Director's Welcome
I want to bring my enthusiasm and a passion for family medicine and the wide variety of experiences that I have had over my 20+ year career to this new program and the next generation of colleagues. Building a curriculum with the foundational elements of whole family care across the continuum with the flexibility to incorporate the uniqueness of each resident’s interests is very exciting and works well in the robust local and national health system of Ascension.
A brief history of my experience includes over 10 years of previous academic experience as faculty, program director and director of faculty development with local, national and international influences. I’ve had the privilege to be Chief Medical Officer of a Federally Qualified Health Center and currently serve on the Executive Board for a start-up FQHC in Racine, Wisconsin. After completing my Integrative Medicine Fellowship with the University of Arizona in 2017, I’ve incorporated this into my clinical practice and began a new leadership journey with Ascension. While being Regional Chief Medical Officer over 3 hospitals, the opportunity to be a Founding Program Director within Ascension Wisconsin was presented and allows me to bring all aspects of my previous experience to the program.
Residents, students, faculty and staff are integral to creating a program culture that emphasizes intellectual curiosity, wellness, community, and shared success with a healthy dose of fun.
We have designed the curriculum to progress from acute care settings in the first year to specialty populations, chronic disease and community partnerships in the second year, to advance ambulatory practice and the professional development plan with the elective blocks in the third year to prepare you for the practice that fulfills your purpose.
Resident physician success is built upon hard work alongside a multidisciplinary team, both in clinic and hospital settings, that prioritizes the patient experience and their individual set of circumstances for their best health. This is done by placing priority on clinical quality and safety in a High Reliability Organization with a Just Culture. This is balanced with a holistic and inclusive framework of ABIDE so that each patient, resident, faculty and staff member can be their authentic selves and support one another through humor, joy, purpose and resiliency. Our ABIDE Council actively helps us keep integrative medicine strategies, advocacy, justice, and health disparity gap closure woven into the curriculum and daily work.
The communities of Southeastern Wisconsin are among the most diverse in the state and our sites of care are focused on serving vulnerable populations as part of our organizational mission. The Villard Avenue Family Health Center has been a beacon of care and community partnerships for many years as the location of the first Wisconsin Family Medicine Residency Program in Wisconsin. Although the name and affiliation has changed over the last 50 years, the spirit of community is strong and renewed with the new Ascension Wisconsin Family Medicine Residency Program.
Program Director: Janice Litza, MD, FAAFP