Program Highlights

Dear candidates,

Thank you for your interest in our residency training program and an opportunity for me to tell you why we can be the RIGHT CHOICE for you.

At Western, we specialize in training comprehensive family physicians and future leaders in family medicine. We do this through a highly adaptable program along with tailor-made curriculums and educational programs for residents.

We believe that residency is a rite of passage that is much more than just a means to getting a medical license and that you are the best judge in the kind of experience that can assist you in becoming the physician and person that you aspire to be. Because of this we have built our program around these three values (please click on each for details):

Because we truly mean business when it comes to developing leaders, we will be launching a new and exciting leadership training program in July 2010 to better prepare our residents to become future leaders in our communities, hospitals and medical educational institutions.

I have lived in London (www.goodmovelondon.com) for over 10 years and I can attest to the fact that London is a great city to work and live in, AND to have fun in! London provides a lower cost of living compared to other cities of similar qualities and more over, the London and surrounding area offers an enormous range of cultural and recreational activities!

I look forward to meeting you in person at our information sessions so that I can show you more about our program!

Sincerely,

Eric Wong, MD, MClSc (FM), CCFP

Flexibility that can be tailored to your unique learning needs:

We offer 5 programs: London Urban, London Regional, Rural, Windsor and Chatham-Kent

London Urban program and Windsor program offers urban and suburban experiences
London Regional program offers rural experience within driving distance from London in Mount Brydges, Strathroy and Tavistock; residents can live in London yet obtain comprehensive rural training
Chatham-Kent program offers rural experience in a large community hospital
Rural program offers rural experience in Goderich and Hanover

Regardless of which program you’re in, you will have access to rotations at all community sites and not limited to rotations at the tertiary care centres in London
Ample elective time:

Up to 7 rotations of electives and 1 core selective: 2 rotations of family medicine electives in PGY1, 3 blocks of general electives, 1 block of core selective in PGY2, 2 blocks of rural family medicine electives in PGY2 for residents in the rural program
Horizontal elective time during PGY2 family medicine block time
One block of elective can be taken out-of-province or internationally

Special Interest Electives (takes place for a limited # of sessions in the evenings) for those with added interests in specific areas. We currently have a emergency medicine special interest elective and have plans to develop more
An academic program based on a credit earning system that allows you to customize learning to your preferred style and make use of opportunities such as formal faculty development sessions, workshops, conferences, self-reading, and online CME activities to fulfill required learning objectives
The ability to take a 1-month vacation elective
The ability to take a 1-month research elective for purposes on working on a research project that fulfills the requirement of the residency project
Strong support for research interests from world-renowned primary care researchers:

The Centre for Studies in Family Medicine (http://www.uwo.ca/fammed/csfm/) is a world-renowned primary care research facility
Experienced staff at the Centre is available to assist residents who want to undertake research activities during their residency
The Canadian Library of Family Medicine (http://www.cfpc.ca/English/cfpc/clfm/main/), the library service of the College of Family Physicians of Canada, is located in the Allyn & Betty Taylor Library at the University of Western Ontario. It provides accessible and comprehensive support for academic endeavours

A program that cares about you more than just "another resident”:

Faculty advisor where a faculty member will provide 1:1 support for you throughout your residency training program whether you’re doing on- or off-service rotations. Mandatory meetings/discussions are held quarterly.
Resident to faculty ratio is 1:greater than 1 to 2:1 depending on the training site
Patient volume during family medicine training is tailored to the needs and skills of the resident. Generally,

PGY1s see patients about every half-hour
PGY2s see patients about every 15 minutes
On a weekly basis, residents see between 40-50 patients

FMRW (Family Medicine Residents of Western) (http://fmrw.uwofm.ca/), a non-profit, resident driven, organization that looks after your educational and social needs:

Annual orientation BBQ and games
Annual golf tournament
Informal gatherings throughout the year
Annual 3-day retreat at a nearby golf resort that emphasizes issues on practice and financial management

A program that places emphasis on your education and training:

Family medicine training that lets you take charge of "your” practice:

You will be the primary health care provider for the same group of patients throughout your training, ensuring continuity of care for you patients as well as allowing you to experience building special relationships with your patients
You will be participating in all aspects of care for your patients: office, house calls, palliative care, child birth, long-term care facilities, acute/chronic hospital care, minor surgical procedures
Requires NO half-day back, which is often disruptive to the educational experience in your off-service rotations

Ample time and opportunities are provided for educational activities:

During family medicine training there are scheduled weekly teaching sessions
Throughout the entire residency, there is a weekly half-day of protected time from all clinical duties on Wednesday afternoon for purposes of educational activities. This time is allotted for you to complete the requirements of the academic program. You have a choice of either:
Attending pre-arranged seminars on selected topics
Do your own learning the way you like it: reading, online CME, workshops, faculty development sessions

A behavioural medicine curriculum that replaces mandatory psychiatry rotations at most programs. It includes:

Mental health teaching seminars on selected Wednesday afternoons
Small group learning on effective interviewing, communication and relationship building skills
Regular direct observations of your patient encounters with feedback done by your family medicine preceptors
Opportunities to work with other mental health professionals (e.g. social workers)
Optional clinical psychiatry rotations for some programs

A comprehensive procedures curriculum that is based on multimedia teaching tools such as videos and anatomic models. It has the most comprehensive resource list/links on where you can learn required procedures based on free resources available to our residents (http://www.familymedicineuwo.ca/residents/rh_procedural.html)
A comprehensive palliative care curriculum that includes choices in different type of palliative care rotations and education sessions (http://www.familymedicineuwo.ca/residents/rh_end_of_life.html)
A curriculum map (http://www.familymedicineuwo.ca/residents/rh_objectives.html) to help guide you and let you keep track of your own learning
A wide variety of PGY3 programs:

Emergency Medicine
Child Health
Sport Medicine
Anesthesia
Care of the Elderly
Academic Family Medicine
Other self-designed programs

A program where you can make a difference:

We have resident representation on almost every committee, subcommittee and taskforce of our postgraduate programs
Regular feedback sessions are held at each teaching site
Evaluations of all rotations and educational seminars are reviewed regularly and necessary improvements made