One Giant Leap for Family Medicine: Preparing the 21st-century Physician to Practice Patient-Centered, High-Performance Family Medicine

摘要

In my present position as Director of the Medical Education Division for the American Academy of Family Physicians, I spend the majority of my time collecting and sharing information about family medicine graduate education or facilitating communication among our many constituencies and affiliated organizations. In general, my personal biases regarding the direction that family medicine education should take are subjugated to representing current policies, requirements, and official recommendations. This is a unique and welcome opportunity for me to share my personal vision of how I wish family medicine education would evolve. However, I must emphasize from the very beginning that this vision is "firmly cast in Jell-O." I readily admit that my opinions evolve as I watch the health care environment and the practice of medicine change over time. Nevertheless, there are enduring themes about which I am increasingly confident. I must also admit that, as the reality of aging becomes increasingly apparent to me, I'm inclined to see myself less as a health care provider and more as a consumer of those services; so, the viewpoint of how I want my doctor to function and relate to me in the future is also evolving. With all of these biases and caveats laid out, let me begin by describing the naissance of my current vision for the future of family medicine education.