Message from the Program Director
Thank you for your interest in the Internal Medicine Residency Program at Santa Barbara Cottage Hospital.
For more than a century, Cottage Hospital has offered residents outstanding clinical training in a unique environment — combining the strengths of a regional tertiary care center and Level 1 Trauma Center with the intimacy and focus of an exemplary community teaching hospital. Our program is proud to be one of the oldest physician training programs in the Western United States, and we continue to evolve and innovate to meet the future of medicine head-on.
At Cottage, you will train alongside a diverse, expert, and dedicated core faculty whose primary focus is education. Our residents care for some of our region’s most underserved patients across both inpatient and outpatient settings. With a carefully cultivated balance between support and autonomy, you’ll develop the clinical excellence, leadership, and humanistic approach that defines truly outstanding internists.
We are excited to be at the forefront of innovation in medical education. Recognizing the rapid evolution of technology in clinical care, our residency has launched a longitudinal AI in Medicine curriculum, including a weekly prompt engineering workshop where residents learn to craft, refine, and apply AI tools to support clinical reasoning, differential diagnosis, and decision-making. Our commitment ensures that you will graduate not only as a skilled internist, but also as a physician fluent in the future of digital health.
My own path was forever changed when I rotated at Cottage as a visiting fourth-year medical student from UC San Diego. I was immediately struck by the extraordinary teaching, the breadth of pathology encountered through Cottage’s role as a regional referral center, and the close-knit, collaborative spirit that defines our community. I was fortunate to train here myself, and it is now my honor to serve as Program Director.
At Cottage, you’ll find the best of both worlds: an opportunity to master exceptional clinical medicine while being immersed in a vibrant, beautiful coastal community. Santa Barbara truly offers the ideal setting — world-class beaches, mountains, cultural experiences, and outdoor adventures are all just minutes from the hospital.
In 2022, we launched our transition to an X + Y block scheduling system — a move driven by resident feedback and educational priorities. This change has been wildly successful, transforming the rhythm of residency and creating protected time for ambulatory learning, electives, and wellness. Residents have overwhelmingly praised the X + Y model for boosting educational quality, improving work-life balance, and fostering a healthier, more sustainable training experience.
We invite you to discover what makes our program such a unique and special place to train — and to become part of our next generation of outstanding physicians, leaders, and innovators.
Lynn Fitzgibbons, MD, FIDSA
Program Director, Internal Medicine Residency Program
Santa Barbara Cottage Hospital
