Welcome to the Department of Family Medicine Website!
 The Mission of the Virginia College of Osteopathic Medicine is to prepare osteopathic primary care physicians to serve the rural and medically underserved areas of the Commonwealth of Virginia, North Carolina, and the Appalachian region and to provide scientific research that will improve the health of all humans
Family Medicine is the medical specialty which is concerned with the total health care of the individual and the family. It is the specialty in breadth that integrates the biological, clinical, and behavioral sciences. The scope of family medicine is not limited by age, sex, organ system or disease entity. Family medicine is the all-encompassing holistic specialty.
This website will highlight the Family Medicine and Rural Primary Care rotation sites along with providing informative links to assist in the education of the VCOM student. The purpose of the clerkship is to ensure that the OMSIII develop a full understanding and appreciation of an integrative approach to the care of patients, families, and communities. Family Medicine definitely should hold the motto 'ut prosim' or 'that I may serve'.
I recommend that you surf this website and use it to its fullest capacity. You have been given the basics; now go out to show why VCOM is the training institution of physicians and research for the 21st century!
Goals for the OMSIII:
- Develop the ability to perform a patient-centered interview and treatment plan
- Develop and use an integrated (biopsychosocial) approach to clinical reasoning
- Continue to develop the responsibilities of being humanistic, professional, ethical, dutiful, compassionate, altruistic and knowledgeable
- Improve self understanding in patient interactions
- Experience Family Medicine in a realistic environment
- Understand the continuity of care model of Family Medicine
- Understand how a practice functions through interaction with office staff and paramedical personnel; develop and practice the team approach to medical care
- Participate in patient education and disease prevention and the enhancement of overall health
- Apply osteopathic philosophy and therapy to patient care
- Apply knowledge of basic and clinical sciences to patient care
- Analyze clinical data and consider patient and family preferences
- Investigate and evaluate patient care practices, appraise and assimilate scientific evidence and improve patient care practices
- Learn to provide optimal, cost effective care
- Recognize the cultural, ethnic, and socioeconomic factors that affect healthcare
- Become an advocate for your patients
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