Department of Family and Community Medicine Research, Scholarship & Professional Development
Welcome to the Department of Family and Community Medicine’s Research and Scholarship website. Our research mission, vision and values are outlined below. We encourage the pursuit and attainment of Earnest Boyer’s expanded domains of scholarship, including the scholarship of discovery, integration, application, teaching and learning.
We train our residents, fellows and other learners to develop an evidence-based approach to scientific inquiry and practice, to be lifelong learners and informed practitioners, scholars, leaders, advocates and change agents. Faculty members model the requisite attitudes and behaviors to guide and inspire our trainees.
In addition to research and scholarly work within the Department, we are involved with collaborative work and team science, in both teaching and research, with other UIC departments, as well as with other institutions to build a learning health system and attain the Quintuple Aim - improving patient experiences and outcomes, reducing unnecessary healthcare costs, optimizing care team wellbeing, and advancing health equity.
Please take a moment to navigate through our website. If you have any comments or suggestions, please contact dfmresearch@uic.edu.
Mission Heading link
Improve the health and well-being of individuals and communities and advance health equity and social justice via cutting-edge research and health workforce development, and guide learners in becoming scholars, leaders, advocates, and change-agents.
Vision Heading link
Be a national and international leader in advancing health equity and social justice – by dismantling systemic racism and all other types of inequity – through transformative research, scholarship, advocacy, and health workforce development.
Strategy Heading link
- Conduct local, regional, national, and/or global research to address health disparities and advance health equity.
- Involve stakeholders at multiple levels who are relevant to the well-being of individuals and communities, with a special focus on vulnerable populations.
- Develop, implement, and evaluate interventions through participatory approaches to enhance high quality patient-, family-, and community-centered care across the life course.
- Mentor all levels of learners to develop successful scholars and leaders, advocates, and change-agents.
- Develop a robust, diverse, and inclusive interprofessional health workforce.
- Disseminate DFCM scholarly work broadly and build communities of learning and practice to advance our mission, vision and values.
Research Activities Heading link
These are some of the activities this division engages in in the areas of medical education and clinical and public health.
Activities related to medical education
- Clinical reasoning
- Evidence-based Medicine
- Faculty development
- Medical decision-making
- Medical informatics
- Promoting scholarship (per Boyer’s model; discovery, integration, application, and teaching)
- Psychometrics
- Role of direct observation in assessment of clinical competence
- Teaching and assessment of ACGME core competencies
Activities related to clinical and/or public health
- Cultural competence
- End-of-life care
- Epidemiology and management of chronic diseases (e.g. diabetes mellitus, hypertension, asthma)
- Nutrition and obesity
- Occupational medicine
- Patient safety
- Patient-centered care
- Patient-physician communication
- Prevention and management of STDs & HIV/AIDS
- Quality care
- Reducing health disparities
- Reproductive health
Midwest AIDS Training and Education Center Heading link
Also known as MATEC, The Midwest AIDS Training and Education Center is based at the , Department of Family Medicine. MATEC is a publicly-funded training center that providing clinical training and support to health care professionals, with a focus on HIV/AIDS care and treatment. Learn more about their work, including their ongoing projects, as well as training and resources.