Curriculum
Curriculum/Conference Schedule
The educational purpose of all rotations is to comply with the Internal Medicine Curriculum as mandated by the American Board of Internal Medicine (ABIM).
The fundamental goals of our program are to train competent, qualified, caring and sensitive physicians who are mindful of the significance of their role in the diagnosis and treatment of disease, the alleviation of suffering, the prevention of ill-health and the empathetic support of those directly or indirectly afflicted with medical illness. Our three-year educational program is geared toward a preparation in internal medicine and board certification. We are dedicated to training physicians who will effectively work in the current and future health care systems. Our residents will enjoy training at a state-of-the-art community-based program, Doctors Hospital at Renaissance, which is under the sponsorship of The University of Texas Rio Grande Valley.
The Department of Medicine endorses a team approach to patient care, while recognizing that residents must have opportunities for individual critical decision-making and patient responsibility as defined by the ABIM.
Our program, as all others, follows the goals and objectives of the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education, where the curriculum is based around the six core competencies.
- Patient Care
- Medical Knowledge
- Professionalism
- Interpersonal and Communication Skills
- Practice-based Learning and Improvement
- System-based Practice
Our competency-based curriculum and its design allow for an individualized educational experience that corresponds to the career objectives of each resident. We are committed to a strong resident education and to serving our community and the larger Rio Grande Valley population in providing acute and chronic disease health management, preventive care and a longitudinal relationship between our residents and their patient population.
Graduates of our program fulfill the requirements of the ABIM. The residency program in internal medicine includes participation in patient care, teaching rounds, didactic noon conferences, Grand Rounds, Morbidity & Mortality conferences, among others. DHR provides an online library as well other academic teaching resources available from UTRGV which can be accessed by the residents from their home.
Mix of Diseases
Residents will encounter patients with a variety of conditions representative of common medical problems in various systems, as well as care for critically ill patients in the ICU and acute-care patients in the emergency department setting. Patients admitted to the teaching service include a wide demographic and ethnic mix from the greater Rio Grande Valley region. There are also a wide variety of socioeconomic situations. This mix provides the residents with a stimulating and enriched training experience with broad diagnostic and challenging opportunities.
Last, but not least, we believe in training leaders in internal medicine. Scholarship and discovery are essential components of academic medical leadership, and this will be reflected in the curriculum as research and scholarly activity rotations as well as participation in hospital quality improvement and patient safety programs.
Conference Schedule
| Time | Conference and Rounds |
| 12-1 p.m. | Noon Conference* |
| 1-1:30 p.m. | PM report |
| *Noon Conference consists of didactic lectures 1-3 times weekly, monthly Morbidity & Mortality, monthly Journal Club, monthly Board Review, monthly Physician Wellness/Medical Ethics, and monthly Global Health/Medical Spanish activities. |
CONFERENCES
- Internal Medicine Core Didactic Lecture Series
- Conference geared toward coverage of the core components of general internal medicine and its subspecialties as they relate to an internist. Our didactics are scheduled in a systems block fashion with a different system approximately every 4 weeks and are geared towards board preparation. Lecturers include our core faculty and subspecialty faculty.
- PM Reports
- Current cases from our various inpatient and outpatient services are presented in this forum. The focus of this conference is on:
- Professional presentation
- Differential diagnosis
- Clinical reasoning
- Evaluation and management
- Prevention of diagnostic/treatment errors
- Cost-effective decision making
- Cases are to be presented by our residents under the guidance of our chief resident or faculty member.
- General internal medicine faculty and subspecialty attendings provide additional teaching through this case-based format.
- Ambulatory Curriculum Series
- Under guidance of our clinic director, residents present a clinic case and pearls to the residency monthly. During our clinic, point of care learning is performed and topics are reviewed that are frequently seen in clinic including preventive care, vaccinations, pain, depression, and acute care. Evaluation and resident feedback occurs monthly.
- Grand Rounds
- Grand Rounds from UTHSCA are shown at least monthly on a Wednesday morning. This conference brings together a wide academic and community provider population. Topics are applicable to both general internal medicine and subspecialty medicine. These include a week dedicated to clinicopathology conference.
- Each PGY3 also presents a live Grand Rounds to cover a topic of their choosing.
- Morbidity & Mortality
- The department of medicine meets monthly for an interactive case-based discussion focused on patient safety and systems improvement. Cases are selected and facilitated by the faculty. This may also be presented by a resident with guidance from a senior faculty, expert in diagnostic error, patient safety and quality improvement. These conferences represent a safe, collegial, non-accusatory environment with an emphasis on systems improvement and preventive bad outcomes. Many of the systems issues and potential solutions identified at this conference are then presented to the hospital administration through safety and quality conferences.
- Journal Club/Evidence-Based Medicine
- Held monthly, a PGY-2 selects a journal under the guidance of faculty and prepares a discussion amongst the residents. We hone the skills required to critically appraise the literature. EBM and statistical analysis are integrated. We discuss a variety of study types and acquire the skills to critique randomized controlled trials, case-control and cohort studies, meta-analysis guidelines, decision analysis, cost-effectiveness and ethical issues.
- Physician Feedback
Held monthly, this mandatory conference ensures open communication pathways between our residents and faculty. Residents meet prior to the conference with chief resident to review concerns, complaints and ideas. Chief resident moderates the hour long feedback session with the goal of finding solutions and improvements for our program and our residents.
- Subspecialty Conferences and Teaching
- These are activities offered to residents rotating in specialty during elective rotations.
- Physician Wellness/Medical Ethics
- This is a meeting between the program leadership and residents for an update and open feedback sessions. Residents lead discussions on topics like burnout, sleep, wellness and more.
- Cohort Competition / Board Prep
- Faculty lead discussion on board-style questions pertinent to the block that the didactics are covering. Residents first answer independently on their phone app and then discussion is opened amongst cohorts. Faculty teach on the key point of the question and test taking skills as well. At the end of the block/month, the cohort with the most points wins a free meal.
- The Business of Medical Practice
- These lectures occur several times throughout the year, and the community medicine rotation contains a more formal curriculum addressing the business of medicine, payment models, and negotiating contracts.
- Quality Improvement/Research Didactics
- To supplement the quality improvement projects that are ongoing amongst the residents, QI experts from UTRGV present a curriculum in a didactic session every 1-2 months.
13. Web-Based References as Up-to-Date and PubMed