Author Archives: stfmguestblogger

Just Say No: Saving Your Sanity While Working in Academic Medicine

Posted on August 27, 2014 | 5 comments
David Norris, Jr, MD

David Norris, Jr, MD

Congratulations! You’ve received your appointment as a new faculty. Faculty evaluations and promotion and tenure reviews will arrive before you know it.

One way to shine in your first year, and to build your CV, is by serving on committees, engaging in research, publishing journal articles, and directing educational experiences. When you start, administrative time is likely spent completing your charts and twiddling your thumbs. You will want to fill that time and will be tempted to take the dozens of opportunities that comes your way. And why shouldn’t you be involved? You have the time—right?

Be careful about always saying yes. Beyond settling into your role as a faculty member, you have to protect your mental health. Getting involved in too much, too quickly, will emotionally, psychologically, and physically burn you out. Plus, you’ll miss great opportunities later on if you’re too busy with projects early on that are only of modest interest to you.

However, knowing when to say no—and then actually saying it—can be a challenge.

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5 Comments

Posted in Faculty Development, New Faculty in Family Medicine Collaborative

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How a Great Idea and an STFM Fellowship Empowered Underserved Children to Pursue Health Care Careers

Posted on July 25, 2014 | 2 comments
Renee Crichlow, MD,

Renee Crichlow, MD,

“What do you want to be when you grow up?”

My parents always asked me this. I learned later that this was about creating a vision and expectation of the future.

Now I am Dr Renee Crichlow, a family physician working and teaching family medicine in underserved North Minneapolis, and I ask every child I see, “What do you want to be when you grow up?”

Many answer doctor or nurse and yet in the medical school and the residency applications I rarely saw any kids from the neighborhood. My co-worker Shailey Prasad, MD, MPH, and I knew this was a complex problem not to be solved overnight.

We decided with the support of our department chair, Mac Baird, MD, MS, to build The Ladder, a structured health care pipeline mentorship program that incorporates hands-on science fun with values and character development designed to facilitate the development of lifelong learners and leaders interested in health care careers.

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2 Comments

Posted in Education, Family Medicine Stories, Leadership, Public Health

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Too Much of Anything Is Bad: Advising Students on the Number of Programs to Apply to

Posted on June 9, 2014 | 3 comments

By David Anthony, MD, MSc, Alec Chessman, MD, Kristina Duarte, MD, ScM, Katie Margo, MD, of Medicine Jacob Prunuske, MD, MSPH, and Martha Seagrave, PA-C.

This is in response to a previous blog post, How Faculty Can Prepare Students for the Match.

In an effort to address the increasing challenge of assisting students in obtaining family medicine positions in the Match, Michelfelder et al recently published a set of recommendations derived from discussions at sessions presented at the Society of Teachers of Family Medicine (STFM) Conference on Medical Student Education (MSE) and the Association of Departments of Family Medicine Conference. We commend the authors on their important work, and we support many of their recommendations, including:

  • Encouraging increased communication between medical school advisors and program directors
  • Discouraging students who do not “see themselves as thriving as family physicians” from applying to family medicine programs

However, we take issue with one of their recommendations, and pose an alternate viewpoint.

The authors state that “Most clerkship directors recommend students apply to 20–40 programs to increase interview offers.” While this statement may represent the prevailing voiced opinion during the lecture discussion at MSE, we take issue with the claim that most clerkship directors recommend students apply to 20–40 programs, and we vigorously disagree with the recommendation. Broadly encouraging students to apply to such a large number of programs will worsen the challenges of students in obtaining interviews and residency positions.

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3 Comments

Posted in Education, Match, Medical School

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