Workforce Update: Residency Road Map for Community Health Centers!

The California Primary Care Association’s Community Health Center (CHC) Residency Road Map is paving the way for community-based graduate medical education (GME) in California’s community health centers (CHCs). Our federal and state advocacy efforts to increase GME funding coupled with our online and in-person educational offerings are positioning CHCs as leaders in physician resident training. This initiative aims to:

  • Develop comprehensive trainings and resources for CHCs desiring to implement or sustain residency training programs or partnerships;

  • Increase the number of new CHC residency partnerships and accredited programs to expand primary care GME in California; and

  • Strengthen and sustain existing CHC residency partnerships and accredited programs to maximize ongoing efforts that train primary care residents in community-based settings and underserved areas.

New Resource Available
These efforts are made possible through feedback contributed by a 14-member Residency Advisory Group made up of subject matter experts in CHCs, university graduate medical education (GME) programs, and partner associations. Their experiences in implementing different residency models were reflected into a new GME resource demonstrating the varying levels of responsibilities, resources, and ownership required on behalf of the CHC. Pathways to Residency was developed to help CHCs understand the differences in staffing, finances, operations, and other components amongst four residency training models used commonly in CHCs – which include CHC as a sponsoring institution, consortium partner, continuity clinic, and rotation site. Check out this resource to help you start your GME program or partnership today! 

Residency Trainings
CPCA also hosted two GME in-person trainings in March 2019 to educate CHCs about the current GME landscape, upcoming funding opportunities, and how to develop the appropriate partnerships to create a physician residency program. We also discussed in-depth the process to become accredited by the Accreditation Council on Graduate Medical Education (ACGME). Thirty-four CHC participants engaged in robust discussions on these topics with ten speakers who shared their strong GME expertise in establishing new physician residency programs in CHCs. The recordings of these presentations are available on our CPCA webcast library in case you missed this training or need a refresher. Keep your eyes out for details on our next CPCA GME in-person training scheduled for August 8th and 9th in Sacramento! We will be discussing ways to strengthen and expand existing CHC residency programs and partnerships.

National Partners
Our Association is excited to continue supporting our CHCs who are “growing their own workforce” and looks forward to developing our workforce development with other partners like the Association of Clinicians for the Underserved (ACU). Nataly Diaz, CPCA’s Associate Director of Workforce Development, was recently appointed to the ACU Board of Directors and is joining efforts with partners across the country to support the development of healthcare clinicians serving America’s underserved populations. CPCA strongly believes and is actively making strides towards developing a healthcare workforce that reflects and is representative of California’s diverse communities.