Family Medicine

I am almost done with this rotation and have yet to post anything about it. This rotation has been busy! I am still in Augusta, GA. I did my family medicine rotation with Dr. Overstreet-Wright and she is fabulous. Very kind and willing to answer any/all of your questions. The clinic she works in also has a physican assistant and nurse practitioner which are also very friendly. The staff are fabulous too. So basically I loved this rotation :) We see around 25 patients a day usually depending on the day. The clinic has a women's health office upstairs, a dental office and a pharmacy. Due to the women's clinic being upstairs we don't deal with any gyn issues as we just send them there. The patient population is older but we did see an occasional child. You become very good at the treatment of hypertension and diabetes!

In my clinic, we would go in prior to the doctor and interview the patient and complete a limited physical exam necessary and then discuss the patient with the dr, then go in together. She would ask additional questions, that I forgot to ask but it was a great learning process because the next time I got a patient I remembered to ask those questions I forgot the first time.

Family medicine is a lot of the same things over and over but you have variety as well. My pharmacology knowledge greatly increased because previously I did an OBGYN rotation and as expected we don't deal with a lot of pharm. It challenges your differential diagnosis skills. 

With each rotation, I think that this is the one that I want to do. I loved OB and I really liked family too. I'm just blessed to be able to soak in all the knowledge from these preceptors. Throughly enjoy each rotation you are given!

Preparing for the shelf:

I read Case Files Family Medicine. I really enjoy this series, it's better than a textbook and easier to get through. Family Medicine is very broad so you have topics from rashes to hypertension to thyroid disorders. 

USMLE uWorld doesn't have a specific set of questions set aside for family medicine so I did AAFP questions. If you go to their website and sign up for a membership, it's $35 dollars for the board style questions. They are helpful. 

My shelf is April 20th. Ekkk nervous, 1 week then I'm 2 rotations down :)
Update on the shelf: It was hard! Kinda felt like Step 1 all over again...