The Specialist in You

This is a finalist in the 2015 STFM Blog Competition

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Avelina Sandoval, MD

“You only see what you look for. You only recognize what you know.”

My attending’s words resonated in my mind as I stood there in my short white coat amidst the chaos of the busy trauma bay. It had been an extremely long night.

I was on my mandatory trauma call as a freshly minted third-year medical student. We had heard stories from our upper classmates about what to expect as we left our classroom nest and went off into the hospitals. We would either get to do “doctor-ly” things or we would get stuck with grunt work depending on who was on our team and how busy the service was.

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Reaching Potential Teachers Like Me

Sonya Shipley, MD,

Sonya Shipley, MD,

One day I received an email from STFM about a task force that seemed awesome, but I did not want to apply. My initial thought was, “That seems great, but I am not qualified for that.” You see, I had only been back on faculty for a little over a year, and I wondered, “What do I have to contribute?” Well, in comes my work mother, also known as my department chair, who says, “Apply! You have lots to offer.” Fast forward to today. Guess who is serving on the Faculty for Tomorrow Taskforce—Moi!

The mission of the task force is to prepare faculty today for family medicine tomorrow—to reach those excellent clinical teachers from residency or community practice who have what it takes to shape the next generation of family medicine clinicians. Fantabulous mission, right?

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Pay it Backward and Pay it Forward on #GivingTuesday

 Victoria Gorski, MD

Victoria Gorski, MD

I’m writing to ask you to put the STFM Foundation on your list of worthy causes to contribute to this year on #GivingTuesday.

The STFM Foundation plays a critical role in nurturing people at all phases of the career life cycle in academic family medicine. So this time of year presents a fitting opportunity for giving a gift to the organization that is likely to be for you, as it is for me, your primary professional family.

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