Voices From Family Medicine: On Becoming a Family Physician

In this essay-part memoir, part reflection, and part oral history-I review my early professional development, a several years' long progression after residency training, during which I grew from functioning as a technically competent primary care doctor to being a capable and compassionate family physician. As part of that development, and with my colleague John Frey, MD, I interviewed several of the founders of the modern family medicine movement. Here I review some of their answers to the fundamental question of my early practice years: What does it mean to be a family physician? I cite some of their words of wisdom, those of particular import for me, and discuss how these words both helped me become a family physician and ring true even today as we approach the 50th anniversary of the founding of family medicine. I conclude by inviting other clinicians and educators in family medicine, those starting out in the field as well as those well on their way, to consider how their personal histories can help inform their involvement in the future of the discipline, especially in light of the ongoing Family Medicine for America's Health initiative. An educational mini-documentary accompanies this article and can be viewed at https://vimeo.com/198742471.