Education

Second Year Clinical Training Program

The second (and optional third) year of training is designed to further prepare the fellow for a career in academic or non-academic nephrology through additional clinical experiences and scholarly activity.

Clinical experiences include: 1) the ongoing one-half day Outpatient Continuity Clinic; 2) a few weeks on the “Bond St.” rotation (typically 4-8 weeks); 3) Outpatient Hemodialysis Rotation; and 4) Outpatient Peritoneal Dialysis Rotation.

• Outpatient Hemodialysis Rotation: During this rotation, second year fellows along with a dedicated attending follow a cohort of patients undergoing chronic outpatient hemodialysis at the DaVita Bond St. Dialysis Unit. Fellows follow their cohort of patients longitudinally for at least 3 to 6 months, depending on their career track.  Clinical issues encountered during this rotation include management of cardiovascular risk factors; development and evaluation of dialysis prescriptions; diagnosis and management of bone mineral disease, vascular access complications, and anemia; and transplant referral, evaluation and work-up.
• Outpatient Peritoneal Dialysis Rotation: Second year fellows in the clinical educator track have additional peritoneal dialysis experience at the Good Samaritan Hospital.

This rotation involves a complete series of lectures provided by renal faculty members at the Good Samaritan Hospital intended to present on several aspects encountered in the care of patients undergoing peritoneal dialysis. As in the first year PD Rotation, second year fellows follow a cohort of PD patients longitudinally with a dedicated renal faculty member.

Second year fellows may also elect to follow additional outpatients in nephrology subspecialty clinics, and or/ renal transplant clinic with nephrology faculty members to gain additional specialized longitudinal experience. Subspecialty clinics available include: 1) HIV infection; 2) inherited renal diseases; 3) lupus; 4) renal stones; 5) vasculits; 6) urology; and 7) secondary hypertension.  In addition, second year fellows may participate in teaching second year medical students in the renal pathophysiology course in order to further develop teaching skills required of an academic physician.