Family Medicine Residency – Peoria: Curriculum

Entrance to Methodist Hospital in Peoria Illinois

Residency Tracks Heading link

There are three residency tracks available through our program: OB/Women’s Health, Global Health, and Sports Medicine. Each track requires several elective rotations, as noted below.

  • Perinatology
  • Extra MNPS block
  • Women’s health procedures
  • International rotation
  • Infectious disease/HIV clinic
  • Travel/TB clinic
  • Ultrasound
  • Radiology
  • Sports medicine
  • Procedures
  • Podiatry

Rotations Heading link

Click on each of the tabs below to see first-year, second-year, and third-year rotations.

Description Duration
Family Medicine Orientation 4 weeks
Obstetrics 8-12 weeks
General Surgery 4 weeks
Family Medicine Service 8-12 weeks
Inpatient Pediatrics (OSF Saint Francis) 4 weeks
Neonatology (NICU)/Night Float 4 weeks
Medical Intensive Care Unit (MICU) 4 weeks
Family Medical Center 4 weeks
Outpatient Pediatrics 4 weeks
Emergency Medicine 4 weeks
Family Medical Center 1-2 half day/week
Description Duration
Emergency Medicine 4 weeks
Inpatient Psychiatry/Behavioral Medicine 4 weeks
Inpatient Pediatrics (Methodist) 8 weeks
Family Medicine Service 8 weeks
Orthopedic Surgery and Sports Medicine 8 weeks
Otolaryngology/Ophthalmology 4 weeks
Geriatrics 4 weeks
Family Medical Center 4 weeks
Gynecology 4 weeks
Elective 4 weeks
Cardiology 4 weeks
Family Medical Center 3 half days/week
Description Duration
Family Medicine Service 8 weeks
Management of Health Systems (MOHS) 4 weeks
Pediatrics Subspecialty Elective 4 weeks
Dermatology 4 weeks
Urology/General Surgery 4 weeks
Community Medicine/Occupational Health 4 weeks
Family Medical Center 4 weeks
Pediatric Emergency Medicine 2 weeks
Electives 18 weeks
Family Medical Center 4 half days/week

Rotation Descriptions Heading link

The orientation for Family Medicine Residency is the first month of your residency.

During this time, residents will complete certifications in ACLS, NRP, ALSO, and PALS, which are paid for by the residency.

Also during this time, residents will undergo didactic sessions and lectures by various clinical staff. Residents are eased into call through “shadow call” with senior residents. You have the opportunity to meet fellow residents and staff during this time.

The Family Medical Center is located conveniently close to Carle Health – Methodist Hospital. The Family Medical Center includes an on-site laboratory and X-ray. In the Family Medical Center, you learn to care for patients by participating in a busy group practice with other residents and our attendings. There are three specialty clinics within our clinic: Dermatology, Women’s Health, and OMT. You will also get to meet many other Family Physicians from the community as they precept in our clinic.

In addition to learning about the common problems, you learn many procedures including:

  • Removal of foreign body from eye
  • Implantation/IUD insertion
  • Circumcision
  • Counseling
  • Drainage of subungual hematoma
  • Excision of nail and nail matrix
  • Casting and splinting
  • Splinting of fractures and sprains
  • Aspiration of joints
  • Injection of joints
  • Injection of trigger points
  • Obstetrical ultrasound
  • Osteopathic Manipulative Treatment
  • Colposcopy
  • Cervical biopsy
  • Cryotherapy of cervix
  • Endometrial sampling
  • Cryotherapy of skin lesions
  • Excision of skin lesions
  • Punch biopsy
  • Shave biopsy

While you are on the family medicine service (FMS) rotation, you care for select patients with a diverse range of problems that will prepare you for independent practice. We manage patients for our attendings, our fellow residents, and all of the patients that are admitted with no primary care physician. The service also follows patients from the time they leave the medical ICU to the general medical floors all the way down to our rehabilitation and skilled care units.

There are typically 15 patients on the service at a time. Four residents are scheduled to be on the service at a time where three of them are working during the day and one at night. There are two first-year residents on service at a time; one works during the day and the other is on as the night float cover.

The first-year resident has the primary responsibility for their patients. Attendings do not write orders; you do. As a third-year resident, you make daily rounds with the first-year resident and are responsible for running the service. One of the family medicine attending physicians makes daily bedside teaching rounds, and is also present for either the daily morning report on new patients admitted the night before or for the sign-out to the night team.

Behavioral medicine faculty and clinical pharmacology faculty also participate in teaching rounds by being part of the team as we round daily.

In your first year, you spend one month in general pediatrics, one month in outpatient pediatrics, and two weeks in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU). During your NICU and inpatient pediatric rotations, you are involved in the management of a wide variety of neonatal and pediatric illnesses and collaborating with the perinatal high-risk obstetric service.

The general pediatrics rotation is located nearby at OSF Saint Francis Medical Center, a large tertiary care facility (616 beds) which is home to the Children’s Hospital and St. Jude’s Research Hospital. Your time at OSF will be supervised by its pediatric faculty members from the University of Illinois College of Medicine at Peoria. During this rotation, you will also be involved with the management of St. Jude’s Hematology/Oncology patients.

The NICU rotation takes place at Carle Health – Methodist where you will be supervised by faculty members from Onsite Neonatal Partners who provide 24-hour in-hospital neonatal care. During your two weeks on this rotation, you are the only resident thus optimizing your learning and no competition from other learners to get procedures.

You will spend one month of your second year at Carle Health – Methodist’s general pediatrics unit. You will fulfill a two-week pediatric ER rotation and one month of outpatient subspecialty pediatrics in your third year.

Our Maternal Neonatal Pediatric Services (MNPS) is our combined rounding service that provides a continuum of care from prenatal obstetrics to birth to neonatal care to pediatrics. Specifically, it is our service that covers all obstetric and gynecological issues as well as nursery and pediatric cases for patients we follow who are admitted to Carle Health – Methodist. Our residents perform a wide variety of duties and responsibilities on this service, providing them with excellent opportunities to learn all the skills to be a full-capacity family practitioner.

For obstetrics, MNPS works with virtually all obstetricians who are admitted to Methodist, caring for their patients with them. This provides an excellent opportunity for our residents to monitor patients, perform deliveries, and learn all the surgical procedures entailed in obstetrics. In addition, residents act as the secondary physician in all cesarean sections performed at Methodist.

For pediatrics, our residents admit and manage sick children for a large number of pediatricians and family practitioners in the area. This provides a good assortment of pediatric cases ranging from newborn management to late adolescent disease management.

Overall, MNPS allows our family practice residents to experience and manage the variety of patients and diseases that a family doctor can routinely expect to see in a hospital setting.

During your surgery rotations you work directly with the surgeons, participating in inpatient care, surgery, and outpatient clinics. Our residency program works with Mid Illini Surgical Associates (MISA), which is a group of dedicated physicians and educators.

You are the first assistant for most surgeries, which will enhance your surgical skills. During your rotations, you will see various disease pathology in general surgery. You will see a diverse population of patients before and after procedures of general surgery, including laparascopic surgery, appendectomy, cholecystectomy, hernia repairs, colonoscopies, hemorrhoid banding, colorectal surgery, care of lesions, excisions, mole removal, and spider vein treatment. You will also gain experience observing other surgical subspecialties, including vascular surgery and bariatric surgery.

Our full-time behavioral medicine faculty members provide essential training throughout your three years to help you manage the psychological aspects of physical illness. Of equal importance are the self-management techniques they emphasize to help you avoid overload and burnout. They see patients with you in the Family Medical Center for co-therapy in areas such as:

  • Individual therapy
  • Group therapy
  • Stress management
  • Sexual dysfunction
  • Pain management
  • Psychological aspects of physical diseases, including chronic pain

Additionally, the behavioral medicine faculty consult with you on inpatients, attend behavioral medicine teaching rounds with you while you are on the family medicine service, and present family medicine behavioral medicine conferences. Once a month the behavioral medicine faculty meet with each class individually to discuss any issues and to share experiences from the past month.

  • Adolescent Medicine
  • Allergy
  • Behavioral Medicine
  • Cardiology
  • Endocrinology
  • Gastroenterology
  • Hematology/Oncology
  • HIV Clinic
  • Infectious Disease
  • Integrative Medicine
  • International Medicine
  • Nephrology
  • Neurology
  • Pain Management
  • Pediatric Intensive Care
  • Perinatology
  • Plastic Surgery
  • Pulmonary Medicine
  • Radiology
  • Rehabilitation
  • Research
  • Rheumatology
  • Rural Family Practice
  • Sports Medicine
  • Would Care
  • Other electives are negotiable