Best echo fellowships?
- Thread starter nope80
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Few things that are important to consider:
1. Are you looking to go in to academia or pvt practice? Choose programs accordingly. For academia u may need to publish and publish! However The distinction between academia and pvt practice is disappearing fast .. as an echocardiographer at a major center I read 40-60 studies on a daily basis! And no, these are not pre-read studies!
2. Advanced subspecialty fellowships entail closer interactions with fewer faculty than general fellowships. Hence it can be harder to 'shine'.. familiarity can breed contempt. What is the culture of the lab like? In most cases its set by the director and key faculty.
3. Not all programs will give you great structural or ACHD experience..may need to ask beforehand. For example, how much fellows are involved in structural cases? Not all big labs do strain, RV stuff well either. For those interested in academia, its important to see how much exposure there is to cutting edge stuff like new equipment and softwares etc.
Look at the publishing record of fellows.
The fellowships that stand out:
1. Mayo- great for echo.. probably the best lab in country at the moment.. but its 'very subsubspecialized'- wd need to see how strong the 3d, structural and adult congenital echo experience is for all level 3 fellows. They publish a lot!
2. Columbia- Becky Hahn is at the helm- its the structural powerhouse. Dont know how the mentorship is.
3. MGH- Picard et al. Strong lab. Lot of mitral valve stuff. Structural volume low.
4. University of Chicago- Lang et al. Very strong 3D.
5. UCSF- Foster/Schiller et al. Very strong adult congenital experience.
6. CCF- very strong globally
Other prominent programs I can think of:
Methodist- lot of big names here
Duke
UAB
Emory
Penn
Northwstern
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Thanks for the list. I have a few questions if anyone can answer:
1. How does one make themself competitive for these top-tier academic echo fellowship programs? I presume first-author publications, presentations/abstracts at international echo conferences, and a strong reference letter from your own school's echo lab directors, but any other tips? i.e. getting level 3 in your general cardiology fellowship? (is this even possible)
2. How competitive are the echo programs to get into top-tier academic echo programs (like MGH/Columbia) in general?
3. For the actual fellowship itself, most of the fellowship I looked at online says 1 year, but do people generally do the 2nd year for research purposes?
4. Do people do MPH concurrently?
5. Also a question most probably won't be able to answer, but I am in Canada and looking ahead for fellowship. How does being from Canada affect my chances at these fellowship programs?
Thank you all in advance.
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It's my understanding that if you want an echo fellowship, you'll find one.
The real question is why. Unless you really want an academic job doing dumb studies that no one will care about because clinically it doesn't matter.
The real question is why. Unless you really want an academic job doing dumb studies that no one will care about because clinically it doesn't matter.
D
deleted980918
One of the former fellows years ago was geographically limited and couldn’t find a job in the area she was restricted to. She was offered a spot in one of the top echo fellowships listed above 3 months before graduation.
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Thanks for the reply. I think for job prospects in Canada and for me and my career goals, it could make sense to do one. From my understanding, in Canada, it is near impossible to find a job with echo time in a desirable city unless you have an echo fellowship from a prominent program. That's generally good to hear that one can find a fellowship, though I would like to get an echo fellowship in a good program (for the job prospect in Canada), and preferably in a nice city..
Thanks for the reply. I guess that makes it a bit more reassuring for me. I know the landscape is different for us, and from what I've read, seems like advanced imaging/echo fellowships are generally not sought after/needed for most jobs in the US, so that makes it a little better for us in Canada.
