Photo By Petty Officer 1st Class James Stenberg | Six residents from Naval Hospital Pensacola’s Family Medicine Residency Program...... read more read more
PENSACOLA, Fla. - After three years of hard work and studying for boards, six residents from Naval Hospital Pensacola graduated from the Family Medicine Residency Program June 28 and are now ready to be family medicine physicians in the Navy.
“I am very proud of this group of residents,” said Lt. Cmdr. Leah Soley, residency program director, NHP. “They are amazing and probably our strongest class in my four years here.”
Naval Hospital Pensacola is one of five family medicine teaching hospitals in the Navy. All residents are medical school graduates, and during their first year of residency, they are referred to as interns. Joining the six residents on Friday were seven graduating interns who must still complete the remaining two years of the residency program. Graduating interns have the option of immediately continuing their residency program or they can elect to serve as a flight surgeon or in undersea or general medicine before completing their residency.
“Being an intern is the hardest year in the life of a doctor,” said Capt. Maureen Padden, commanding officer, NHP, who completed her internship in 1993 at Naval Hospital Camp Pendleton, Calif.
Throughout all three years, residents are exposed to the full scope of family medicine and serve as primary care managers for patients within NHP’s Family Medicine Medical Home Port. They treat patients of all ages and see a variety of health care scenarios in both inpatient and outpatient settings to include pediatrics, surgery, internal medicine, gynecology, psychiatry, orthopedics, dermatology and neurology. It is not uncommon for a resident to be the one who tells a patient she is pregnant, deliver the baby and provide care for the mother and infant after the birth. This wide range of health care knowledge is what attracted many of the residents to family medicine.
“As a family medicine resident, I was exposed to everything, and I wanted to do it all,” said Lt. Daniel Algert, a graduating resident who will be reporting to USS Eisenhower (CVN 69). “I would be on call on the labor deck, go help in the Emergency Room, go over to the Intensive Care Unit and then listen to a mom concerned about her child. We have a great program here and [the staff] prepared us well for a family medicine career in the Navy.”
One of the advantages these residents had doing their residency at NHP was the exposure to patient-centered care, also known as Medical Home Port. Naval Hospital Pensacola’s Family Medicine Residency Program was the first one in the DoD to pilot Medical Home Port, which is a team based approach to primary health care where patients are assigned to a specific team. The team reviews all of the patient’s medical needs and ensures that anything required for the patient is addressed during the appointment, including booking referrals and giving needed immunizations. Understanding Medical Home Port was not only an advantage for the residents, but will benefit all of Navy Medicine when the residents report to new commands with this knowledge.
“They are now experts at Medical Home Port,” said Soley, “and they will be expected to help lead the implementation of Medical Home Port at their next assignment.”
Despite the long hours and lack of sleep, these new family medicine physicians are now prepared for whatever their next assignment will be in Navy Medicine.
“I learned a lot and had great mentors,” said Algert. “I feel like I am ready for family medicine."
The graduating residents were: Lt. Cmdr. Sonja Whitaker, Lt. Cmdr Bruce Yee, Lt. Andrew McDermott, Lt. Daniel Algert, Lt. Lesley Algert and Lt. Jean Mathurin.
The Graduating interns were: Lt. Cmdr. Eduardo Rizo, Lt. Cmdr. David Moore, Lt. Julie Polonczyk, Lt. Meghan Ginn, Lt. Mark Wirtz, Lt. Matthew Regan and Lt. Cmdr. Marcel Vargas.
| Date Taken: | 07.03.2013 |
| Date Posted: | 07.03.2013 09:17 |
| Story ID: | 109682 |
| Location: | PENSACOLA, FLORIDA, US |
| Web Views: | 421 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
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