Capstone
Leadership for the future
Our Capstone Curriculum was designed as an immersive set of innovative experiences to catalyze each class’s learning as they move from one level of training to the next. All residents participate in capstone weeks, which occur in a two week block at the beginning of July, one week in fall, and one week in the winter.
The seasonality of capstone is reflected in the overall intention of each session:
Summer Capstone – The Big Transition: The two summer capstone weeks are when we say goodbye to our graduates, welcome our new R1s, and prepare each class to ‘level up’ to the expectations and responsibilities of their new role. It involves a lot of team building and skill building to prepare each class for the year ahead. Rising R2s will also get the opportunity to work in the gardens and kitchens at Ceres Community Project, as a decompression and community outreach after their largely inpatient heavy first year.
Fall Capstone – Settling In and Diving Deeper: This week occurs after the first section of rotations and offers a chance to deepen knowledge and connections, both clinically and in the residency community. We also use this week to prep for the next interview season.
Winter/Spring Capstone – Looking Ahead, Reigniting the Flame: At this point in the year, residents are beginning to look ahead to their next step, whether becoming senior residents or graduating and moving on. This week includes more career prep and feedback sessions to help ensure each class has the tools and skills they need for the next year.
Curricular Buckets:
In addition to the overarching themes, each capstone week includes a combination of trainings, workshops, team-building, and sessions – some specific to a single class and others for all residents as a whole – to further the goals of the following curricular goals:
1.Becoming an effective, efficient family physician
- telemedicine training
- OSCEs
- Learning the ‘4 Habits for Highly Effective Communication’
- The Art of Saying No communication workshop
- EMR efficiency tips and optimization
- motivational interviewing,
- research and QI
- Billing & Coding
- ABFM modules
2. Advancing skills in full-scope family
- ALSO training
- Stroke and Code simulation
- Nexplanon training
- POCUS in every capstone
- Inpatient and Outpatient Procedures with Simulation
3. Medical Education and Leadership
- Junior precepting
- Inclusive leadership training
- What color is your brain? Personality perspectives
- Giving Dynamic Presentations
4. Self Reflection and Finding Your Path
- CV workshop
- Finding your personal mission – retreat with the Natura Institute for Ecology and Medicine
- Career panels
- 1:1 Career Planning with program director
- Mask making workshop
- Identity and Storytelling
5. Individual, Community, & Global Transformation
- DEIAA/Antiracism curriculum
- Prison visit
- Ceres Community Project
- Spanish language training
- Climate Health Curriculum
- Gender affirming care
- Listening & Belonging Workshop
- KP ACCESS Training
6. Teamwork and Culture Building
- Transition Ceremony
- Group Hikes
- All residency meals together
- Bowling
- Book and Movie Club
- Community Service at local shelters, food banks
- Residency Garden Work
Community Medicine
Maximizing the total health of our communities.
Our program engages residents in community health from day one. Our goal is for our residents to obtain the knowledge and skills to lead sustainable positive community change.
Residents receive a longitudinal curricular experience with our affiliated partner, Petaluma Health Center. Petaluma Health Center is a federally qualified health center (FQHC) which prides itself on being a high performing wellness and prevention-minded community health center. All residents see patients at PHC regularly throughout their entire three years, precepted by our Community Medicine Fellow. The curriculum includes community medicine, population health, public health, advocacy for justice in healthcare and other social determinants of health. Residents gain the knowledge and skills to lead sustainable positive community change.
Dedicated community medicine rotations in all 3 years include additional opportunity to care for our community’s most vulnerable and participate in leadership training focused on optimizing community health. During this time, residents see patients at the Jewish Community Free Clinic, Graton Day Labor Center. Residents also facilitate the KP ACCESS program, in which vulnerable, at-risk FQHC patients receive short-term Kaiser Permanente insurance to gain access to free, vital specialty services.
Residents see patients at the Jewish Community Free Clinic and facilitate the KP ACCESS program, in which uninsured patients at local FQHCs who are not able to obtain timely, affordable specialty care elsewhere in the community can receive short-term Kaiser Permanente coverage to gain access to free, vital specialty services. Residents become their temporary PCP and help navigate their care pathway through our system.
In addition to these experiences, residents can use elective time for community medicine electives at any of the following community sites with which we have affiliation agreements:
- Sonoma County Indian Health Project
- West County Health Center Gender Expansive Services Clinic
- Ceres Community Project
- Petaluma Health Center: gynecology/prenatal clinics, OMT clinic.
- And more!
We also provide longitudinal didactics in community medicine, population health, public health, health equity, and advocacy for justice in healthcare.
KP ACCESS
KPACCESS, or Kaiser Permanente Access to Community Centered Equitable Specialty Services, is a new program facilitated by the Kaiser Permanente Santa Rosa Family Medicine Residency in which we collaborate with Sonoma County community health centers to make high-quality advanced medical specialty services available to Sonoma County’s uninsured residents. This vulnerable, at-risk population receives short-term Kaiser Permanente coverage so they may access these vital services.
Referrals are generated by two local Federally Qualified Health Centers (FQHC) – Santa Rosa Community Health and Petaluma Health Center. Services are free of charge for KP ACCESS patients, who continue to receive their primary care through their original FQHC while enrolled. Once the specialty care is completed, KP ACCESS patients are transitioned back to their community health center. Our family medicine residents act as liaisons to coordinate patient care throughout the Kaiser Permanente system.
Integrative Medicine
A focus on wellness and preventive care for both patients and physicians.
- In conjunction with the Andrew Weil Center for Integrative Medicine (AWCIM), our residency offers the Integrative Medicine in Residency (IMR) program, which provides a dynamic, self-paced online Integrative Medicine curriculum specifically designed for medical residents. This 100-hour competency-based CORE program aligns with ACGME guidelines and equips physicians to better address the growing prevalence of chronic illnesses and stress-related disorders. Upon completion, residents receive a Certificate of Completion and gain access to over 85 additional hours of advanced, condition-specific content. The program provides 24-hour access and blends online learning with experiential activities, ensuring flexibility for busy schedules. It also includes a Healthcare Professional Wellbeing Course and incorporates evaluation tools to monitor progress and assess knowledge acquisition.. During specific rotations, residents complete the UAZCIM curricular content that is specific to their current rotation. This includes formal didactics and guided online training. We offer an optional 200-hour certificate track to UAZCIM.
- All residents receive one free year of membership with the American College of Lifestyle Medicine and have access to the Lifestyle Medicine Residency Curriculum (LMRC), a comprehensive, applicable, and flexible curriculum that prepares residents to make evidence-based, lifestyle behavior interventions. The LMRC consists of both educational and practicum components that can be completed on elective time. Upon completion of both the educational and practicum components of the curriculum, residents will be qualified for the American Board of Lifestyle Medicine (ABLM) certification exam.
- Personal and professional development through mentorship, protected time for reflection, and a culture of caring.
- Longitudinal training in HeartMath, Lifestyle Medicine, Food as Medicine, health promotion, preventive health, and evidence-based herbs and supplements.
- Many faculty have additional training and board certification in Integrative Medicine, Lifestyle Medicine, and integrative modalities (acupuncture, herbal medicine, manual medicine/OMT, mind-body techniques).
- All three years residents perform forty-minute integrative health consults as part of their required rotations with the opportunity to do additional consults in elective time
Physician Health and Resilience
Promoting Reflection and Personal Growth
Our program values a healthy work-life balance. We believe that doctors who take care of themselves take better care of their patients. With a humane schedule (no overnight shifts in the first year and no 24-hour call at all!), strict adherence to ACGME resident work hour requirements, and faculty who model healthy, balanced lifestyles, we ensure that our residents thrive. Our faculty model healthy, balanced lifestyles.
Formal residency resilience practice includes:
- Personal & Professional Development (P&PD) Groups: Regularly scheduled with protected time for each class, Personal and Professional Development (P&PD) sessions are facilitated by a faculty member to foster support and community during this time of dramatic growth.
- Resident Balint: Balint is a group method of discussing and reflecting on the doctor-patient relationship. The purpose of Balint is to build empathy for patients and to creatively explore the unique bond between doctor and patient.
- Residents participate in HeartMath training and mind-body techniques such as guided visualization, and meditation.
- Quarterly administration of the Physician Wellness Inventory(PWI) to support resident emotional and mental health.
- Fun! Regularly scheduled activities through Physician Health & Wellness (movie nights, ski trips, group hikes, sports games) and Live Well Be Well employee wellness program.
Equity, Inclusion, and Diversity
Leading the nation in equitable care and reduced disparities.
Through a longitudinal curriculum, residents also explore how historical, political, environmental, and institutional factors impact health equity and underlie health care disparities.
Other highlights include:
- Health Disparities and Racial Justice Curriculum along with training in culturally sensitive care.
- Options to care for patients in La Clinica, KP Santa Rosa’s Latine Health Module, which offers culturally responsive, bilingual care.
- KP Santa Rosa is a nationally recognized leader in LGBTQ+ Care – opportunities for advanced training in transgender medicine.
- Opportunities for research around social determinants of health and reducing disparities in health outcomes.
- Commitment to the promotion and support of diversity within the residency and community by participating in pathway programs for junior college and undergraduate students with the goal of attracting residents, faculty, and staff of diverse cultural backgrounds and life experiences to better serve our communities.
- Kaiser Permanente has been committed to providing culturally responsive, prevention-focused healthcare to patients for over 65 years. Our integrated, technologically advanced, outcomes-based clinical care has been applauded by health experts across the nation.
Kaiser Permanente Santa Rosa serves an increasingly diverse population, whether defined by socioeconomic status, social determinants of health, sexual orientation, gender identity, race, or ethnicity. Nationally, such diversity is usually matched by discrepancies in healthcare outcomes. Kaiser Permanente Northern California has been shown to be a significant exception to this rule, renowned for both culturally respectful care and an innovative model of integrated healthcare delivery which can reduce or even eliminate disparities in healthcare outcomes within a diverse population.
Scholarly Activity and Leadership
Tools for success: time, training, and resources.
We wrap support around residents and faculty to harness their passion to advance the field of Family Medicine through clinically relevant, community focused QI projects, scholarly activity, and innovation. All residents have time and support to complete their two required scholarly activity projects (and often more!) within the three years of training.
Highlights include:
- 1:1 support from the residency’s full-time senior research project manager.
- Kaiser Permanente’s renowned Division of Research is available for programming and biostatistical support for resident projects.
- A network of clinical librarians to help ground projects in the latest research.
- Annual residency “Scholarly Shark Tank” – our fun and collaborative forum for showcasing resident and faculty scholarly projects. During Shark Tank, residents and faculty pitch their research proposals to recruit other resident and faculty colleagues to “buy in” and collaborate on their project.
- Training and funding are available locally and regionally to support the dissemination of scholarly activity through both conferences and publication.
- Training in teaching and clinical leadership through Personal and Professional Development rotations in the second and third years.
- Opportunities to present scholarly outputs at a KPNC regional scholarly symposium, UCSF Colloquium, and other regional/national conferences such as STFM.
Climate Forward Curriculum
As a climate-forward residency, we recognize and acknowledge that climate change is considered to be the single largest threat to human health for the foreseeable future. With increased weather-related disasters, physicians are already on the front lines of the climate and health crisis. We also recognize the enormous impact that the US healthcare system has on the production of greenhouse gases and global warming.
We are working to integrate climate-related topics into our residency education. Our goal is that residents graduate and practice medicine with a climate-informed lens. We are committed to finding ways to reduce our carbon footprint and train residents who can become advocates for climate health through the following:
- Didactics focused on climate change and a climate health elective.
- Elimination of beef (a major contributor to global warming) at all residency-provided meals.
- Discouraging single use plastics (eg we strongly encourage use of metal speculums and other reusable tools that reduce waste; we provide residents and faculty with a set of bamboo cutlery to reuse).
- Appropriate bins for composting and recycling in our module.
- Support for any resident or faculty interested in training to be a Climate Ambassador through Climate For Health (link: https://climateforhealth.org/)
- Relevant resident and faculty scholarly projects related to effects of wildfires on health and morbidity, educating patients in health and planetary benefit of more plant-based diet.
We invite you to join our conversation and help us educate our colleagues and our community!
Residency Advising Program
Faculty advisors are assigned to work with a resident over the course of the training program. Each advisor undergoes a rigorous selection process and is eager to develop a longitudinal and supportive relationship with their resident. The program provides catered lunches and dedicated time for the resident/advisor pair to meet monthly. These meetings are 1:1, as the advisor aims to get to know the residents’ professional goals, listen to areas of struggle, and provide guidance to help residents meet their specific career goals. Advisors advocate for residents and receive ongoing training focused on helping residents find joy and meaning in medicine.
