Continuity of care in family practice. Part 4: implementing continuity in a family practice residency program.

Although continuity of care is an important goal of family practice residency programs, there are many factors which inevitably prevent its full achievement by individual residents in any program. Each resident is frequently faced with conflicting responsibilities involving the Family Practice Center, inpatient clinical services, and other parts of the residency training program. This paper explores this dilemma and suggests a variety of positive approaches to resolve the issue. All family practice residents must necessarily be intimately involved in providing continuity of patient care and develop the requisite skills and attitudes. However, full continuity of care must ultimately be provided on a program and group level, not exclusively by the individual resident.