Preventive Medicine Residency Columbia - Program Details

Fostering public health improvement

Congruent with our sponsoring institutions' missions, we will train residents to provide culturally competent care for a variety of populations, including vulnerable populations, and improve the health of our state through our clinical and academic affiliations.

The academic component of our program includes the completion of a Master of Public Health (MPH) degree at the USC Arnold School of Public Health (ASPH). In addition to the MPH coursework, there are weekly residency didactic seminars, monthly journal clubs, interdisciplinary conferences and educational activities, and opportunities to attend professional conferences.

Engaging learning opportunities

Our program’s affiliation with the University of South Carolina provides residents with numerous options for engaging in teaching, research and scholarly pursuits. Residents apply their academic training during clinical and practicum rotations. They learn about clinical preventive medicine, quality improvement, healthcare management and administration, community health initiatives and public health practice through rotations with our state and regional health departments, throughout the Prisma Health system and in other healthcare organizations in our community. Our location in the state capital enables residents to gain experience with health policy and public health practice at both the state and regional levels.

Resident and alumni highlights

Humna Fayyaz, MD, MPH

Humna Fayyaz had already earned two degrees from the University of South Carolina when she discovered her passion for public health. The B.S. in Biology alumna had just graduated with her MD from the USC School of Medicine Columbia and was completing training in psychiatry as a resident at the Medical University of South Carolina.

“I realized there were upstream factors that were driving health inequities in the patient population I was treating and wanted to have the tools to address these factors professionally,” Fayyaz says. “With this interest in hand, I decided to pursue a Preventive Medicine Residency and a Master of Public Health in Epidemiology due to its vast intersection between medicine and public health.”

Returning closer to home, she continued her residency training at Prisma Health as a resident physician in the Preventive Medicine Residency Program. During her program, Fayyaz developed interests in preventing and treating addiction, specifically opioid use disorder at the patient level as a physician and at the population level through state and federal policy change. After graduation, Fayyaz continued her training in these areas with a fellowship in addiction medicine at the University of Illinois-Chicago Hospital.

As part of her fellowship, she elected to spend time at the Cook County Department of Corrections and the Veterans Justice Outreach Program – both located at the Jesse Brown VA Medical Center. Fayyaz continues to use the public health planning and policy tools she built during her residency program to advocate for patients who have been disproportionately impacted by opioid use disorder and those from marginalized communities through her work.

Stephanie Lee, MD MPH

Stephanie Lee, MD, MPH is dual-board certified in both pediatrics and preventive medicine. She was inspired to train in preventive medicine while working as a pediatric resident in California, when there was an outbreak of measles at Disneyland. She witnessed firsthand the public health procedures and principles necessary to contain the outbreak, including contact tracing, quarantine and handwashing. She was also involved in the care of children with mycobacterium abscesses after undergoing pulpotomy, a procedure akin to root canal, in dental clinics. This outbreak ended up infecting 71 children, and she was involved with contacting the health department and assisting with their investigation. Both these experiences inspired her to pursue work in public health, since public policies and regulations has such an immense, direct impact on children’s health.

Currently, Dr. Lee works as a pediatrician at a community hospital in Pennsylvania. She was recently appointed Medical Director of Refugee Resettlement at her clinic in Berks County, coordinating care for unaccompanied immigrant children. She credits her work for her master's degree in public health, preventive medicine training and time spent with the Prisma Health Department of Infectious Disease and their refugee work for preparing her to assume this role. Lee is also a member of American College of Preventive Medicine (ACPM) in the Young Physicians Section. In 2021, she participated in ACPM advocacy hill day, where she spoke to lawmakers from Pennsylvania about funding for preventive medicine residency programs.

Outside of clinic, she is an avid writer and recently published stories in the 3rd edition of The Chronicles of Women in White Coats. She loves exploring the outdoors with her husband and one-year-old German Shepard/Corgi mix, Latte.

Find out more at stephleemd.com.