Primary Care Advanced Practice Provider (APP) Fellowship

Goals of the Fellowship

• Increase clinical competencies, expertise, and skillsets amongst APPs and optimize opportunities to practice autonomously.
• Provide fellows exposure to a variety of clinical practice settings and styles with diverse patient populations.
• Development of the fellow’s individual practice style through varied exposure, experienced APP mentorship, and continuous feedback from physician preceptors.
• Strengthened resiliency in practice, with the skills and tools necessary to identify and manage burnout.

Core Didactic Curriculum

Based upon an intake assessment which measures the fellow’s clinical competencies and past educational experiences, some fellows may be required to participate in additional didactics or learning opportunities to further develop their knowledge and expertise. Summit Health’s curriculum includes important topics that support the overall mission of modern healthcare, which aims to improve the quality and accessibility of care. This includes modules on population health, value-based care, and leadership development.

Quality Improvement Project

Supplementing core didactics, fellows will also complete a quality improvement project that includes a formal poster presentation. Before completion of the program, fellows will conduct a poster presentation highlighting the improvement opportunity they identified, their analysis, and proposed solution. This project provides fellows the opportunity to become involved with quality and outcomes improvement throughout the fellowship and helps foster future leaders in improving patient care throughout their careers.

Reflective Presentation

Fellows will maintain a self-reflective journal throughout the duration of the program aimed to record their experiences to show personal growth throughout the 12-month fellowship. The journal entries will include the Fellows’ experiences, self-evaluations, successes, struggles, meetings with their preceptors, as well as leadership interviews with key leaders from Summit Health. The journal entries and other assignments completed during the fellowship will serve as an opportunity for fellows to build a strong personal portfolio that highlights their skills, competencies, and experiences.

Journal Club

Throughout the fellowship program, participants will also engage in an academic journal club. On a rotating basis fellows will all be asked to read the same academic article that relates to curriculum covered during the fellowship. One fellow will then be asked to summarize and lead a Grand Rounds style discussion regarding the selected article. Leaders and other providers within Summit Health may participate in the journal club further strengthening fellow’s confidence in their competencies and integration within the Summit Health team.

Autonomous and Precepted Practice

Throughout the APP Fellowship Program, fellows will have the opportunity to participate in autonomous and precepted practice time at a minimum of three days per week. This structure allows fellows the opportunity to develop the practice style and slowly transition to full autonomous practice all while still receiving continuous feedback and input from experiences providers.

Skills Labs

Fellows will take part in Skills Labs where they will participate in hands-on learning with experienced providers. Three separate Skills Labs will be conducted quarters one and two of the program. Fellows will learn skills and common procedures related to women’s health, orthopedics, wound care, ophthalmology, dermatology, podiatry and more.  

Including but not limited to:

• Laceration repair
• Incision and Drainage
• Simple biopsy
• Foreign body removal
• Long-term birth control insertion
• Orthopedic therapeutics

Specialty Rotations

The Summit Health APP Fellowship Program provides the opportunity for fellows to rotate in specialty clinics providing exposure to complex disease processes often co-managed within the Primary Care setting. Fellows will have the opportunity to complete rotations in six core specialties and nine supplemental specialties.

Core Rotations:

• Endocrinology
• Cardiology
• Dermatology
• Gastroenterology
• Neurology
• Psychology
   

Supplemental Rotations:

• Nephrology
• Otolaryngology (Ear, Nose, and Throat [ENT])
• Pulmonology
• Obstetrics and Gynecology (OB/GYN)
• Urology
• Hematology/Oncology
• Orthopedics
• Rheumatology