Our Residency program began as a joint project of community hospitals in the Kennebec Valley region, the Veterans' Administration Hospital of Togus, Maine, and a rural research and development organization, Medical Care Development, Inc. We were first accredited in 1973 and are the oldest family practice residency program in New England. We affiliated with Dartmouth Medical School in 1979 and were incorporated as the Maine-Dartmouth Family Practice Residency (MDFPR) in 1980. Our second medical school affiliation agreement was signed with the University of New England in 1994. The Residency is a nonprofit corporation financed primarily by its sponsoring hospitals. Our director and a resident sit on the Residency's board of directors.
We are a 27-resident program with nine residents in each year's class. Since 1980, we have been supported primarily by Kennebec Valley Medical Center (KVMC) in Augusta and Mid-Maine Medical Center (MMMC) in Waterville, two hospitals which merged to become MaineGeneral Medical Center in July 1997.
We have two family practice centers. Our larger center is in Augusta next to the Augusta campus of MaineGeneral, where 18 residents are based. A newer, rapidly growing practice is located three miles from the Waterville MaineGeneral Campus, where nine residents are located. Our goal is to produce family practitioners who are concerned with and thoroughly schooled in the effective delivery of comprehensive medical care to rural communities.
Our faculty includes MD and DO physicians, physician assistants, nurse practitioners, a medical sociologist, a psychologist, and an administrator. All are involved in teaching, caring for patients, and helping to coordinate our educational programs. Faculty physician certifications include family medicine, internal medicine, geriatrics, and obstetrics and gynecology.
Residents of our program are the only house staff at our sponsoring hospital in Maine. Graduates practice throughout Maine, the United States, and abroad, primarily in small town and rural settings.