NICU academic positions & research requirements

[Oso]

Hi all,
I have a question about faculty positions and research requirements in neonatology. I'm finishing up my 2nd year of fellowship so starting to think about jobs.

Basically, are there academic positions out there where you can focus solely on clinical service and bedside teaching? Plus maybe being a part of some committees?

I enjoy research but don't necessarily feel the need to make it a huge part of my career, and definitely don't see myself being someone who spends the majority of their time working on research and writing grants. If I 'have' to do some then that's totally fine. For example, my current institution has a rough guideline of 2 papers per year and that doesn't sound unreasonable.

But what I truly enjoy is clinical service and working with trainees. I like being at the referral level IV NICU and having babies sent to us from all over and not having to refer things out. I like working with trainees and doing teaching and mentoring. Curriculum development and medical scholarship/publishing does not interest me much, however. For these reasons I'm not sure I would enjoy private practice, though I may still try to apply to some community level IV's just to check them out.

TLDR: Do academic level IV NICU's offer positions where you can focus on clinical care and teaching and not have to worry about publishing papers?

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[Oso]

Anyone??

 

[HemeOncHopeful19]

Yes I would imagine there are plenty of places that will pay you an academic salary but have you work a clinical workload in any field if you want it. It may involve doing some work without fellows/residents at satellite hospitals though.

 

[oldbearprofessor]

Hi all,
I have a question about faculty positions and research requirements in neonatology. I'm finishing up my 2nd year of fellowship so starting to think about jobs.

Basically, are there academic positions out there where you can focus solely on clinical service and bedside teaching? Plus maybe being a part of some committees?

I enjoy research but don't necessarily feel the need to make it a huge part of my career, and definitely don't see myself being someone who spends the majority of their time working on research and writing grants. If I 'have' to do some then that's totally fine. For example, my current institution has a rough guideline of 2 papers per year and that doesn't sound unreasonable.

But what I truly enjoy is clinical service and working with trainees. I like being at the referral level IV NICU and having babies sent to us from all over and not having to refer things out. I like working with trainees and doing teaching and mentoring. Curriculum development and medical scholarship/publishing does not interest me much, however. For these reasons I'm not sure I would enjoy private practice, though I may still try to apply to some community level IV's just to check them out.

TLDR: Do academic level IV NICU's offer positions where you can focus on clinical care and teaching and not have to worry about publishing papers?

Sorry - didn't see this. There are many academic centers which also manage Level 2 and 3 community hospitals. Many of these allow clinical faculty to split their time between the L 2/3 places and the "big house" with the sickest babies. Some academic centers also hire faculty into primarily clinical/teaching/Qi type of roles. Finally, there are a few "private practices" that have residents and even fellows and don't emphasize research. So, the answer is yes, but every place has its own needs and interests.

 

[Oso]

Yes I would imagine there are plenty of places that will pay you an academic salary but have you work a clinical workload in any field if you want it. It may involve doing some work without fellows/residents at satellite hospitals though.

Sorry - didn't see this. There are many academic centers which also manage Level 2 and 3 community hospitals. Many of these allow clinical faculty to split their time between the L 2/3 places and the "big house" with the sickest babies. Some academic centers also hire faculty into primarily clinical/teaching/Qi type of roles. Finally, there are a few "private practices" that have residents and even fellows and don't emphasize research. So, the answer is yes, but every place has its own needs and interests.

Good to hear, thank you both!

I don’t have a lot of QI experience, all my scholarly work has been research, but I guess I could try to make that a focus for this upcoming year.

 

[SurfingDoctor]

Good to hear, thank you both!

I don’t have a lot of QI experience, all my scholarly work has been research, but I guess I could try to make that a focus for this upcoming year.

It's pretty easy.

Plan (find a question) --> Do (do something about it) --> Study (find out if your intervention made a difference) --> Act (find out that administration doesn't actually give a sh-t and the really problem was just a lack of resources that nobody actually wanted to pay for to begin with but they thought it would be more fun for you to waste your time figuring out what they already knew)...

Rinse, repeat.

Just be smart, and write it up and submit it to some QI journal that no one has ever heard about or read. And then slap that "QI committee" on your CV. Also, document every lecture you've ever given. You told the janitor about prematurity. Mark it. Remember, the promotions committee can only count publications, lectures and committee appointments, they don't actually read any papers nor care to know the details about what you actually did.

 

[BabyDoc86]

There are definitely programs that have "Clinical Scholar" type of tracks where the expectation to publish is minimal and not required for promotion - each program may call it something different. Expect to have a lot more clinical time than other colleagues in different tracks.