Program that turns out family physicians in Pierce County faces uncertainty
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- CHC family medicine residency program losing St. Joseph affiliation effective June 30.
- MultiCare proposing plan for CHC third‑year residents, future for others unclear.
- Tacoma mayor hopes to bring all sides to the table to discuss options.
A local family-medicine residency training has received another dose of bad news as a permanent training partner for participants has yet to be established.
In February, The News Tribune reported on Tacoma-based Community Health Care losing access to Virginia Mason Franciscan Health’s St. Joseph Medical Center in Tacoma for its family medicine doctors in training. The health system in December alerted CHC it was terminating its affiliation effective June 30.
VMFH, in statements to The News Tribune at the time, cited an internal push to put more resources into critical care for newborns as a factor in the decision affecting Pierce County. The system said it would host other residencies, including a family medicine residency program in Kitsap County.
Earlier this year, it appeared that Tacoma-based MultiCare would step in to fill the void. MultiCare at the time told The News Tribune in a statement, “In partnership with Community Health Care, we are currently evaluating options for more of their residents to rotate within our hospitals and clinics.”
The plan was to partner with the East Pierce Family Medicine residency program at Good Samaritan Hospital in Puyallup. CHC has a clinic in Puyallup, and many of its patients live in Parkland, Spanaway and Lakewood, according to those involved in the program.
That plan last month appeared to be nixed completely, and CHC in a release said the program would be forced to close at the end of this month.
On June 5, MultiCare told The News Tribune that a short-term resolution was in the works, while noting that “Residents in this program were doing their clinical rotations at St. Joseph Medical Center for the last 12 years. The hospital notified CHC in December 2025 that they would discontinue providing access to clinical rotations for this program as of July 1, 2026.”
According to MultiCare, “CHC approached MultiCare to see if we could provide clinical rotations for their residents. MultiCare evaluated this option over several months and determined that we had insufficient capacity to train their first- and second-year residents, but we could handle the third -year residents. This will allow these third-year residents to graduate and become board-eligible.”
No further details were provided from either CHC or MultiCare on the plan moving forward.
CHC is a nonprofit network of community-based, federally qualified health centers. It provides medical, dental, pharmacy and behavioral health as well as specialty healthcare services to underserved patients in Pierce County, and includes residency training for new medical professionals.
It notes on its website, “Most of Community Health Care’s family physicians care for patients in-clinic, at local hospitals and deliver babies. What you learn at CHC, you can practice here for the rest of your career – as well as in other underserved areas or rural communities that need full-spectrum family doctors.”
Carri Jo Timmer is program director and director of medical education for CHC’s family-medicine residency at its Hilltop Regional Medical Center in Tacoma.
In an interview on June 4, she told The News Tribune that projected lower reimbursements for patients on Medicaid seemed to be a factor in MultiCare’s actions.
Timmer noted that the issue was never put in writing but was her understanding based on conversations with an official overseeing the hospital’s residency programs.
“Her verbal report was that the financial component was (the issue), and that it’s the payer mix,” Timmer told The News Tribune.
MultiCare did not address whether Medicaid patient loads were a factor when it responded to The News Tribune’s questions.
According to CHC’s website, “No one is denied care due to inability to pay. If you are uninsured or under-insured, we offer a sliding scale based on family size and income.”
Partnership going back years
Since the program started in 2014, CHC had an agreement with CHI Franciscan, and then VMFH, to provide hospital-based training.
According to CHC, last year the nonprofit provided care to over more than 54,000 patients, 6,453 of them seen by residents.
“At St. Joseph specifically, our providers gave care to 1,618 patients, performing 600 labor and deliveries in addition to postpartum evaluations and newborn examinations,” according to CHC’s release.
The residency has graduated 55 board-certified family physicians since its inception, most continuing to practice locally, according to CHC.
“We’re incredibly community-focused and ingrained in the community,” Timmer told The News Tribune, while noting many participants had moved to other states in light of the recent upheaval.
It was unclear June 5 following MultiCare’s announcement how many were staying with the program.
“Studies show that where you train is where you stay,” Timmer said, “so all of those people we’ve lost, they’re not coming back to Washington state.”
Mayor: ‘Potential closure is deeply concerning’
Timmer said that Tacoma Mayor Anders Ibsen had been “incredibly supportive” and was trying to bring the health systems’ leaders to the table for discussions, “so that we can have a conversation, and if funding is a problem, (then) how can we offset that?”
In a statement provided via email to The News Tribune in response to questions, Ibsen said, “Community Health Care’s family medicine residency program is a vital asset for healthcare access in our region, and its potential closure is deeply concerning.”
He added, “I have offered my support to convene the leadership of CHC, MultiCare, and Virginia Mason Franciscan Health so we can better understand the specific hurdles they are facing. While the City is not in a position to provide direct funding to sustain the program, my goal as mayor is to bring everyone to the table.”
He noted that he recognized the health systems were currently “navigating complex financial pressures, but by leveraging Tacoma’s strong network of workforce partners, I am hopeful we can collaboratively identify innovative solutions to keep these crucial medical professionals in our community.”
The local health systems’ actions regarding family medicine residency programs are not unique. On June 3, Becca Wolinsky, a third-year family medicine resident in Seattle, wrote in a published Seattle Times op-ed that Providence Swedish plans to cut the number of family medicine physicians it trains in Seattle by six per year while consolidating its residency programs, with plans to finalize by July 1.
Previous reporting from The News Tribune contributed to this report.
