General Internal Medicine Fellowship
Education and research | Fellowship training | Faculty
Research | Contact information | Application
Education and research
The Virginia Commonwealth University offers a two-year fellowship in General Internal Medicine to board eligible physicians. The fellowship will offer intense training to physicians preparing to enter the following
- Academic general internal medicine
- Health care delivery administration
- Health services research training
- Industry
Fellowship training
America is undergoing a revolution in the financing, composition and delivery of health care, apart from government attempts to reform care. Underlying these discussions of health care are several problems: how to improve the quantity and quality of primary care; how to improve technical effectiveness and decrease technical costs of care; and how to improve physician accountability without compromising the physician-patient relationship.
Fellows will be trained in health services research. Formal training will consist of accredited degree programs for either the Master of Health Administration or Master of Public Health. Finishing course work will be required for these degrees during the fellowship. A strong didactic component including established research conferences is included in the fellowship.
Individual research project
Fellows will be required to conduct an individual research project in one of several tracks they may choose. Each fellow will be assigned a career mentor, and each will choose a separate research mentor appropriate to their chosen research track. In addition, fellows will be trained in the practical aspects of research, including project management and data management. Writing for publication and writing to obtain funding will be taught. Results of the project are expected to be suitable for publication in peer reviewed journals and presentation at national meetings.
Medical education research
A unique feature of the fellowship will involve fellows in a group research project in medical education. This research will be designed in the context of a faculty development program for full-time faculty and community preceptors in primary care.
Clinical work
Throughout this fellowship, fellows will spend one half day per week precepting residents and students in a VCU ambulatory teaching site for nine months per year. Site directors will be responsible for evaluating the quality of precepting by fellows. Fellows also will spend one half day per week caring for their own continuity panel of patients. It is planned that fellows will follow their own patients when admitted to the hospital. Fellows will be precepted by VCU faculty. Fellows will spend up to one month per year ward attending, and one additional month per year attending on the General Medicine Consult Service.
Faculty
Most faculty also attend on the inpatient general medicine ward services, where they take an active role in teaching internal medicine from the generalist perspective. In addition, the General Medicine Consult Service is staffed entirely by the division faculty, who provides housestaff with the principles of inpatient consultation with a particular emphasis on preoperative patient assessment.
Outcomes research
Long before the revolution in health care, the Division of General Internal Medicine/Primary Care was engaging in groundbreaking research on these topics. Today, the division remains vigorously engaged in research designed to inform and improve health care delivery and effectiveness. Please visit the outcomes research and faculty sections of the Division of General Internal Medicine/Primary Care home page for a complete listing of current projects and potential mentors.
Fellowship contact information
Program director
Wally R. Smith, M.D.
P.O. Box 980306
Richmond, Virginia 23298-0306
Phone: (804) 828-6938
E-mail: wrsmith@hsc.vcu.edu
Application
For application please complete and send us the application form below:
Application (PDF)
