OSU Family Medicine Interest Group

For third and fourth-year medical students, student involvement is promoted through the Family Medicine Leadership Development Program (FMLDP). This is the second year of Ohio State’s Leadership Development Program. This student-driven program was created through the Family Practice Interest Group and the Department of Family Medicine; it targets third and fourth year medical students who have expressed an interest in Family Medicine. The purpose of the program is to build a support structure and a sense of camaraderie between students and with Family Physicians in the community, to improve student retention in the field of Family Medicine, and to develop students into leaders for our specialty and medicine as a whole as well as for their communities. The program is made up of monthly meetings and an optional Honors Program component in the fourth year.

Invitations to join the Leadership Development Program are extended to all OSU students who have expressed an interest in Family Medicine. Students who have had regular attendance at the monthly meetings have the option to complete a self-designed independent-study project and be a part of the Family Medicine Honors Program.

The Leadership Development Program meetings occur one Sunday evening each month in the home of a local Family Physician. The schedule generally includes a meal with time for socializing, presentation and discussion of a medical or leadership topic, and journal club. Articles for journal club are selected from American Family Physician and can be about research, ethics, or current issues in medicine. Occasionally the journal club time has been used to discuss other issues such as direct to consumer advertising of pharmaceuticals or residency interview experiences. The students who are a part of the Leadership Development Program select the topics for the meetings. This year topics included legislation, challenges to professionalism, public health and preventive medicine, media training, finance and leadership opportunities in Family Medicine. The speakers/discussion leaders included many community family physicians, a member of the US House of Representatives, representatives from the governor's office, the director of the Columbus Health Department, and a former television anchorperson.