Helping Educators Learn Pediatric Pain Assessment and Intervention Needs Program (HELP PAIN): Program Development with Community Partners.

Background/objectives: This paper details the development of the Helping Educators Learn Pediatric Pain Assessment and Intervention Needs (HELP PAIN) program.

Methods: HELP PAIN is an 8 h live training program for school providers (e.g.

Associations of the Informal Curriculum and Student Perceptions of Research With Family Medicine Career Choice.

Background: The United States is facing a primary care physician shortage that is predicted to continue through the next decade. Determining why graduating medical students pursue a career in family medicine may inform efforts to help address this shortage.

Methods: Medical student responses to the Family Medicine Attitudes Questionnaire (FMAQ), a 14-item validated questionnaire developed to assess student attitudes toward family medicine, were collected at 16 US medical schools and compared to each institution's proportion of graduates entering family medicine.

The Relationship Between Medical School Clerkships and Primary Care Specialty Choice: A Narrative Review.

Background And Objectives: There is a persistent shortage of primary care physicians in the United States. Medical schools can help meet societal primary care health needs by graduating more students who select family medicine and other primary care careers. The objective of this narrative review was to evaluate the relationship between clerkships and primary care specialty choice.

Medical School Characteristics, Policies, and Practices That Support Primary Care Specialty Choice: A Scoping Review of 5 Decades of Research.

Background And Objectives: The United States, like many other nations, faces a chronic shortage of primary care physicians. The purpose of this scoping review was to synthesize literature describing evidence-based institutional practices and interventions that support medical students' choices of primary care specialties, published in the United States, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand.

Methods: We surveyed peer-reviewed, published research.

Influences of Medical School Admissions Practices on Primary Care Career Choice.

Background And Objectives: Medical schools should understand how to matriculate students who are more likely to enter primary care specialties and put admissions processes into place that achieve this result. However, there are no existing reviews that have systematically evaluated medical school admission practices and primary care specialty choice.

Methods: We conducted a narrative synthesis utilizing a systematic literature search to evaluate the effectiveness of medical school admission strategies designed to increase the percentage of graduates entering primary care specialties.

The Impact of Family Medicine Interest Groups and Student-Run Free Clinics on Primary Care Career Choice: A Narrative Synthesis.

Background And Objectives: Student-directed activities such as family medicine interest groups (FMIG) and student-run free clinics (SRFC) have been examined to discover their impact on entry into family medicine and primary care. The objective of this review was to synthesize study results to better incorporate and optimize these activities to support family medicine and primary care choice.

Methods: We conducted a comprehensive literature search using PubMed, Scopus, and CINAHL to identify all English-language research articles on FMIG and SRFC.

Institutional Characteristics Influencing Medical Student Selection of Primary Care Careers: A Narrative Review and Synthesis.

Background And Objectives: There is an ongoing shortage of primary care physicians in the United States. Medical schools are under pressure to address this threat to the nation's health by producing more primary care graduates, including family physicians. Our objective was to identify institutional characteristics associated with more medical students choosing primary care.

How Medical Education Pathways Influence Primary Care Specialty Choice.

Background And Objectives: Primary care is associated with improved patient health and reductions in health disparities. Consequently, the demand for primary care physicians is increasing. To meet this demand, medical schools have employed strategies to graduate students interested in primary care careers, including medical education pathways-structured, longitudinal experiences that are explicitly separate from the main curricular scope of the undergraduate medical education experience.

Examining Access to Psychiatric Care in Michigan's Upper Peninsula.

Introduction: There is a shortage of mental health services in rural America, and little research is focused on rural underserved communities. Our aim was to identify and map clinical mental health services located in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan (UP) and explore primary care physician (PCP) mental health service provision and barriers to access experienced by this population.

Methods: We mapped clinically active psychiatrists and inpatient psychiatric units in the UP, and identified high-risk regions based on >30 mile distance to ambulatory services or low inpatient bed to population ratio.

FMAQ-S: Development of a Short Form of the Family Medicine Attitudes Questionnaire.

Introduction: Identifying and training students who choose family medicine careers is essential to meeting primary care workforce needs in the United States. Medical students' positive attitudes toward family medicine are associated with students' choice of family medicine as a specialty. This study sought to refine a previously tested questionnaire assessing US medical students' attitudes toward family medicine by shortening the questionnaire to make it more useful in educational practice and research settings.

Education and Attitudes on Medical Cannabis in Family Medicine Residency Programs.

Background And Objectives: Medical cannabis has become increasingly prevalent in the United States, however the extent of family medicine resident education on this topic remains unknown. The objective of this study was to ascertain the current state of medical cannabis education across this population and identify patterns in education based on state legality and program director (PD) practices.

Methods: Survey questions were part of the Council of Academic Family Medicine Educational Research Alliance (CERA) omnibus survey from May 2019 to July 2019.

Attitudes Toward Family Medicine Among Students Choosing Other Primary Care Specialties.

Background And Objectives: Little is known about how medical students choose between primary care specialties. We compared the attitudes toward family medicine of medical students intending to practice primary care but not family medicine (PCNFM), with students intending to practice family medicine (FM) and those intending nonprimary care (NPC) careers.

Methods: The Family Medicine Attitudes Questionnaire (FMAQ) was distributed to 2,644 fourth-year medical students at 16 medical schools in spring 2017.

Telehealth in response to the COVID-19 pandemic: Implications for rural health disparities.

Telehealth programs have long held promise for addressing rural health disparities perpetuated by inadequate healthcare access. The COVID-19 (coronavirus disease 2019) pandemic and accompanying social distancing measures have hastened the implementation of telehealth programs in hospital systems around the globe. Here, we provide specific examples of telehealth efforts that have been implemented in a large rural healthcare system in response to the pandemic, and further describe how the massive shift to telehealth and reliance on virtual connections in these times of social isolation may impact rural health disparities for those without access to necessary broadband to deploy digital technologies.

Trends in Subspecialization: A Comparative Analysis of Rural and Urban Clinical Education.

Background And Objectives: Medical students who train in rural communities are often exposed to physicians practicing a broad scope of care, regardless of discipline. We examined how rural education is associated with practice specialization rates for students who match in primary care or general core specialties.

Methods: We linked practice and specialty data (2016 AMA Masterfile dataset), demographics (American Medical College Application Service data), and internal college data for 1974-2011 Michigan State University College of Human Medicine graduates who received clinical education on either the Upper Peninsula (rural) or Grand Rapids (urban) campuses.

Defining Rural: The Predictive Value of Medical School Applicants' Rural Characteristics on Intent to Practice in a Rural Community.

Purpose: To understand the predictive value of medical student application characteristics on rural practice intent.

Method: The authors constructed a linked database of 2012-2017 medical school matriculants from American Medical College Application Service applications and Association of American Medical Colleges Matriculating Student Questionnaire (MSQ, 2012-2017) and Graduation Questionnaire (GQ, 2016-2018). Using logistic regression, they compared application variables (birth, high school, childhood county, and self-declared geographical origin) to students' MSQ and GQ intent to practice rurally.

The Effect of a Community-Based Medical School on the State and Local Physician Workforce.

Purpose: To assess the effect of community-based medical education as implemented by Michigan State University College of Human Medicine (MSU-CHM), which has immersed students in diverse communities across Michigan since its founding, on the physician workforce in the six communities in which clinical campuses were initially established.

Method: The authors used American Medical Association Masterfile data from 2011 to obtain practice locations and specialty data for all MSU-CHM graduates from 1972 through 2006. They classified physicians as either practicing primary care or practicing in a high-need specialty.

Preparing Family Physicians to Care for Underserved Populations: A Historical Perspective.

Family physicians have been involved in the care of rural and urban underserved populations since the founding of the specialty. In the early 1970s family medicine training programs specifically focused on training residents to work with the underserved were established in both urban and rural settings. Key to the success of these programs has been a specific focus on improving access to care, understanding and eliminating health disparities, cultural competency and behavioral science training that recognizes the challenges often faced by patients and families living in poor rural and urban areas of the country.

RU4PC? Texting to Quantify Feedback About Primary Care and Its Relationship With Student Career Interest.

Background: Faculty and residents routinely offer feedback about medical students' specialty career preferences, yet influence of feedback has not been quantitatively evaluated. This study aims to report incidence and balance of primary care comments heard by medical students and determine the effect of comments on career interest.

Methods: This multicenter observational cohort study used text messaging and online surveys to examine positive and negative feedback about primary care, as reported by medical students in real time between September 2012 and April 2013.

Thirty Years Training Rural Physicians: Outcomes From the Michigan State University College of Human Medicine Rural Physician Program.

Purpose: There is a shortage of primary care and rural physicians in the United States. In 1974, Michigan State University College of Human Medicine (MSU-CHM) created the Rural Physician Program (RPP) to address these issues and increase primary care physicians in Michigan's Upper Peninsula (UP). The authors describe the program and analyze 30 years of outcomes.

A systematic approach to diabetes mellitus care in underserved populations: improving care of minority and homeless persons.

Background And Objectives: Discrepancy in care of diabetes between racial and ethnic minority groups and Caucasians is well documented in America. System-based practices have been shown to improve quality of care outcomes. We implemented a disease registry and management system proven successful in a suburban practice network in four community health centers to improve diabetes process outcomes.