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What's it like being a family practitioner?
#family-practitioner
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treasa’s Answer
A family practitioner is a doctor who specializes in caring for the entire family. They serve as a doctor for individuals regardless of their age and gender. Patients can be children, adults, and the elderly, and are treated for a wide array of medical issues.
This type of doctor is especially prominent in small, rural communities where there may not be the funds, population, or facilities available to justify doctors who specialize in serving different ages. However, family practitioners can be found in urban and suburban settings as well.
This type of doctor is especially prominent in small, rural communities where there may not be the funds, population, or facilities available to justify doctors who specialize in serving different ages. However, family practitioners can be found in urban and suburban settings as well.
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Hannah’s Answer
Life as a family doc can look very different depending on your goals. The big picture is that family docs are the jack of all trades in medicine. They see infants to the oldest people and work to coordinate care with specialists. It can be a career that is focused in on clinic or in the hospital depending on your location.
So as a medical student my time in family med was divided between clinic and general medicine in the hospital with a sprinkle of peds and ob gyn. In their training as residents after medical school family med people will rotate through all of the specialties from surgery, peds and ob so that they have a very broad but less deep knowledge of medicine.
The small town family doc I worked with for three years is only in clinic and he sees mainly older people working with chronic disease like diabetes and heart disease. But he also has a side gig where he does all the sports physicals for the high school and attends all the football games.
One family doc delivers babies and does everything except the most extreme cases for her pregnant mamas.
One family doc sees patients in the hospital in the morning and manages their medicine and care then walks over to clinic and sees a mix of peds, sick people and old people.
So basically it is a mix. But some things that they all do is coordinate care and have long lasting relationships with their patients. It is also considered by some to be more of a laid back specialty in that the total hours worked per week are less than specialties such as surgery
Shadow some family docs in different positions
Read about the job on https://www.aafp.org/home.html
So as a medical student my time in family med was divided between clinic and general medicine in the hospital with a sprinkle of peds and ob gyn. In their training as residents after medical school family med people will rotate through all of the specialties from surgery, peds and ob so that they have a very broad but less deep knowledge of medicine.
The small town family doc I worked with for three years is only in clinic and he sees mainly older people working with chronic disease like diabetes and heart disease. But he also has a side gig where he does all the sports physicals for the high school and attends all the football games.
One family doc delivers babies and does everything except the most extreme cases for her pregnant mamas.
One family doc sees patients in the hospital in the morning and manages their medicine and care then walks over to clinic and sees a mix of peds, sick people and old people.
So basically it is a mix. But some things that they all do is coordinate care and have long lasting relationships with their patients. It is also considered by some to be more of a laid back specialty in that the total hours worked per week are less than specialties such as surgery
Hannah recommends the following next steps: