Obstetrics
Obstetrical care can be a core component of practice of a full spectrum family physician if chosen, which is why it is such an important part of our curriculum here at Northern Light Eastern Maine Medical Center Family Medicine Center and Residency. The residency is one of three delivering services at Eastern Maine Medical Center. We deliver all our own clinic patients, patients referred from Wellspring (a residential substance abuse treatment center), and referred patients from Health Access Network (a Federally Qualified Health Center in Lincoln). We are lucky to have such strong working relationships with the two other delivering services on the floor; our residents provide coverage after hours and on weekends in exchange for invaluable mentorship. We share with them precipitous deliveries, transfer OB patients from the several critical access hospitals in the region, and patients who present without prenatal care. We are in a fortuitous position as family physicians to manage medical complications of pregnancy and are often consulted by our OB/GYN colleagues to comanage for this reason. We are uniquely staffed by three OB fellowship trained family medicine faculty who are fully credentialled in the hospital to perform surgical obstetrics.
Our patient population is disproportionately high risk; as such we work with the state’s maternal fetal medicine team based out of Portland to help guide care.
Residents at a minimum are required to deliver two continuity patients and 10 vaginal deliveries by the end of their residency. While for some this is enough, many residents are keenly enthusiastic about obstetrics, and will opt for more volume through the Health Access Network referrals and seizing upon opportunities with Obstetricians when they have actively laboring patients on labor and delivery. We have also created opportunities for high volume away rotations for these residents as below.
High Volume Away Rotations
For those residents who wish to include obstetrics in their scope of practice following residency, our program has established relationships with higher volume centers for away rotations. One of the main sites that has been visited by our residents in recent years is at Southern New Hampshire Medical Center in Nashua, a teaching site for Tufts and Maine Dartmouth.