range of medical specialties. Most of the physicians on the active medical staff are appointed to voluntary faculty status with UK and are involved in the education of the family medicine residents.
Collaborations with Community and Education Programs
The presence of the residency in the UK Center of Excellence in Rural Health-Hazard offers an opportunity for health disciplinary education with a variety of health professionals and collaboration with community programs.
The residency also works closely with the Southeast Kentucky Area Health Education Center. AHECs provide rural health education opportunities for health professions education programs at University of Kentucky, University of Louisville, Lincoln Memorial University-DeBusk College of Osteopathic Medicine, and the Kentucky College of Osteopathic Medicine. The Southeast Kentucky AHEC has a fully functional medical library, located at Hazard ARH, available for medical professionals with assistance provided for students and residents.