The Primary Care Program at the University of Rochester

Our Categorical Program’s “6+2” Block Model provides outstanding educational experiences for all residents, no matter their career choice. Whether interested in primary care, hospital medicine, or subspecialty practice, we want all residents completing our program well-prepared to succeed in any area of practice.

We have built significant inpatient and ambulatory elective time into our categorical curriculum to allow residents the flexibility to tailor their own curriculum to match their needs and interests. Our Primary Care Program builds upon our 6+2 Block approach, increasing ambulatory training time substantially for residents who want predominantly ambulatory careers.

Interns in the Primary Care Program follow the same 6+2 block schedule as their Categorical Program colleagues, empowering them to complete the intern year with a solid foundation in inpatient medicine and ready to lead teams on the inpatient services. They are grouped together in the same ambulatory block cohort, which allows for the formation of a primary care resident community within the larger resident community and for participation in an additional primary care resident-specific curriculum on Friday mornings.

These education sessions are a mixture of specialist-led didactics in fields like endocrine, sleep medicine, and psychiatry and skills-based training including joint injections and etonogestrel implant (Nexplanon) placement.

Upper-Level Ambulatory Experiences

As an upper-level resident, there are two approaches for obtaining additional ambulatory experiences, either through the 4+4 schedule or within the 6+2 schedule.

4+4 Schedule

In the 4+4 schedule, residents have 50% more time seeing patients in their continuity clinic and more longitudinal elective time within their ambulatory blocks.

These longitudinal electives include:

• Core specialties such as endocrine and GI.
• Primary care–focused electives such as geriatrics, student health, and rural private office.

6+2 Schedule with Additional Electives

Alternatively, within the 6+2 schedule, residents maintain their standard ambulatory block with additional two-week primary care or ambulatory electives.

Elective options include:

• Specialized primary care rotations such as Federally Qualified Health Centers, rural primary care, transgender health, student health, and medicine in psychiatry.
• Primary care-adjacent specialty electives such as sports medicine, women’s health, addiction medicine, and memory care.

6+2 Example Schedule

4+4 Example Schedule

Block 1

Block 2