What's your Endocrine fellowship like?

[MiaJasmine]

First-time poster! I have been following SDN forums since my pre-med days and can always find sound advice here. What is the structure of Endocrine fellowship programs?
I am currently a PGY-4 board certified in IM, but at my current program I function as a shadow & a scribe for the PD who is essentially running the program out of a private practice with minimal/no academics. We spend 75% of our time with the PD throughout the fellowship. In the outpatient setting, we have no autonomy with patients. We do get to assist with thyroid ultrasounds, but the PD does all the FNAs. The PD does all the insulin pump adjustments without any explanations. Besides going to the main hospital for the IM residents' didactics once a week, our daily pharm rep lunches are considered didactic sessions.
I want to leave because I don't want to waste time and graduate with poor training, but if this is normal I would just deal with it.

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[rokshana]

First-time poster! I have been following SDN forums since my pre-med days and can always find sound advice here. What is the structure of Endocrine fellowship programs?
I am currently a PGY-4 board certified in IM, but at my current program I function as a shadow & a scribe for the PD who is essentially running the program out of a private practice with minimal/no academics. We spend 75% of our time with the PD throughout the fellowship. In the outpatient setting, we have no autonomy with patients. We do get to assist with thyroid ultrasounds, but the PD does all the FNAs. The PD does all the insulin pump adjustments without any explanations. Besides going to the main hospital for the IM residents' didactics once a week, our daily pharm rep lunches are considered didactic sessions.
I want to leave because I don't want to waste time and graduate with poor training, but if this is normal I would just deal with it.

are you a fellow? or a chief resident?

if you are a fellow, unless you suddenly get autonomy, i'm not sure how you are going to be eligible for the boards....you are required to document that you are competent to perform FNAs (at least 10), and depending on when you start fellowship, reading DXAs and CGMs as well. Your are also required to have at least 2 continuity clinics per week with an average of 4 pt contacts per clinic. Not sure if there is an inpt component that is required, but i've not heard of an endo fellowship that doesn't have some sort (usually as a consultant service) inpt service.

I'll have to admit, i'm not aware of endo fellowships that aren't university based, so my experience is based on that...but usually there is an inpt consult service, ambulatory service( in different attending clinics including FNA clinic, but we are usually doing the FNAs with attending supervision), electives, and research weeks or months.

Ours is a bit unique in that we are a 3:0 program (at the moment,have approval for a 4th spot so eventually will become a more traditional 2:2 program) so 1st and 2nd year have the same number of university consult weeks for the fellows (currently 4 months per fellow/year total) with more research time in 2nd year than 1st year.

also our didactics are though the endo department...scan , cytopath, endopath, neuro-endocrine, endo research conferences and journal club once a month each, clinical endocrine conference 2-3 times a month and endocrine grand rounds twice a month (though sometimes these are cancelled). the only IM conference we go to is grand rounds once a week.

your program doesn't sound normal and if you never do anything by yourself will not make you eligible to sit for the Endo boards.

here are the ABIM requirements

http://www.abim.org/certification/policies/imss/endo.aspx

 

[Raryn]

are you a fellow? or a chief resident?

if you are a fellow, unless you suddenly get autonomy, i'm not sure how you are going to be eligible for the boards....you are required to document that you are competent to perform FNAs (at least 10), and depending on when you start fellowship, reading DXAs and CGMs as well. Your are also required to have at least 2 continuity clinics per week with an average of 4 pt contacts per clinic. Not sure if there is an inpt component that is required, but i've not heard of an endo fellowship that doesn't have some sort (usually as a consultant service) inpt service.

I'll have to admit, i'm not aware of endo fellowships that aren't university based, so my experience is based on that...but usually there is an inpt consult service, ambulatory service( in different attending clinics including FNA clinic, but we are usually doing the FNAs with attending supervision), electives, and research weeks or months.

Ours is a bit unique in that we are a 3:0 program (at the moment,have approval for a 4th spot so eventually will become a more traditional 2:2 program) so 1st and 2nd year have the same number of university consult weeks for the fellows (currently 4 months per fellow/year total) with more research time in 2nd year than 1st year.

also our didactics are though the endo department...scan , cytopath, endopath, neuro-endocrine, endo research conferences and journal club once a month each, clinical endocrine conference 2-3 times a month and endocrine grand rounds twice a month (though sometimes these are cancelled). the only IM conference we go to is grand rounds once a week.

your program doesn't sound normal and if you never do anything by yourself will not make you eligible to sit for the Endo boards.

here are the ABIM requirements

http://www.abim.org/certification/policies/imss/endo.aspx

Yeah. The OPs post is pretty strange... I can't imagine a fellowship like that in any subspecialty.

(btw, whats a 3:0 program? 3 fellows every other year?)

 

[rokshana]

Yeah. The OPs post is pretty strange... I can't imagine a fellowship like that in any subspecialty.

(btw, whats a 3:0 program? 3 fellows every other year?)

yep...the program at one point had 3 clinical and 3 research positions...evident;y the NIH money dried up and the 3 research fellow positions were eliminated...worked out that the had all 3 fellows graduating at the same time and they decided to fil all 3 instead of holding off on 1 of the spots...

 

[dozitgetchahi]

First-time poster! I have been following SDN forums since my pre-med days and can always find sound advice here. What is the structure of Endocrine fellowship programs?
I am currently a PGY-4 board certified in IM, but at my current program I function as a shadow & a scribe for the PD who is essentially running the program out of a private practice with minimal/no academics. We spend 75% of our time with the PD throughout the fellowship. In the outpatient setting, we have no autonomy with patients. We do get to assist with thyroid ultrasounds, but the PD does all the FNAs. The PD does all the insulin pump adjustments without any explanations. Besides going to the main hospital for the IM residents' didactics once a week, our daily pharm rep lunches are considered didactic sessions.
I want to leave because I don't want to waste time and graduate with poor training, but if this is normal I would just deal with it.

Lol is this an osteopathic program?

Y'all may be shocked, but this is TOTALLY the type of BS that gets pulled in some DO 'fellowships' and in some sleazy DO residencies in general. There are DO dermatology programs that are exactly like this - the PDs require everyone to get board certified and then they basically act like derm midlevels for their 'training'. Didactics are usually negligable.

And to answer your question: NO this is not normal, YES this is garbage training, and YES you are right to think about leaving.

 

[EndovsMed]

First-time poster! I have been following SDN forums since my pre-med days and can always find sound advice here. What is the structure of Endocrine fellowship programs?
I am currently a PGY-4 board certified in IM, but at my current program I function as a shadow & a scribe for the PD who is essentially running the program out of a private practice with minimal/no academics. We spend 75% of our time with the PD throughout the fellowship. In the outpatient setting, we have no autonomy with patients. We do get to assist with thyroid ultrasounds, but the PD does all the FNAs. The PD does all the insulin pump adjustments without any explanations. Besides going to the main hospital for the IM residents' didactics once a week, our daily pharm rep lunches are considered didactic sessions.
I want to leave because I don't want to waste time and graduate with poor training, but if this is normal I would just deal with it.

So did you quit on your fellowship ??