FUTURE speaker champions family medicine's flexibility

Kathryn Hart, MD, FAAFP, has been teaching family medicine for 15 years. Last year she added something new to her curriculum vitae: direct primary care (DPC) physician.

“Our careers can be diverse in family medicine,” said Hart, a professor of family medicine at Georgetown University School of Medicine and a member of the Maryland AFP. “I was able to shift into DPC and still maintain my academic appointments. We can mix and match a lot in family medicine and have interests in things like women’s health procedures, sports medicine, academic medicine, leadership and administrative work. Those added interests balance the patient care piece. The variety keeps our careers interesting and allows them to evolve over time as our lives outside of medicine also evolve. It lends itself to flexibility, which is really nice.”

Hart teaches and advises medical students and precepts residents, but she also spends 40% of her time outside of the university health system in direct primary care.

“Autonomy is one of the biggest things,” she said. “I have a lot of control over my schedule. I enjoy spending more time with patients. I have a smaller patient panel, so patients have more access to me. They can see me the same day or next day instead of waiting for an appointment or going to urgent or emergency care. That’s been really great, seeing people when they need to be seen.”

FUTURE session will highlight family medicine career flexibility

Hart will bring her perspective to the AAFP’s FUTURE (formerly National Conference) July 30-Aug. 1 in Kansas City, Missouri. She will discuss different practice settings in a session with Jessica Richter, DO, MPH, a full-scope, private practice family physician from Kansas City, Missouri; and Jennifer Harader, MD, a DPC doctor from Topeka, Kansas.

“We want to give people a sense of the different options they have after residency,” Hart said. “Many people are shifting out of employed settings to DPC and concierge practice. Students may be more open to a career in primary care if they understand their options. We want to educate them that these models exist, and they may want to explore them as they make career decisions or look for jobs. It’s one more way we can be flexible in family medicine.”

Fighting stereotypes that discourage students from family medicine

Hart also will present a session on specialty respect with fellow Georgetown family physician Jeffrey Weinfeld, MD.

“Students are dissuaded from family medicine because of the stereotypes engrained in social media and pop culture and the hidden curriculum of medical school,” Hart said. “Our main goal is raising awareness of this issue because in family medicine it’s definitely a piece of the puzzle in career choice.”

Hart and Weinfeld have been working together to address specialty respect at Georgetown since 2020, implementing a multi-faceted campaign that includes student workshops, posters, laptop stickers, lapel pins and a pledge.

The Georgetown colleagues have presented the topic to their peers at local, regional and national events. This will be their first time bringing it to students and residents at the national level.

“For students, naming this experience is helpful,” she said, “and we give them tools to address this when it happens. We want to empower students to make the decision that’s right for them and not be dissuaded by negative and often misguided opinions they hear about family medicine.”

Finding her own path to family medicine

Family medicine wasn’t Hart’s original plan. She enrolled in Cornell University with a long-term plan to attend its veterinary school. But as a sophomore, Hart participated in a program that brought animals to nursing homes and juvenile detention centers.

“I realized while doing that I enjoyed talking with people,” she said.

Her first clinical rotation at the University of Maryland School of Medicine was at a family medicine clinic where she saw Richard Colgan, MD, make home visits and care for a vulnerable patient population in Baltimore.

“He practiced old-time, Norman Rockwell medicine,” said Hart, who also later was mentored by Colgan when she served as an assistant professor and clerkship director at Maryland. “He used to talk about the three As of qualities that patients look for in a doctor: Accessible, Affable and Able, in that order, and I really took that advice to heart.”

By her second year, Hart was an officer in her school’s family medicine interest group. During her fourth year, she attended National Conference (now FUTURE), which offers hands-on procedure workshops, student and resident congresses and expo hall filled with hundreds of family medicine residency programs in addition to educational sessions.

“It was such a positive experience that confirmed I had made the right decision,” she said.

Mentoring the next generation of family physician leaders

Now Hart, a member of the Maryland AFP’s Board of Directors since 2019 and its treasurer since 2025, is working to develop the next generation of family medicine leaders as director of Georgetown’s Community Health Leadership Track.

That program places students at an Area Health Education Center and pairs them with a mentor for a longitudinal clinical experience with an underserved patient population. Students complete a community learning project with elementary students, and also learn mentoring skills by working with high school and undergraduate students.

Hart aims to pass on her passion for leadership and advocacy.

“I’ve enjoyed having a seat at the table,” she said. “I bring an interesting perspective to my state academy in that I live in Maryland, went to medical school and was on the faculty at Maryland, and precept Georgetown family medicine residents at their clinic site in Maryland. I’ve also practiced in Washington, D.C., which is an obvious bridge to collaborating with DCAFP in advocacy.”