Community Pediatrics Overview
We base the teaching of management of common illnesses in community settings. We emphasize the importance of continuity of care in smaller, community hospitals associated with Partners Healthcare and the MassGeneral Hospital for Children. These rotations represent the continuum of practice from a pediatrician's office, through urgent care management, and on smaller inpatient units that reflect the epidemiology of illness in the community. Four months of ambulatory care rotations complete the teaching of outpatient pediatrics.
Cambridge Hospital
The pediatricians at Cambridge Hospital, a Harvard teaching hospital, are members of our Pediatric Service staff. Pediatric facilities at Cambridge Hospital include a busy emergency room, primary care and subspecialty ambulatory clinics, a small inpatient facility, and a 15-bed nursery. Junior residents at Cambridge Hospital provide medical coverage for an inpatient adolescent and childhood psychiatric unit. The Pediatric Department of Cambridge Hospital runs several neighborhood clinics in the City of Cambridge seeing more than 83,000 ambulatory visits each year. Residents rotating at Cambridge experience an excellent range of outpatient issues critical to the general pediatrician practicing in the community. The rotation at Cambridge will therefore focus on general outpatient pediatrics in the community.
North Shore Children's Hospital
MGH pediatric house officers provide care to children at the North Shore Children’s Hospital in Salem, Massachusetts. The service includes a busy urgent care clinic which sees nearly 20,000 patients annually and a 20-bed inpatient ward serving children with a variety of common medical diagnoses. The care team is supervised by a junior resident and works closely with the pediatric staff of North Shore Children’s Hospital and community pediatricians to coordinate patient care. Extensive Developmental Pediatric Consultative Services provide care to patients throughout the northern Boston suburbs. Residents rotating at North Shore experience a broad range of inpatient issues critical to the general pediatrician practicing in the community. The rotation at North Shore therefore focuses on general inpatient pediatrics in the community.
Newton-Wellesley Hospital
Newton-Wellesley Hospital provides a base for the MassGeneral Hospital for Children in the western Boston suburbs. Residents experience several outpatient subspecialty clinics, consult in the emergency room and manage a small associated inpatient unit. Residents rotating at NWH experience a range of both inpatient and outpatient issues focusing on subspecialty pediatrics as practiced in a community setting with our MGH faculty members.
Continuity Clinics
Residents deepen their experience in primary care by acting as primary care physicians one-half day per week for patients in a continuity clinic. During the four ACR rotations, residents attend their continuity clinic for at least five half-day sessions. We base our continuity sites at community health centers associated with MGH or Cambridge Hospital, or at practices affiliated with MGH, Newton-Wellesley Hospital or North Shore Children’s Hospital. This provides residents a unique opportunity to function as primary care pediatricians in their patients’ communities. Residents develop their own panel of patients and function as their patients’ primary caregiver.
