An individualized, ambulatory-focused curriculum.

We work hard to ensure that everything our residents do is relevant to their future careers in ambulatory medicine. Our core curricular focus is that residents experience “office every day,” so that learning during specialist rotations can immediately be applied to outpatient primary care. This approach also ensures that our graduating residents achieve nearly double the ACGME requirement of 1,000 clinic hours. Those clinic hours are accompanied by hundreds of progress notes, even more InBasket messages, and repeated exposure to the primary care presentations residents need to be ready for independent practice. The intensity of our outpatient training also allows residents to “choose their own adventure” via elective opportunities and longitudinal tracks without worrying about crowding out important learning in the clinic.

Curricular Highlights

  • Inpatient service consists of two PGY1 residents and one PGY2/3 senior. This reduces the amount of time upper class residents spend on the inpatient team, allowing us to intensify ambulatory training.

  • No dedicated ICU or night float blocks.

  • Maternity Care block is spent one-on-one with community preceptors, participating in deliveries when they do. There is no Obstetric floor call where residents sit and wait for deliveries to come in.

  • Specialty rotations such as General Surgery, Nephrology, and Cardiology are almost entirely outpatient based.

  • Weekly Wednesday didactics are designed for adult learners and require residents to be directly involved in teaching. We focus on resident-led and faculty-facilitated small group discussions and not on expert provided PowerPoint presentations.

  • Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) topics are integrated regularly throughout our didactics. Our DEI committee plans monthly spotlights that our residents present to faculty, residents, and staff during all-office business meetings.

  • Weekly Thursday afternoon didactics alternate between Sports Medicine/Ultrasound and Osteopathic Manipulative Medicine. Our OMM didactics take place at Ohio University Heritage College of Osteopathic Medicine’s Dublin campus, using their state-of-the-art OMM lab.

  • A wide range of curricular tracks allow residents to focus their family medicine education. Most of these tracks are designed for PGY2/3 residents. See below for more details!

Curricular Tracks

  • We are proud to offer exceptional training in Osteopathic Medicine. We hold ACGME Osteopathic Recognition, with a robust didactic and practical experience in Osteopathic Manipulative Treatment.

    • We provide biweekly lectures and hands-on sessions, using the nearby facilities at the Ohio University Heritage College of Osteopathic Medicine Dublin Campus OMT lab. These lab sessions are "clinically oriented," organized by presenting pathology with a focus on creating efficient and effective treatment approaches that can be immediately used in the office. Labs are typically led by Dr. Byler, with occasional help from interested residents or guest speakers.

    • We provide direct one-to-one supervision of resident OMT encounters three half days a week in our OMT Clinic. Direct supervision provides significant benefits to our resident learners. Attendings can provide immediate feedback, demonstrate new techniques, and evaluate resident competency.

    • Residents are encouraged to routinely use OMT in their personal clinic time. These visits are typically indirectly supervised and allow residents to grow in confidence and practice skills they have gained in didactics and the OMT clinic.

    • Our residents far exceed the ACGME required minimum of 50 OMT encounters, with graduating residents routinely seeing 150-250 encounters.

    • Residents meet with Dr. Byler biannually to review their progress and future goals in OMT. We work together to ensure that time in the OMT clinic is tailored to residents' individual goals.

    Allopathic Focused Curriculum for MDs:

    We have designed our OMT curriculum to be accessible for both DO and MD residents. The clinical orientation of our didactic labs make them accessible to MDs who already have a clear understanding of pathology based on their training. The direct observation in OMT clinic allows for individualized training adapted to each resident's proficiency. Our residency program has successfully trained multiple MD residents to demonstrate clear competency in OMT techniques prior to graduation.

    If you have questions about the Osteopathic Medicine Track, please email Dr. Byler at dorvan.byler@ohiohealth.com for more details.

  • Our longitudinal psychotherapy track trains PGY2/3 residents to better understand psychotherapy techniques including Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) and Motivational Interviewing through didactic training and actual practice.

    Residents meet every other Friday morning to complete didactic modules in the first few blocks, then see their own panel of counseling patients for the rest of the year. The track is overseen by Dr. Byler and our behaviorist Jenni Cook, who precept after patient visits and lead bi-monthly didactic sessions discussing various elements of psychotherapy. Guest speakers with expertise in other areas of behavioral health, such as trauma or sports psychology, present during this time as well.

    Residents who have completed the track report continued and effective use of these techniques during their typical office visits (not just psychiatric encounters!)

    If you have questions about the Psychotherapy Track, please email Dr. Byler at dorvan.byler@ohiohealth.com for more details.

  • Our program’s educational opportunities in Sports Medicine are robust, and ideal for residents interested in pursuing a Sports Medicine Fellowship. Sports Medicine/Ultrasound Didactics occur twice a month with a variety of topics and guest speakers included. There is dedicated time for practicing ultrasound, focusing on a different body region each session. We have two ultrasound machines in the office and residents use them routinely.

    Our Program Director, Dr. Bring, is a Sports Medicine trained physician who is the Medical Director at several events and facilitates learning opportunities for the residents.

    Sports coverage opportunities include:

    • High School Athletic Coverage - Interested residents are paired with local high schools to cover sports longitudinally such as football or wrestling. This can include time spent in the training room weekly.

    • OhioHealth Capital City Half and Quarter Marathon

    • Columbus Half and Full Marathon

    • Grandview Half and Quarter

    • Arnold Classic Sports Festival

    • Local Division III Colleges and Universities

    • Spring Sports Physicals for Local High Schools

  • Our Lifestyle Medicine track integrates the curriculum offered by the American College of Lifestyle Medicine into our regular didactics, teaching our residents how to motivate change and address the pillars of Lifestyle Medicine: what we eat, how we move, sleep, manage stress, connect to our community/ purpose, and avoid toxic substances.  While all residents get at least 40 hours of didactics and hands-on activities in Lifestyle Medicine, the Lifestyle Medicine resident will complete an additional 60 hours of education and prep, including helping lead an intensive therapeutic lifestyle group visit experience for patients. If completed in its entirety, the LM track will prepare the resident for the American Board of Lifestyle Medicine Board Exam and Certification at the end of residency. 

  • Our Academic Medicine track will benefit a resident that foresees a career in academic family medicine, teaching medical students and/or residents. Blocks would include opportunities to serve as a “junior preceptor” for rotating medical students and first year residents. Participation in OhioHealth system-wide faculty development activities would be available. Residents in this track will be assigned a mentor with a senior OhioHealth faculty member to help plan their career. A scholarly project is required that will demonstrate the resident’s skills in both investigating a topic and presenting it to a regional audience.

  • This track will prepare residents to serve within their practices, hospitals or health systems leading quality and safety teams. Blocks would allow residents time to focus on quality and safety projects that they develop and implement them in the family medicine center or the hospital. Longitudinal participation in office and hospital QI and Safety committees will be expected during the second and third year of training. Residents in this track will be assigned a mentor with a senior OhioHealth faculty member serving in a quality and safety position. A QI project is required that will demonstrate the resident’s skills in both successful project and presenting it to a regional audience.

  • This track is for the resident who wants to gain proficiency in the care of patients with obesity and related disorders into their post-residency care of patients, and potentially become board certified in Obesity Medicine. Residents will gain multidisciplinary, multi-modality experience in the care of patients with obesity. An obesity medicine-focused scholarly project will be completed and presented to a regional audience. Dr. Grant, an obesity medicine certified physician, will mentor residents in this track.

  • This track is ideally suited for the resident who wishes to learn the ins and outs of running an efficient outpatient practice.  Becoming an Epic PowerUser and periodic Epic efficiency reviews will also be included in this track.  Participation in the office workflow workgroup will be included.  There will also be a longitudinal curriculum involved to explore different types of practices and different systems.   A member of the Dublin Family Medicine residency faculty will mentor residents interested in this track.  

  • If a resident aspires to a career in any form of health care leadership – practice, hospital, health system, or specialty organizations (OAFP, AAFP) – this track will be invaluable. A block may be used to focus on a leadership development project, but most of this track will be a longitudinal experience. The resident will be expected to review several articles and books on leadership and present the lessons learned in this study at a regional conference. A member of the OhioHealth or DMH leadership team will be assigned to the resident as a mentor and time spent will help the resident formulate a career path and identify skills to be developed.

  • The process of traveling abroad to practice medicine can be complicated but worthwhile! This track helps streamline the process of finding and pursuing an elective rotation in another country, typically during second or third year. OhioHealth has relationships with several locations already, and those destinations are preferred, but it is possible to create your own experience if the process is started early enough.