Clinical Sites
One of our program’s greatest strengths is the variety in our teaching hospitals. Our residents spend time at three main hospital sites and multiple other outpatient clinics during their training. This provides a unique opportunity to work with different patient populations and a wide variety of patient acuity and complexity. The opportunity to rotate at each site offers all our graduates a comprehensive understanding of the internist experience.
Each hospital has its own Associate Program Director (APD), a site-specific Head of Internal Medicine, and two to five Chief Residents to provide leadership, support and advocacy for all residents rotating at the site. The dedicated program administration also ensures high quality teaching and learning conferences at all three hospitals.
University of Minnesota Medical Center
The University of Minnesota Medical Center is a major academic hospital in the Twin Cities and serves as a quaternary referral center for a multi-state catchment area. It is made up of two hospitals and dozens of specialty and subspecialty clinics on the East and West Bank campuses of the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis. UMMC is part of M Health Fairview, a partnership between the University of Minnesota, University of Minnesota Physicians, and Fairview Health Services. Residents spend time on multiple rotations including general medicine wards, medical ICU, advanced heart failure service, subspecialty consult services and outpatient clinic rotations. They have the opportunity to work closely with subspecialists and to treat highly medically complex patients. The faculty at the University of Minnesota Medical Center are dedicated to teaching and are consistently recognized for excellence in patient care and cutting-edge research.
Clinics and Surgery Center Primary Care Clinic
The resident primary care clinic is located in the M Health Clinic and Surgery Center (CSC), a state-of-the-art outpatient center located a block from the hospital. The CSC houses a wide range of specialists located in one, easy to access location. The space is designed for collaboration and to allow our care teams to work together in new ways to meet each patient's unique needs.
Associate Program Director
Dr. Melissa Plesac
Regions Hospital
Regions hospital is a large teaching hospital located in downtown St. Paul. It has a long and illustrious history dating back over 150 years. Originally named Ancker Hospital, it functioned as the county safety-net hospital and later became a private non-profit hospital when it became part of the HealthPartners system. Because of this history, it continues to serve as the county hospital for the eastern metropolitan area and surrounding communities. Regions currently has 550+ licensed hospital beds and is the only Level 1 Trauma Center in St. Paul. Regions is home to a renowned Burn Center and has the largest emergency department in the state. Residents will spend time in the general wards, medical ICU, and on a variety of inpatient and outpatient subspecialty rotations. While rotating at Regions, residents will care for patients from a variety of diverse backgrounds and with a variety of resources.
Associate Program Director
Dr. Paula Skarda
Minneapolis VA Health Care System
The Minneapolis VA Healthcare System (MVAHSC) offers a unique experience that is an integral part of our residency training. It is a tertiary referral center that has more than 300 beds and a catchment area of over 390,000 square miles including Minnesota, North and South Dakota, Nebraska, Wisconsin, Kansas, Missouri and Wyoming. Inpatient services at the VA are highly resident-driven with teaching services comprising the majority of the care teams. The hospital also contains many outpatient clinics including primary care and a multitude of specialty clinics. The Minneapolis VA has a comprehensive Women’s Health Center, a state-of-the-art Spinal Cord Injury and Disorder center, and is one of only 20 centers to have a Geriatrics Research Education and Clinical Center (GRECC). It also hosts one of the largest active research programs in the VA healthcare system with over 150 investigators conducting more than 500 research projects, which residents are often involved in. Our VA offers outstanding clinical faculty across a wide range of specialties who are highly engaged in resident education.
VA Primary Care Clinic
As a primary care center, the VA emphasizes continuity and offers connections to many services including mental health, pharmacy case management and counseling, physical therapy and nutrition through the Patient-Aligned Care Team (PACT) model.
Residents who work in the VA primary care clinic inherit a panel of patients their intern year who they will follow throughout their residency. This allows for residents to develop longitudinal relationships with patients and manage patients through different stages of health.
Associate Program Director
Dr. Reut Danieli
CENTER FOR INTERNATIONAL HEALTH
The Center for International Health was established in 1980 in response to the influx of Southeast Asians to Minnesota after the end of the Vietnam War. As immigration trends change Minnesota's demographics, the clinic sees many patients of varied backgrounds. Since 1980, the program has expanded to include patients from more than 30 countries, with a staff of providers combining more than 100 years of experience in International Health, Tropical and Travel Medicine, with extensive experience practicing both internationally and in the United States. Our International Mental Health program was established in 1984, and the International Travel Clinic in 1986.
Key Components
(This care delivery model is nationally recognized)
- Multidisciplinary care: Adult primary care; mental health program (psychiatry and psychology); pediatric specialty care (new arrival screenings, INS adjustment of status examinations)
- Multilingual staff: Frontline staff, medical assistants, nursing and medical staff who are multilingual and multicultural.
- Providers with expertise: Providers who are bilingual and bicultural, from the countries of origin of our patients, and with advanced degrees in tropical and travel medicine, public health, and international health.
- Professionally trained Medical Interpreters: Staff interpreters available on site for multiple key languages. Agency interpreters contracted for all other languages. Telephone interpreter available for all languages.
Program Activities
Patient Care
- New arrival screening examinations for refugees and immigrants (adults, pediatrics and families)
- Primary care for non-English speaking and limited English speaking patients (adults only)
Consultative/Subspecialty Care
- International Mental Health
- Psychiatry
- Psychology
- Group therapy (Vietnamese political prisoner's men's group)
- Cross-cultural health care consults
- INS adjustment of status examinations for families (Civil Surgeons on staff)
Academics
- Continuity Clinic – IM and Med-Peds:
- Observerships for International medical graduates
- Nursing and CMA students
- School of Social Work interns
Lectures/other educational activities
- National, state and local lectures and day-long symposia on refugee health
- New Book– "My Heart it is Delicious" by Billie Young, published October 2007
- Chris Newberry Video "If We Knew Their Stories" with TPT Television
- "Immigrant Medicine" textbook published October 2007
- "LEARN" model video on cultural care
- Research
- multiple published case studies from the CIH
- review articles on refugee and immigrant medicine
- retrospective review of extrapulmonary tuberculosis in Minnesota
- Consulting
- Site visits and discussion of our care delivery model with Mayo, Maine Medical Center, HCMC, PNMC, CDC, International Organization for Migration, Canada and others
Community Outreach & Service
- Board of Directors (International Institute of Minnesota, United Cambodian Association of Minnesota, Vietnamese Social Services of Minnesota and others)
- Health Fairs, community events
- Outreach via ethnic media
- Health articles in Russian newspaper
- Radio talk shows on mental health issues
- Somali health television series
- Hmong newspaper article
HealthPartners St. Paul Wabasha Clinic
The clinic is staffed by both internal medicine and medicine/pediatrics physicians with robust and diverse practices, nearly all of whom have been chief residents or have been directly involved with teaching residents since graduating from residency. Staff also attend in HeathPartners hospitals, TCUs and nursing homes and are leaders in QI for the organization.
Community-University Health Care Center (CUHCC)
The CUHCC primary care clinic is located in South Minneapolis and was founded on the mission of transforming care and education to advance health equity. The clinic serves over 11,000 patients a year from 12 different racial and ethnic groups spanning 5 continents. In addition to primary care medicine, CUHCC offers patients a full range of dental and mental health services that are not typically offered at a community health center. CUHCC is staffed by pharmacists, psychiatric nurse practitioners, family practice, internal medicine and medicine/pediatrics physicians, licensed social works, psychologists and many others. The clinic utilizes an interprofessional care model that uses a collaborative, team-based approach to integrate the delivery of education and patient care. Residents at CUHCC will have the opportunity to work with students and preceptors in other fields to best serve the complex needs of their patients.
As a founding member in the country's first accountable care organization (ACO) for federally qualified health centers, CUHCC is leading change in urban health and improving patient outcomes to meet the Institute for Healthcare Improvement's Triple Aim: improve the patient experience, improve patient health, and reduce the cost of patient care.
