Overlook Family Medicine residents may choose a Palliative Care Area of Concentration (AOC) track. The three-year experience supplements the regular family medicine residency curriculum. The AOC mainly consists of participation in a number of ongoing palliative care activities conducted by the Overlook Medical Center Palliative Care Program. When possible, the family medicine schedule is adjusted to accommodate the resident's Palliative Care AOC involvement.
The AOC resident regularly attends Palliative Care Program team meetings. At the meetings, the most active palliative care and ethics consults are reviewed, with opportunities for the residents to present, and palliative care projects are planned and developed. In addition the resident attends:
- Palliative care inpatient consults, including family meetings
- Monthly Schwartz Center Rounds, an innovative supportive, intensive interdisciplinary discussion of challenging clinical care scenarios and issues
- Other palliative care program rounds, meetings and discussions:
- Overlook Medical Bioethics Committee
- Palliative care trainings and programs
- One or more of the several palliative care and ethics conferences in NJ at which Palliative Care Program members present
At the heart of the residency's Palliative Care AOC is our program's strong history and relationship with Overlook Medical Center's Palliative Care Program. Our palliative care track is coordinated by the faculty attending who is co-director of Atlantic Hospice and assisted by other faculty including our behavioral scientist, who is an active member of the Overlook Medical Bioethics Committee, and helped develop Overlook's palliative care program.
Whether or not residents select the Palliative Care AOC, all residents receive significant palliative care exposure. During the community medicine rotation in PGY-2 and PGY-3, all residents spend a week on the palliative care service, participating in consults and other activities. During the other weeks of the block, in both PGY-2 and PGY-3, residents also see patients in the Family Medicine Hospice Home Visiting Program with a family medicine attending who is board-certified in hospice and palliative medicine.
