Wellstar Health System-Wellstar Kennestone Regional Medical Center Program

Program Identity & Fit

Wellstar Kennestone is a large, community-based tertiary/quaternary care hospital in metro Atlanta training internists through both a categorical track and a dedicated Primary Care Track, with no 24-hour in-house call and heavy exposure to a high-volume, medically complex, socioeconomically diverse patient base. Research exists but is secondary to clinical training - opportunities include case reports, QI, and clinical projects in collaboration with the Wellstar Research Institute, without an expectation of protected research time or a formal scholarly requirement. The program's stated mission emphasizes social determinants of health, community volunteerism, and increasing the internal medicine physician workforce within Georgia, and graduate outcomes lean heavily toward hospital medicine and primary care rather than competitive subspecialty fellowship placement. Distinctive features include a resident-run board review series, POCUS/procedural emphasis, a strong home-grown faculty pipeline (many core faculty and chiefs are program graduates), and a culture repeatedly described by residents as "family-oriented" and community-rooted, with many trainees explicitly choosing the program to stay near family or return to the region.