Preliminary Year Residency Program

Our Commitment

The Preliminary Year Residency Program offers an enriching year of internal medicine training, which thoroughly and comprehensively prepares trainees for their future specialty of choice. The preliminary year affords an optimal balance of educational rigor and flexibility to tailor one’s intern experience. Our graduates leave our program with a strong internal medicine foundation that serves them very well throughout their training and future careers.

Leadership

The program director is Dr. Andrea Carter, who holds a Master’s Degree in Medical Education. She has published and presented nationally on many medical education topics including teaching for retention and assessment and feedback for learners. She has also developed, formally evaluated, and published several curricula to teach trainees how to care for patients with substance use disorders. Dr. Carter cares for patients admitted to the general internal medicine teaching services at UPMC Presbyterian/Montefiore and she has a primary care practice within UPMC General Internal Medicine Oakland (GIMO).

Educational Strengths and Mentorship

Preliminary year residents have the same ready access as categorical residents to diverse and rich educational opportunities. These include daily conferences, weekly intern reports, monthly evidence-basic medicine conferences, morbidity and mortality and clinical reasoning conferences, among many others. Our preliminary year residents also benefit from the outstanding and individualized mentorship from the Internal Medicine Program’s Chief Medical Residents, and from a critical mass of medical educators in the Department of Medicine who are nationally recognized for their expertise in education and innovation.

Clinical Opportunities

The UPMC Preliminary Year Residency Program is fully integrated with the UPMC Internal Medicine Categorical Residency Training Program. Rotation options and experiences are identical to those of categorical program trainees, with the exception that preliminary year residents do not have their own continuity clinic. Residents benefit from the fact that we are the region’s largest referral center, with world-class case exposure. This is balanced with rotations at the VA Hospital, which traditionally offers more “bread and butter” Internal Medicine and complements the exposure to the rare and/or very complicated case variety more often seen at the university hospital. Residents also have the opportunity to rotate at Shadyside hospital, which provides world class oncology training including the opportunity to care for patients undergoing CAR-T cell therapy

Scholarship

All preliminary year residents have extensive opportunity to participate in any research area of interest, with access to nationally renowned investigators who are excited to mentor our trainees.  We harness resources from a world-class research university and Department of Medicine ranked #5 and #6 respectively in NIH funding. 

Electives

See examples of electives, below. Blocks are on average 4 weeks with three weeks of vacation.  

Interdepartmental electives:

Anesthesiology

Dermatology

Emergency Medicine

Neurology

Ophthalmology

Orthopedics

Pathology

Pediatrics

Psychiatry

Radiology

Surgery

To Apply

The preliminary year program has a unique NRMP code and accepts applications only through the ERAS system.

For more information about the UPMC Preliminary Year Residency Program, please contact domres@mail.pitt.edu.