April 2, 2025
Dr. Didiano works at Atrium Health Musculoskeletal Institute Department of Sports Medicine and as a team physician at Queens University of Charlotte. In addition, she serves as the Secretary-Treasurer on the NCAFP Board and as chair of the NCAFP Advocacy Committee.
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After completing medical school at the Edward Via College of Osteopathic Medicine in Blacksburg, VA, Dr. Didiano came in 2012 to complete residency at the Cabarrus Family Medicine residency in Concord. There, she met past NCAFP president Dr. Maureen Murphy. “She was my advisor during residency and became a close mentor and friend,” Dr. Didiano says. “She encouraged me to get involved with the NCAFP. And when I did, I had such a great experience.”
Dr. Didiano has served in three different positions on the NCAFP Board: first as the resident director-elect, then as the resident director, and later as a physician member. The resident director position was an elected position at the time. Dr. Didiano received both votes and support from her fellow residents for her ideas on mentoring residents and new family physicians. “One of my proposals was to make a mentoring program that helped NCAFP members transition between medical school, residency, and practice,” she says.
Eventually, Community Care of North Carolina (CCNC) implemented a very similar program. Dr. Didiano currently serves as one of the mentor physicians who helps younger medical students and physicians connect with their communities and their work. “It’s been fun to see the idea come to fruition,” she says.
Dr. Didiano has continued to lead the NCAFP while her career has progressed. As chair of the NCAFP Advocacy Committee, she helps to lead the state policy advocacy which will reduce administrative burden for family physicians and improve health care outcomes for patients. “I really enjoy the advocacy,” she says, “because I can see the day-to-day impacts of the policies we fight for while also advocating for the bills that that will help us see incremental changes over time.”
She has certainly seen incremental changes in state health care policy since she began attending NCAFP White Coat Wednesday events. “Seeing my representatives change their positions over the years has been really encouraging,” she says. “When I was just starting out, there was really opposition against expanding Medicaid. But they came around to see that we needed to do that for our state. It’s been exciting to see policies like that come to fruition.” (You can hear more about Dr. Didiano’s 2025 White Coat Wednesday experience here.)
After finishing her residency, she then completed a sports medicine fellowship at Cone Health Sports Medicine in Greensboro. “I wanted to do a combination of Family Medicine and sports medicine because I was passionate about both,” Dr. Didiano says.
As she practiced both Family Medicine and sports medicine in Lincoln County, Dr. Didiano found that the two specialties blended and helped her give even more care to her patients. “The community I worked in didn’t have any sports medicine available,” she says. “I could treat high school athletes for an injury on the field, and then soon after I would start caring for their entire family after forming that relationship. It was a nice dichotomy of being able to see families in both my primary care setting and my sports medicine setting.”
Then in 2021, Dr. Didiano broadened her leadership by being a team physician at Queen’s University in downtown Charlotte. “I always wanted to take care of a college as a team physician,” she says. “That’s where I had my first experience with sports medicine in undergrad, and I really love the college environment. Plus, I enjoy taking care of student-athletes, because they make for a fun working environment.”
“You can really make your career as you want it to be,” she says. “With our breadth of training, we can be jacks-of-all-trade. Family Medicine has given me a great variety of experiences as a physician.”
Exposure to the variety Family Medicine has to offer is great for medical students and residents to explore, Dr. Didiano says. “You can have those experiences,” she says. “The biggest thing you need to do is go out and have different experiences: Don’t be afraid to look for mentors outside your training center. And definitely don’t be afraid to ask about shadowing physicians who have the type of career you want.”