Hospitalist fellowships - soon to be a requirement

[legobikes]

I came across this meme some time ago, perhaps it was on here. I'm currently a third year who very recently shifted from thinking about IM to Peds hospitalist as my ultimate career choice. I was wondering what is in the works w/r/t this and if it will affect me.

Any info?

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[Stitch]

I wonder where this is going as well, but suspect it depends on what you want to do. Honestly, I find it weird to require a fellowship in order to do inpatient pediatrics after your 3 year peds residency. Any residency ought to prepare you adequately for it. The main advantage to being fellowship trained at this point (as far as I see it) seems to be publishing and researching. If you want to be at a university center or big children's hospital, then I think you'll probably have to do a fellowship and may even be expected to publish or continue some research.

As it is right now, some people are fellowship trained and others are not, and it's not a requirement in general to be so. As more people come out of the fellowship, this scenario may change, but again, it depends on what you want. Smaller (mainly adult) hospitals with small peds floors taking care of less sick kids aren't likely to require it. Likewise if you just want to be a nursery hospitalist, you can probably do that too.

Is there anyone posting currently who's done the hospitalist fellowship? I'd like to hear their input if so.

 

[surftheiop]

Does hospitalist just mean inpatient, non-specialized peds? Or does it refer to the shift work scheduling pattern?

(I guess I'm asking if all inpatient, non-specialized peds are hospitalists)

 

[Stitch]

A hospitalist is a general pediatrician who only does in patient management, whether that's in a nursery or a general peds floor. Private primary care docs who work in out patient offices also take care of their in patients, but since they do both they are not hospitalists. The model seems to be shifting such that hospitalists may end up replacing private practice guys when it comes to in patients, and there are currently fellowships available. I'm not sure I'd consider them 'subspecialists,' however; they're still general pediatricians.

 

[oldbearprofessor]

A hospitalist is a general pediatrician who only does in patient management, whether that's in a nursery or a general peds floor. Private primary care docs who work in out patient offices also take care of their in patients, but since they do both they are not hospitalists. The model seems to be shifting such that hospitalists may end up replacing private practice guys when it comes to in patients, and there are currently fellowships available. I'm not sure I'd consider them 'subspecialists,' however; they're still general pediatricians.

I don't think they would take that title, even with a fellowship. Academic general pediatricians who are 2 or 3-year fellowship trained don't generally consider themselves "Sub-specialists", just folks who have taken one particular pediatric training and care pathway. Somewhat a matter of semantics I suppose. Whether the extra training is worth it depends on where you'd like to practice. If you are going to be taking care of relatively complex Level 2 NICU babies and older vent-dependent NICU grads, etc at one of the larger children's hopsitals, then some extra hospitalist training will be of value. Either way, if you'd like a major teaching role for residents, as both academic general and hospitalists often do, then that can be incorporated into the fellowship even in a formal way with a masters program.

I'm not sure where all this is going in terms of board certification though. It would seem hard to do this, but we'll see.