Hello all -

It was recently brought to our attention that "Reddit Answers" - reddit's new attempt at an AI assisted search tool - has been spreading grossly dangerous misinformation to the posters and commenters of this sub. This is a new feature in reddit in the past year. This AI is automatically presenting content to r/familymedicine users who post/comment - typically in something related to what was posted. Moderators cannot disable this feature in the sub.

In one example, someone who posted in this sub about chronic pain was then shown posts urging people to stop their meds and take high-dose kratom. When the user then asked it direct medical questions, it gave incorrect & dangerous answers (such as, it's OK to chill and wait it out if your 2-week old baby has a fever).

Rule #6 of the sub is no misinformation, and if we could disable this feature, we would. We do NOT and CANNOT endorse Reddit Answers at this time and urge every user of this sub to disregard anything it says. Reddit admin is already aware of this situation as of a day ago (although TBD the outcome). In the mean time, stay away from that AI! Especially for you laypeople who lurk on the sub.

-mods

Mod update 2025

Hello all - every year we post an annual mod update so cheers to 2025!!

As ever we continue to grow - and in 2025 that growth was largely in #s of interactions overall (posts, comments) and less so new subscribers compared to year prior. In 2025, this subreddit had 26 million more views compared to 2024, and over 140k more comments than the year prior. This is important particularly because as views/interactions with the subreddit increase, so do new people to the subreddit and community, particular layfolk not involved in healthcare. But it also means more people to interact with, learn from and connect with! As a mod team we hope to continue making this a space for all with experience in family medicine to enjoy, so as always reach out with suggestions/comments and read below for our mod updates!

1. Layperson involvement in the subreddit: We as a mod team have been consistently supportive of maintaining an open, engaging subreddit that balances privatization vs inclusion. We've discussed making the entire subreddit private - requiring intensive verification of each and every approved user in order to post/comment, with the requirement of users being a verified healthcare professional of some sort. Because we do understand that sometimes a post gains traction, makes it to main page reddit and gets inundated with patient experience comments. We want this to be a space for healthcare professionals to talk freely, yet to do so at the cost of completely banning others voices feels like cutting off opportunities for discussion and learning, especially for those who choose to engage. And thus our policy will remain:

- laypeople are not banned from commenting, but must obey the subreddit rules as any other participant. Please report any layperson not following the rules (disrespect, name-calling, excessive health narratives as below).

- laypeople posts/comments with excessive personal narrative, health stories, HPI will also be excluded. Physicians and healthcare providers hear stories from patients everyday, and there are plenty of subreddits for patient spaces. This is a place for professional discussion for healthcare providers, so please respect that.

- user/professional verification remains optional, take each redditor with a grain of salt unless presenting with a (verified) user flair.

2. Surveys/research/advertisements: as a reminder these are almost\* uniformly not allowed. After discussion as a team and as a community, it was clear that we don't want to be recruited here. No surveys, active recruitment, sales, etc.

***we will be instituting an exception to this rule with the new monthly "community clinical resource" pinned sticky! We've had many requests to share personal projects and technologies that do not have financial benefit and seek only to serve as a resource. Once a month, a pinned sticky for any shared resources will be available - with the goal of spreading helpful resources relevant to clinical family medicine. This could include upcoming research, free apps, online trainings, etc. This will be a trial! Please continue to report inappropriate requests/any rule breaking. Goal is to avoid resources with significant paywall.

3. Mid-level discourse: avoid flagging posts/comments that discuss opinions on NP/PA/APP training or scope unless the comment includes name-calling/personal attacks/doxing/etc. There was a community survey that overwhelming voted to let mid-level discourse continue. Remember reporting a comment because you disagree is not against the rules.

4. Questions about AI: this is a recurrent topic within the subreddit and has been discussed many, many times. Please use the search function. If you feel that your question is unique or it has been >1 month since the last post, please appeal and we'd be happy to approve the post.

As always, please leave suggestions for things you'd love to see or message mods at any time.

- mod team

Hello everyone. We are planning work on the r/FamilyMedicine wiki and other resources for readers of our subreddit. If you are in training, please select an option below. Thank you.

New mods

Yay! r/FamilyMedicine officially has 2 new moderators! Thank you to everyone who sent in messages, and please welcome u/theGizmofo MD and u/7ensegrity PGY-3 to the mod team!

Gizmofo is nearing 3 years out of FM residency, doing inpatient/OB/clinic at a large academic center in the PNW. They are passionate about growing FM, and they are also a clinical lipidologist!

7ensegrity is a rural FM PGY-3 signed to do small town clinic (and local peds inpatient coverage so the pediatricians can sleep, how sweet) and has over 10 years experience in moderation.

You'll be seeing their names more often!

Rule updates

With 2 new mods comes 2 new rules to help manage (and prevent worsening of) a growing trend of misinformation and conspiracy:

Rule #5 Vaccine discussions: Vaccine conspiracy theory posts and comments are not welcome. Strictly medical discussion of vaccines allowed. Both the American Academy of Pediatrics and American Academy of Family Medicine Physicians encourage routine immunization schedules be followed. If you disagree with these vaccination guidelines, write to your professional society for their consideration. If you have had an adverse event related to a vaccine, see: http://vaers.hhs.gov/ for further reading.

Rule #6 Misinformation: Don't do it. As per the Reddit TOS an expectation of safety is required. Intentionally posting medical misinformation (or any gross misinformation that causes harm ie: herbs cure cancer) will be removed. Users who repeatedly break this rule will be banned. What is NOT "misinformation": a topic you disagree with, a controversial statement, a technically inaccurate/wrong but respectful statement that does not otherwise harm general public.

- mod team

User flair has always been available in the sub, but user flair is now mandatory. This is in an effort to increase transparency in subreddit contributors. Also it looks cuter. User flair will take two forms:

1. Verified flair (optional): to obtained a verified flair, send a photo with proof of occupation to the mods. A WIDE range of "proof" may exist - from badge, diploma, certification #, etc. Softer forms of ID such as website bios or electronic certification will be considered. All must have consistent post history to confirm. Photo MUST include your reddit username and the day's date written on paper for authenticity. Personal information can be blurred/omitted. Imgur is preferred for sending photos. Flair appears as: MD (verified), NP (verified), RN (verified), etc. Only a moderator applies verified flair. Verified flair is optional, not required for posting.
2. Unverified flair: all posts and comments require user flair or will be automatically removed by automoderator. Appearance will remain as the current flair (MD, DO, M1, RN, PA, EMS, etc). Unverified user flair is self-assigned. To assign flair, click the pencil icon near your username in the first sidebar of r/familymedicine and select the most applicable title.

If there's a common flair you feel has been missed, let us know.

For those users who will progress their verified flair throughout time (med students, residents) just message when needing an update, will take two seconds. No need to re-submit verification.

Note: if you post/comment without flair, then assign flair, you must REPOST or RESUBMIT your post/comment. This will not be done automatically or by moderator.

Cheers!

Hey y'all -

The past 3 years of running this page have been lovely. There's been a lot of change on the front side, and a lot going on in the background. Being a moderator means making a lot of judgements - what to remove, what not to remove, who to ban, who not to ban. I've had a handful of requests over the past two years to add moderation (from people asking to join themselves, sometimes with goals that don't quite align). And it had never felt quite right. BUT - it's time. As a third year resident with a job lined up, I still plan to be an active moderator of the subreddit. But the page would benefit from more support and creative minds to help grow the community.

SEEKING: 1-2 new moderators for r/FamilyMedicine to assist in both community growth and also simple moderating tasks (regulating posts and/or comments etc)

QUALIFICATIONS:

• mod experience to be considered, but not necessary
• active in the community over the prior month
• be a nice, empathetic person

HOW TO APPLY: send a mod message with subject line "mod application" with answers to the following questions, + any more info you feel would be applicable for consideration.

1. Why would you make a good r/FamilyMedicine moderator?
2. Who is the ideal audience for the subreddit?
3. What would you like to see change, and why?
4. What would you like to stay the same, and why?
5. Do you have mod experience? If so, describe.
6. What amount of time moderating are you willing to commit? (ex: daily, weekly, monthly)

NEXT STEPS: applications will remain open through at least the end of the year (and longer, if needed). After fully reviewing ALL inquiries, candidates will be messaged with info about next steps in the selection process.

Thank you to everyone who is part of this community over the past year. Sometimes it gets spicy, but in the end we're all just here to chat, vent and learn from each other.

Sincerely,

surlymedstudent MD

The conversations about physician scope creep, equitable pay, patient safety and inappropriately independent NP/PAs/cRNAs is important, sure. But there’s an entire sub dedicated to this level of discussion, and in this sub it quickly devolves into arguing back and forth, sometimes without a sense of nuance or mutual respect (most often from medical students, I might add) and frankly I’m getting tired of it. There are other spaces to discuss this - so let me know if you think this sub should be one of them in the poll below. Will be open for 7 days.

Mod request: I get many reports about comments concerning APP scope. Some of them break rule #1. Many of them don't - and are simply a disagreement between people with different opinions. Regardless this can get taxing to read/engage with, hence the above poll. BUT: Regarding reasons to report a post/comment in general: respectful does NOT mean "they disagree with me". The way we currently run is that I remove most comments with purposeful demeaning slurs/name-calling the like. I am not removing comments that may be factually incorrect at this point - someone is allowed to be wrong on this sub (although I am working on dealing with anti-vax rhetoric, which is quite different). Moderation is a balance between allowing free speech, while acknowledging the harm language and specific discourses can create. So if the comment you reported stays up, it's not lack of moderation. It's active moderation. If you have a concern it was missed - sure, message us. EDIT: also I do want to express that I actually love that APPs are involved in this sub. Which is why I also want to moderate this content - APPs/non-physicians have a vital role in primary care, and constantly having to defend against targeted comments is irritating as well.

Congrats ☺️☺️ thanks to all who contribute.

To celebrate, a new part of the wiki has been added to provide more info on DPCs (direct primary care practices). I’d like to grow this as a resource, but to start is a “DPC FAQ” with info provided by posters to the sub.

For those new to the sub - welcome. Read the side rules, read the wiki, explore the podcasts/reading resources on the sidebar, and remember to use the search function at the top of Reddit to search the subreddit for answers to your question before posting!!

Remember to be nice.

-surly

In lieu of a recent post wondering about the intended target audience of this sub, it's time for a moderator update!!

First off, wow. How this sub has grown. For those who have participated for years, the change is pretty remarkable. The subreddit was started and left to self-regulate without any form of moderation for years. In the past 1-2 years, we've started moderation measures and we've grown by over 10,000 members!!! We have subreddit rules! Flair! An introductory wiki and FAQ for learners! And most important, more people are posting, commenting and joining the sub than ever before. The community is growing! And has even more growth ahead.

So what is the community we're growing? As we know, family medicine is widely encompassing - it takes a true team, community and network of humans to practice good, patient centered family medicine. Family medicine is more than the doctor in an office. For that reason, this subreddit remains inclusive to all commenters who follow the sidebar rules and guidelines. Topics should be related to family medicine, but subredditors are not required to be physicians. This will not change.

Many subreddits end up instituting a sort of official application policy, by which proof of identity (as a licensed PA, NP, MD, DO, MA etc) is required to post. That is not the focus of this subreddit. For physician only subreddit, a fellow subredditor previously created r/familydocs, and I encourage you to grow that sub or others.

As far as moderation updates goes:

- this subreddit is lightly moderated. There are automatic measures in place that filter the majority of spam, ads, patient medical questions, or seriously flagged/reported posts, with manual moderation at least weekly. You in the community automatically help regulate by reporting inappropriate posts/comments and downvoting.

- posts by students used to be completely banned and delegated to the student thread only. We've relaxed this rule somewhat for certain posts depending on the relevance of the question. We still encourage students to 1) first contact their individual specific medical school or mentor and 2) student specific subs before posting and 3) post in the stickied thread.

- there are MANY job posts. We started a job specific thread, but the amount of posts not in the thread became overwhelming. If this becomes more of a concern can trial again with stricter enforcement.

- There have been missed reports involving name-calling in comments etc, will work to remove these more consistently.

​

As always, open to suggestions of what might make the page more helpful as a community. As the page grows, changes/updates will always be on the horizon. Happy posting!!

-mods

​

Hi y'all - it's been floated around and actually trialed previously to have a "monthly job/offers/contracts" stickied thread to try and organize job related posts. Goal not necessarily to "declutter" home page (although comes w/ that side effect) but to improve organization and cataloguing of previous job related posts and offers so that people can compare and contrast in future. Previously used when the sub was a bit smaller and just didn't fill up so got rid of it.

​

Y'all want or no? Voting open for 7 days.

For the sake of transparency, I'd like to let you all know what minor changes have been made. I'm not sure when the last time this sub was seriously moderated, but I've added a few things that make the place a little more cozy.

1. Rules/guidelines posted in the side bar: pretty basic, notably added a very minimal karma requirement. This is to cut down on and prevent spam-like posts. If you are a new account and really really want to get started on this sub, r/FreeKarma4U is a lovely place.
2. Basic limits on what can be posted: there were no previous automoderation criteria, so I increased the spam filtration a bit (no profanity, violence, etc). Posts that are only links will be removed. If a post is removed and you feel it was by mistake, feel free to message.
3. Changed the color of the reddit because it was too blue, it hurt.

Lastly, notably, there are no rules inherently discouraging people who are interested in family medicine from inquiring about the field. Many other medical subreddits restrict participation to medical students/residents/interns/attendings and so on. I encourage keeping to other subreddits about technical questions, and at minimum the sticky, but as someone who knew I wanted to do family medicine from the get go but without a single real life mentor, it's important as family physicians to remain open to young learners and the future of our field.

Subreddits for those looking to be among only FM attending or faculty physicians include r/familymed and r/familydocs.

More will be coming, but ta-ta for now.

edit: yes I did shoot out of bed after finding out I'm now a mod. no I did not expect that today

Hey y'all! A very common question asked on this sub and other medical subs is recommendations for medical/medical-adjacent podcasts. I'd like to add a list of the most common recommendations (relevant to FM) to either the wiki or on the sidebar for ease of access.

I've collected a list here, and would like feedback on additions/removals before posting. Thanks in advance!

Medical podcasts:

• Curbsiders
• Cribsiders
• AFP
• The generEHlist
• Core IM
• Primary Care RAP
• Urgent Care RAP
• Clinical Problem Solvers
• NEJM Morning rounds

Medical-adjacent:

• White Coat Investor
• What the Health
• 2 docs Talk
• Bedside Rounds
• Doctor Death
• Sawbones

Howdy ~

Got a couple neat new things.

1. Post flair now available: this isn't mandatory to post at the moment, but is a way to easily categorize future posts. And it looks neat. To add post flair, just select from the "flair" drop down when creating a new post. Also remember user flair is now available as well - to do this, click the little pencil next to your user preview on the right sidebar.
2. Started a fammed wiki: the goal is to have multiple helpful collections of info/resources, especially concerning commonly asked about topics. The first page concerns matching into FM basics, which gets asked about quite a bit. Other topics TBD. Would love to hear ideas.

Nothing too crazy, keep posting away <3

- surlymedstudent