Southside Family Practice Residency

A Message From the Director

A great deal has changed in the practice of medicine since Southside Hospital started its Family Practice Residency in 1972, but after three decades, I am convinced that the kind of physician we train is what our American health care system needs the most. Sub-specialization and high technology remain popular with both the medical profession and the public, but we pay a price for this. Our profession uses more technology than is necessary for quality health care, yet we are not expanding the primary and preventive services needed by many. Our system is the most expensive in the world, yet our health care outcomes are far from the world's best. Training more skilled and talented family physicians, as we try to do at Southside, would go a long way toward remedying these problems.

My experience as president of the New York State Academy of Family Physicians and my service on committees of the American Academy of Family Physicians has broadened my perspective on the way health care is provided in this country. I am convinced that a family practice emphasis is the best way for everyone to receive quality health care.

Southside has graduated more than 250 family physicians who now care for people all over the United States. The hospital's Department of Family Practice of more than 50 physicians includes about 30 of our graduates. Southside has always served an economically and ethnically diverse population. The hospital takes particular pride in the outstanding clinical care that it provides to patients with the greatest need. We work closely with the Suffolk County Department of Health Services to staff the Brentwood Family Health Center. We treat some of the most challenging problems in the health care spectrum: AIDS, substance abuse and teen pregnancy as well as the full scope of acute and chronic disease. We would never be able to provide this care without our family practice residents and faculty. Our residents gain a wide experience in the hands-on management of these problems, and patients view them as their primary physicians. Our graduates have always told us that this high level of clinical responsibility has prepared them for the clinical challenges they face in practice. These experiences will benefit you as well if you choose Southside for residency. You will receive intense training within a friendly, community hospital environment in a suburban setting.

As a network hospital, we benefit from the stellar academic resources, financial strength and stability and advanced technology available within the North Shore/LIJ Health System. This affiliation has strengthened our expertise in providing training and services in maternal health and pediatrics. We are proud to be one of the few programs in the metropolitan New York area to have a full-time Family Physician faculty responsible for residency obstetric training.

We participate in the Suffolk Health Plan, a county-sponsored Medicaid managed care program.  This allows our patients to receive more comprehensive service and assists resident physicians in learning the skills needed for managed care practice.

I hope you will carefully review the material on this website. We think it will give you an excellent overview of Southside's residency. We hope to see you for an interview and a first-hand look at our program.

Richard J. Bonanno, MD
Director, Family Practice Residency Program
Medical Director, Brentwood Family Health Center
Associate Professor of Family Medicine, School of Medicine, State University of New York at Stony Brook
President, New York State Academy of Family Physicians, 1995-1996