Phelps Memorial Hospital Center and Open Door Medical Center in Sleepy Hollow, along with New York Medical College, are teaming up for the first residency program in Family Medicine in New York State in 15 years.

National accreditation for the program was granted in June and the first class of six residents will start their training in July 2012, three at Phelps and three at Open Door on Beekman Avenue, according to Lindsay Farrell, president and CEO of Open Door Family Medical Centers.

“This has been two years in the making,” Farrell said. “We’re looking for a pipeline of physicians because there’s a need for primary care doctors. We’re trying to attract the cream of the crop. It’s a new era in health care.”

New York Medical College will serve as the sponsoring academic institution for the new program. More than 80 physicians at Phelps will supervise and teach the residents during their three years of training, which will include seeing outpatients at Open Door.

“Our organizations are committed to this program because of the growing need for primary care services in the U.S.,” said Keith Safian, president and CEO of Phelps. “In 2014, when insurance coverage is extended to millions of people who are now uninsured, there will be a sharp increase in demand for services and an estimated national shortage of 60,000 primary care physicians.”

To better accommodate the residents and its patients, Open Door is planning to relocate from its existing 5,000 –square-foot space to a two-story, 12,000-square-foot building at 1 New Broadway, which it purchased for $2.4 million about a year ago from funding it received from a $3.8 million grant. Phelps received $1.3 million from the grant.

“We got lucky because the program is so compelling,” Farrell said. “This building has been dead for so long. I think we’ll revitalize the whole intersection. I think this is a perfect use.”

Open Door has filed an application with the Sleepy Hollow Planning Board and is seeking an exemption from the village’s parking regulations since Farrell said most of its 4,000 annual patients walk to its current facility.

Farrell is hoping Open Door will be in its new location by July 2013, when 12 residents will be enrolled in the Family Medicine Residency Program.

“Patients will be able to see all physicians under one roof,” Farrell said.

“Family Medicine is the lynchpin in what is becoming an increasingly complex healthcare system,” said Dr. Montgomery Douglas, chairman of the Department of Family and Community Medicine at New York Medical College. “Healthcare costs are lowered as patients of family physicians make less frequent visits to higher cost specialists and emergency rooms.”