Aspirus Clinics

Family Medicine Residency

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Having a strong residency program in Wausau benefits the entire area, as 40 percent of the program’s graduates since 1978 serve in rural communities. The program also helps the region financially by bringing roughly $3 million annually in state and federal funds to north central Wisconsin.

The UW Wausau Family Medicine Residency trains medical school graduates in the skills needed to be a Family Medicine physician. Residents enter the program through the National Residency Matching Program (NRMP). The program has a capacity for six residents per year of the three-year training, totaling 18.

Qualified applicants – either in their final year of medical school, or already graduated – are recruited to the program through residency fairs and marketing initiatives. They come to Wausau each year between October and February to look at the program, its faculty and residents, and the community. 

At the close of each interviewing season, each applicant will develop a list of all of the programs visited, and rank-order them. Meanwhile, the program will rank each applicant interviewed. 

The lists then enter a process of matching that starts with each candidate’s list, and tries to match that candidate with the program he/she ranked first. The process begins in March, and continues until each applicant receives an assignment to residency training. Osteopathic Medical School graduates participate in a separate matching program that publishes results in mid-February.

The residency helps Aspirus achieve health care excellence in several ways: 
  • Continuing Medical Education: Wausau is the site of medical conferences for health care professionals to hone their skills.
  • Collaboration: Medical care is constantly reviewed, studied, researched and discussed by several professionals.
  • New Training: The residency is linked to the University of Wisconsin and can offer training to all medical professionals
  • Research: The UW Department of Family Medicine has one of the country’s largest research programs and is consistently among the top five departments nation wide in National Institutes of Health Awards. As an academic partner, the residency has access to these top-notch resources.