Photos from our Med-Peds residents’ Global Health trips.
The Medical Education track is a one year track with Internal Medicine, available to residents in their last year of training with an interest in pursuing a career in academic medicine. The aim of the track is to provide teaching on how to be an effective educator, various teaching opportunities at the medical school and residency level, shadowing experiences with academic leaders, and faculty support for a scholarly project related to medical education.
Track components
One month elective
Sample Projects
For those interested in medical education, but do not wish to pursue the full track, a two week elective is available with similar experiences listed as those above.
The Health Equity track was created to address both global and local health equity issues, encompassing the idea that “Global is Local”. The purpose of the track is to empower residents with knowledge, skills, and experiences that they can use to advocate for health equity throughout their careers. The track provides a supportive environment through which residents can collaborate with Rush service initiatives and research, both locally and globally.
Mission
Our mission is to train culturally competent physicians to identify health disparities with the goal of improving health outcomes and eliminating health inequities, both locally and globally.
Objectives
The Global Health Branch is selectively offered to residents who desire a broader and deeper exposure to service and learning in global health.
Health care providers from Rush have been supporting and assisting local communities in the Dominican Republic and Haiti to establish and sustain public health and medical services for the past sixteen and eleven years respectively. On site work occurs quarterly to foster continuity and sustainability within the communities. Teams are multi-specialty with volunteers from medicine, surgery, nursing, physical therapy, and pharmacy. Trip experiences are one week long in duration with opportunities to participate on both Primary Care and Surgical Trips. The goal is for time to be spent in both countries by the end of the track experience.
In addition to yearly travel, Global Health Branch residents are expected to complete a scholarly project. Examples of previous projects are:
For those residents interested in a Global Health experience, but are not looking for a three year commitment, we do offer a Global Health Elective which is a one time, two week experience. Of note, priority is given to Track residents.
Rush partners with the non-governmental organization, Community Empowerment, whose mission is to work with local leadership in underserved communities to provide essential health care, while fostering the development of self-sustaining health care systems.
Click here for more information on the Global Health Track
Community Health Branch will have a focus on healthy equity in the community. Rush has had a strong commitment to the West Side of Chicago stemming from a deep desire to improve the health and well-being of our surrounding communities. Rush Anchor Mission Strategy outlines the efforts aimed at reducing the social, economic, and environmental inequities faced by individuals living on the West Side.
Inspiration is drawn from this commitment to provide Community Health Branch residents with the opportunity to work closely with Rush community partners. Experiences can be tailored to resident interests. Examples of experiences include COVID-19 immunization efforts, attending home-based primary care visits, assisting with providing non-emergency medical treatment services to individuals experiencing homelessness, spending time with the local public health department.
Each resident will develop and complete a scholarly project, which can be focused on research, quality improvement, education, or service. Guidance and mentorship for the scholarly project will be provided throughout the course of the Track.
The Rush Internal Medicine Residency offers a two year Quality Improvement and Patient Safety Track. Participating residents will have special guidance on a specific project of their choosing from mentors who are enthusiastic and who have access to resources, data, and statistical help.
During the first year of the track, residents (usually working in pairs) will develop and implement a QI project under faculty supervision. Projects will be designed to directly improve patient care, satisfy the residency program requirement for scholarship, and ideally lead to nationally presented abstracts and publication in peer reviewed journals.
In the second year of the track, residents will participate in a “Safety Rotation” where they will have the opportunity to work alongside hospital patient safety leadership through the office chief medical officer (while also having time to finish their projects). This allows residents to gain first-hand experience seeing and understanding the broader organizational efforts to improve safety and quality on a global level.
This track is an ideal for anyone interested in academic hospital medicine, hospital administration, quality and safety, or healthcare business analytics.
Quality improvement driven by residents
So far, our track residents have been involved in number of QI projects on various subjects, including:
Many of these projects have resulted in significant cost savings, improvements in patient safety/flow, and also have been presented in local/regional forums, as well as at national conferences.
Pictured: QI Track participants Esha & Gianna, Med-Peds class of 2023
The Rush Pediatric Residency Program established their Advocacy Track in July 2020. Residents learn about different ways they can help advocate for their patients through experiences with various community organizations. This will provide motivated residents the opportunity to have a longitudinal experience in order to strengthen their ability to become future leaders in advocacy on community, state, and national levels.
Core topics
Pictured: Peds and Med-Peds faculty at a shelter as part of the Rush COVID Rapid Response Team
Click here for more information on the Pediatrics Advocacy Track