Endocrinology Fellowship | Curriculum

All fellows spend, on average, one full day per week in the endocrine / diabetes clinic setting. Therefore, fellows have, on average, eight half-day clinics per calendar month. Two of these eight clinics are fellow continuity clinics where fellows follow their own patients throughout their three-year fellowship program. The six other clinics are endocrine / diabetes clinics staffed by pediatric endocrinology faculty and may also include subspecialty clinics in, for example, special diabetes populations, Turner Syndrome, bone and calcium disorders and disorders of sexual differentiation and growth.

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Fellows participate, throughout their fellowship, in the inpatient pediatric endocrinology hospital consultation team. During this service, fellows take care of the primary endocrine and diabetes patients and provide pediatric endocrinology consults in the neonatal intensive care unit, intensive care unit and on the general hospital wards. Fellows at the PGY-4 level have eight to 10 weeks of call per year, and fellows at either PGY-5 or PGY-6 levels have four weeks of call per year. Fellow endocrine call coverage is in blocks of one to two weeks, with Monday through Saturday nights off (covered by another fellow). During the call coverage and in-hospital rotation, fellows work closely with the pediatric endocrinology faculty and receive one-on-one training in clinical pediatric endocrinology. Each fellow has his or her own clinical mentor for the entire program. Fellows also participate in resident and medical student education by going to formal lectures, teaching residents and students during rounds and by leading the bedside rounds. Additional exposure to teaching residents and medical students occurs during the outpatient clinic activities.

The Endocrinology Division at Cincinnati Children’s provides postdoctoral training in basic, clinical and epidemiological research through programs at the Cincinnati Children’s Research Foundation and the University of Cincinnati College of Medicine Graduate Training Programs. The division further supports participation in master’s programs for selected fellows. This allows the fellow to obtain during fellowship (with or without the addition of a fourth year) a degree of master’s in public health related to clinical research, epidemiology or education. Fellows are supported for the development and execution of their research project(s) by one or more research mentors. Fellowship research is supervised by the Scientific Oversight Committee, which consists of the fellowship program director and assistant program director, division director, a biostatistician, and a basic scientist and clinical scientists outside of the Endocrinology Division. Support is further provided for the fellows to obtain extramural funding for their research project.

Fellows participate in educational activities involving the division as well as related to the pediatric residency program at Cincinnati Children’s. Fellows give formal presentations during the in-hospital rotation for pediatric residents and medical students on elective. Fellows also give a formal pediatric residency curriculum presentation during the second and third year. In addition, fellows give case presentations, journal club presentations as well as research presentations during the didactic sessions organized within the division.

The Endocrinology Division supports a variety of educational activities. These include, but are not limited to weekly inpatient clinical conference, monthly journal club, weekly combined adult and pediatric endocrinology clinical and research conferences, monthly conference on disorders of sexual differentiation, as well as invited lectures organized by the division, involving speakers from outside our division. In addition, the division supports four visiting professorships on an annual basis, which allow direct exposure and discussion between the pediatric endocrinology fellows and the visiting professor. Fellows attend, at a minimum, one scientific meeting per year, and are encouraged to present their research at national meetings.