The UW School of Medicine and Public Health (SMPH) has seen a significant increase in students matching to family medicine (FM) residency programs this year. With 16.3% of the class (28 students) matching to FM, this year marks the third-highest match percentage in the last decade. This is a notable increase from last year’s match rate of 9.8%.
The highest FM match rate for SMPH in the last 16 years was 19.5%. The average match rate over the last ten years has been 14.2%. Since the implementation of the ForWard Curriculum, which replaces the traditional model of medical education with a three-phase model that fully integrates basic, public health and clinical sciences throughout a medical students’ education, the average has been about 11%.
Of the 28 students who matched to FM this year, 13 were from the Wisconsin Academy for Rural Medicine (WARM) and Training in Urban Medicine and Public Health (TRIUMPH) programs. The remaining 15 students were on the traditional track.
As SMPH continues to strive for excellence in medical education, programs like DFMCH anticipate a bright future for family medicine.