Curriculum Overview

Rotations Offered

Weeks on Service Intern Year

Weeks on Service 2nd Year

Weeks on Service 3rd Year

Adult Emergency Medicine: Emergency medicine training includes a 4-week block in the first year and two 2-week blocks in the third year. First-year rotations take place at Alaska Native Medical Center, Central Peninsula General Hospital in Soldotna, Fairbanks Memorial Hospital, or another local or rural emergency department site, and include ER bootcamp, intubations, hands-on emergency care, and clinic time at the FMP site. Third-year residents complete two 2-week blocks at Providence Alaska Medical Center, the state’s referral hospital and Level 2 Trauma Center. Residents also build emergency care skills through workshops, didactics, ATLS, ACLS, PALS and NRP certification, and emergency room care during rural rotations in small Alaska hospitals.

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Ambulatory: Dedicated outpatient clinical rotation at the FMP site.

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Cardiology: Cardiology training is both longitudinal and block-based. Residents care for patients with acute and chronic cardiac conditions, including CHF, cardiomyopathy, atrial fibrillation and valvular heart disease, through continuity clinic at the Providence Family Medicine Center, a weekly walk-in cardiology clinic and a short block-style cardiology experience alongside cardiologists. Acute topics such as coronary syndromes, arrhythmias and new-onset CHF are reinforced through emergency medicine rotations, the family medicine inpatient service, SIMS/code scenarios, didactics, journal club and expert teaching.

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Community and Ambulatory Medicine (CAM): This rotation serves as an introduction to the FMP site and the patient centered medical home and is composed of outpatient clinic sessions and didactic sessions. Interns will have a relaxed schedule with dedicated preceptors and peer level support during the first block of their residency. Didactic presentations review the EHR, billing and coding, the interdisciplinary care team, and other primary care topics.

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Critical Care (ICU): This 4-week adult critical care rotation takes place at Providence Alaska Medical Center, the largest hospital in Alaska. Residents work in teams under direct supervision of critical care specialists/intensivists while managing and caring for a broad range of critically ill patients. The rotation provides exposure to diverse illnesses and pathology, with opportunities to develop procedural skills and increase knowledge and competence in treating critically ill patients.

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Dermatology: In addition to the common skin conditions residents encounter in continuity clinic, workshops and didactics, residents complete a 2-week dermatology rotation during their third year. This experience includes one-on-one training with a local dermatologist in community dermatology clinic settings and may include online modules. Together, these experiences help residents identify and treat prevalent skin conditions and perform common dermatologic procedures.

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Elective: 6+ months over 3 years. Involves time in continuity clinic at the FMP site; rural electives exclude time at FMP site.

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Geriatrics: Geriatrics training is longitudinal, with two 2-week focused blocks during the PGY-2 year. Throughout residency, residents care for geriatric patients in the family medicine clinic and on the family medicine inpatient service, participate in core didactics, and gain experience through assisted living/home visits, hospice teams, the PAMC wound care clinic, and geriatric/palliative care clinic. PGY-2 and PGY-3 residents are assigned continuity nursing home patients and participate in monthly faculty rounds, interdisciplinary rounds, and close collaboration with the palliative care department. Dedicated scholarly activity time is also included, and many residents participate in a GEM article review.

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Gynecology: Gynecology training is both longitudinal and block-based, with two 2-week rotations during the second year. Residents work with consultant gynecologists and FM-OB faculty in the family medicine clinic, care for their own patients in continuity clinic, and gain experience with panel management, cervical cancer screening and breast cancer screening. The curriculum also includes time with local gynecologists, community OB-GYN and/or GYN oncology clinics. Over three years, residents are exposed to common gynecologic procedures, including colposcopy, endometrial biopsy, IUD insertion and removal, and Nexplanon insertion and removal, preparing them to provide full-spectrum care for their patients.

Linked to Ambulatory Clinic rotations.

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Health Systems and Practice Management: Focuses on functioning within larger health systems. Includes didactic experiences meant to enhance the resident’s understanding of functioning within larger health systems. Includes dedicated time for work on QI projects. Rotation is led by the Medical Director of the FMP site. This rotation includes clinic time at the FMP site.

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Inpatient Pediatrics: Staff the inpatient pediatrics service at PAMC which is run by dedicated pediatric hospitalists and is the only Children’s Hospital in the state, caring for both common and specialized health conditions. There are often medical students on this rotation. This rotation includes clinic time at the FMP site. (4 weeks days R1/4 weeks nights R2)

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Medicine (Inpatient): Staffed by primarily full scope FM physicians, majority of which are core faculty at the residency. The service keeps a dynamic cap to grow the census through the year as the teams mature. Max census is usually 15-18 patients for 2 interns and 1 senior, but this can go higher depending on the milieu and the team. There are usually medical students on this rotation. This rotation includes clinic time at the FMP site and includes night and weekend coverage. Interns serve as the primary clinician for their panel of patients with management of the team being the primary responsibility of the senior resident. (12 weeks days R1, 4 weeks nights R1/8 weeks days R3, 4 weeks nights R3)

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Some cross coverage

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Mental and Behavioral Health: Behavioral health training is integrated and longitudinal, preparing residents to address human behavior, mental and behavioral health, substance use and addictions, and psychiatric disorders as part of full-spectrum family medicine. The curriculum emphasizes care for underserved and rural populations and is coordinated by behavioral science faculty in collaboration with physician faculty, community physicians and behavioral health professionals. Residents build behavioral medicine skills through patient care, didactics, consultation, focused learning and practice experience.

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Musculoskeletal (Ortho): 2-week block in R1 year. Includes clinic time at the FMP site.

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Musculoskeletal/Sports Medicine: Musculoskeletal and sports medicine training reflects Alaska’s active lifestyle and is described as including eight total weeks of musculoskeletal rotations across residency; stakeholders should confirm how these weeks should be represented in the table. Residents work with orthopedic groups, sports trainers and physical therapists to build skills in detailed musculoskeletal exams, casting techniques, X-ray interpretation and surgical management. Sports medicine experience includes sideline participation with trainers at high school sporting events.

Obstetrics: Obstetrics training includes dedicated time on Labor and Delivery, OB triage, postpartum, antepartum and newborn units, as well as prenatal care in the Patient-Centered Medical Home. Residents develop relationships with continuity OB patients and their families through a primary and backup resident model, with one resident planning to be present for delivery. Residents perform deliveries for clinic patients alongside family medicine and OB-GYN faculty and, while on OB rotations, also work with family medicine and community OB-GYN attendings. At the PAMC Maternity Center, which averages 230 deliveries per month, residents are involved in all aspects of low- and high-risk OB care, including surgical obstetrics. Senior residents also have opportunities to teach on the rotation. R2 residents serve as seniors, and newborn care is included.

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Osteopathic Education: Alaska Family Medicine Residency has ACGME Osteopathic Recognition. Osteopathic residents have opportunities to use and further develop their OMT skills across patient care settings, including integration of osteopathic concepts and OMT into the care of their own patient panels at Providence Family Medicine Center. The center also hosts an OMT clinic where referred patients can receive OMT and osteopathic faculty and residents can share, compare and develop their skills. Designated osteopathic residents participate in DO didactics and help facilitate an annual OMT workshop.

Outpatient Pediatrics: Pediatrics is taught in multiple settings throughout all three years, with residents caring for pediatric patients in outpatient and inpatient settings, at the Family Medicine Center, and during rural rotations. Outpatient pediatric training includes community outpatient pediatric clinics, Alaska CARES, pediatric therapies such as PT/OT/SLP, and a second-year primary care experience typically at Southcentral Foundation with Alaska Native beneficiaries and the IHS system. Residents work closely with family physicians, pediatricians and pediatric intensivists, and gain additional newborn care experience as part of the obstetrics rotation.

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Pediatric Emergency Medicine: This rotation takes place in the Providence Alaska Medical Center Pediatric Emergency Room, where residents work one-on-one with emergency room physicians, including some with specialty pediatric emergency medicine training, to care for children across a variety of shifts. The rotation includes clinic time at the FMP site and often includes weekend cross-coverage call on the inpatient pediatrics service. Residents also complete NRP, PALS, workshops and core didactics focused on pediatric emergency medicine.

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Psychiatry: The required Psychiatry rotation takes place during the R2 year and consists of two 2-week rotations led by behavioral science and psychiatry faculty. Residents focus on mental and behavioral health in inpatient and outpatient clinic settings through direct patient care, self-study and shadowing in specialty clinics. The rotation helps residents build clinical decision-making skills for mental health and substance use concerns, including management of acute and chronic conditions that may require hospitalization, referral and discharge planning, and psychopharmacology, including indications, dosing, titration, side effects and serum level monitoring.

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Rural: Rural training prepares residents to practice family medicine in Alaska’s remote and isolated communities, where limited road access, weather and distance create unique health care delivery challenges. Alaska’s rural medical system includes community health aides, small regional hospitals staffed by family physicians, telemedicine and air transportation. All residents complete a 6-week R2 rural block in Bethel at the Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta Regional Hospital or in Sitka with the Southeast Alaska Regional Health Consortium; this rotation does not include time at the FMP site. Experiences may include high patient volumes, conditions rarely seen elsewhere, patient transport in challenging weather, obstetrics, village site visits and phone-based patient assessment with community health aides. In R3 year, residents have 8 weeks of rural electives, with up to 4 weeks available for an international rotation, allowing them to choose locations and skills that support full-scope rural practice.

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Rural and Austere Medicine (RAM): Covers winter survival skills, field triage, and other rural medicine topics. 2-week rotation in R1 year paired with TCM. There is the option of participating in components of this rotation as a facilitator/peer teacher in R3 year, but this is not required. Additional, optional opportunities include the Marine Wilderness Medicine experience in the Spring/early summer.

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Specialty Clinics: This 2-week second-year rotation provides an integrated experience in three surgical subspecialties: ENT, ophthalmology and urology. Residents work one-on-one with subspecialists in their offices, focusing on common conditions encountered in primary care, including diagnosis, treatment options and when to refer.

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Surgery: The surgery rotation takes place at Providence Alaska Medical Center during the PGY-1 year. Residents serve as interns on the trauma surgery service and complete a block working one-on-one with a general surgeon in the operating room, inpatient care and outpatient care, with active involvement in the care of surgical and postoperative patients. The rotation includes ATLS experience, floor management and clinic time at the FMP site. Suture workshops, didactics and wound care clinic during the PGY-3 geriatrics rotation supplement the surgical curriculum.

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Transcultural and Community Medicine (TCM): Uses a combination of didactic and experiential learning opportunities to deepen resident’s understanding of the diversity of our Anchorage community as well as that of our Alaskan community more broadly. This rotation is led by the behavioral health faculty of the residency.

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Wilderness Medicine: Wilderness Medicine is an important part of the curriculum, helping residents build confidence in wilderness medicine, survival skills and safe travel in Alaska’s remote environments, including residency-related travel to towns and villages in Bush Alaska. Basic survival skills and wilderness medicine training are required for all residents, with additional opportunities for residents interested in Advanced Wilderness Life Support certification. The curriculum includes a required 3-day winter survival experience for first-year residents, focused on Alaskan winter survival skills such as snow caves, fire building, edible plants and animals, and avalanche search and rescue techniques. Additional opportunities include an optional 4-day summer wilderness medicine kayak trip in Prince William Sound for third-year residents and AWLS-based didactics and workshops as part of the residency didactic program.