"The Gap Years" Dilemma - 2020 Sunset Date for IR Fellowship

[thekermakarma]

Long time reader, first time poster...I'm currently a radiology resident finishing up R1 year. As most of you know, the current R1's (DR class of 2020) and incoming R1s (DR class of 2021) are the two classes that fall into the "Gap Years" between the phased out IR fellowship (sunset date 2020) and the IR/DR Residency. This means that the IR fellowship will no longer exist for us to apply to, and that we were too early to apply to the IR/DR residency. I am interested in hearing other residents opinions about what their programs are doing to handle this gray zone?

There is an SIR sponsored webinar with their recommendations on how to handle this time period:



But this only highlights three programs opinions, two of which have long-standing, well established IR/DR programs. My program is trying to figure out how best to approach the transition. Any insight is appreciated....

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[DrfluffyMD]

Try to back fill into your IR/DR program. This is how our institution is doing it.

 

[DJNYY]

Long time reader, first time poster...I'm currently a radiology resident finishing up R1 year. As most of you know, the current R1's (DR class of 2020) and incoming R1s (DR class of 2021) are the two classes that fall into the "Gap Years" between the phased out IR fellowship (sunset date 2020) and the IR/DR Residency. This means that the IR fellowship will no longer exist for us to apply to, and that we were too early to apply to the IR/DR residency. I am interested in hearing other residents opinions about what their programs are doing to handle this gray zone?

There is an SIR sponsored webinar with their recommendations on how to handle this time period:



But this only highlights three programs opinions, two of which have long-standing, well established IR/DR programs. My program is trying to figure out how best to approach the transition. Any insight is appreciated....

If your institution is approved for the new integrated IR residency, you can simply transfer into it within your own institution. This is however, limited based on how many residents in your R1 class want to do it vs how many residency positions your institution is approved for. Alternatively you can separately apply for the 1 or 2 year independent IR residency later on (which is basically the same as the fellowship and is only 1 year if you do ESIR at your program). The number of independent IR residency spots will most likely be less than the current number of available IR fellowships since some places will internally transfer their own DR residents.

For example: U Michigan historically takes 5 IR fellows per year but since their current R1 class has had 3 people internally transfer into the IR/DR residency, by the time you apply for the independent 1 or 2 year IR residency, U Michigan will only have 2 spots available instead of their traditional 5.

As alluded to above, the safest route to ensure you have an IR training position is to internally transfer at your institution

 

[thekermakarma]

Thanks for the responses. Much appreciated. Definitely aware of the options alluded to above. I asked the question because our R1 class currently has a large number planning on going into IR. Traditionally most residents stay at our program for the fellowship which can comfortably handle 5-6 fellows. That being said, there will still be a traditional fellow class the year before us (2019) so there will not be enough of a workload to handle a fellow class of 3-4 and 4+ IR/DR or ESIR residents.

I guess I was surprised that there wasn't more of a conversation between SIR and the ACGME to keep the current fellowship extended out until 2020. I realize there are advantages to just ripping the band-aid off and starting the IR/DR residency sooner, but originally they had projected the fellowships to sunset 2022 and it seemed like logistically it would have made more sense to just let the fellowship run until the majority of the new IR/DR residents were ready to fulfill their IR months.