Mission statements: what do they tell us about family medicine training programs?

Family medicine is the second largest medical specialty in the United States; yet, some argue that it is struggling to define itself. This study examined mission, vision, and goal statements of family medicine residency programs as a means of gaining insight into the current definition of the discipline.

Mission statements were obtained from the Internet sites of family medicine residency programs or requested directly from programs when the mission statements were not available on the Internet. The content of the mission statements was analyzed for the presence of eight categories of family medicine values that were identified through a literature review.

We obtained mission statements from 296 of 472 (63%) residency programs. No significant relationships were found between program characteristics and the number or types of values found in the mission statements. The following three categories of family medicine values were named in at least 70% of mission statements: (1). community issues, (2). academic mission, and (3). quality health care. In contrast, the words "family" and "research" were mentioned by only one third of programs.

Community-oriented care was mentioned more often than family-centered care. Despite the mention of academic missions by many training programs, most lacked a stated interest in research development. Although quality health care was named in the majority of mission statements, keeping current with technology was not. These findings contribute unique information that may be useful in the evolving definition and discussion of family medicine.