Fellowship Pathways

ID/Critical Care Medicine & Nephrology/Critical Care Medicine

We are happy to announce that the Department of Medicine at SUNY Downstate subspecialty Fellowship in Pulmonary Disease and Critical Care Medicine is now offering two Critical Care Medicine Fellowship tracks: Infectious Diseases/Critical Care Medicine and Nephrology/Critical Care Medicine.

These Critical Care Medicine Fellowship tracks provide advanced education to allow fellows from other subspecialty, specifically, Infectious Diseases and Nephrology to train and pursue Critical Care Medicine within the ACGME-accredited combined Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine Program thereby serving our community with much needed well-trained Intensivists to take care of the aging population with complex medical conditions and comorbidities.

We are accepting one (1) fellow per track each year with critical care training being integrated into the first two years of each respective subspecialty track. In the Critical Care training year (F3) there will be a heavy focus on pure critical care training encompassing all aspects of intensive care medicine.

Applications for both tracks are accepted exclusively via the Electronic Residency Application System (ERAS). Please visit the ERAS website (https://www.aamc.org/) and follow the application process. Incomplete applications will not be reviewed. These tracks are applied to via ERAS under the Infectious Diseases and Nephrology tracks respectively.

Both tracks participate in the Medical Specialties Matching Program of the National Resident Matching Program (NRMP).

Infectious Diseases/Critical Care Pathway

Candidates for this combined pathway will apply via ERAS (under the Infectious Diseases/Critical Care Medicine track). The first two years will be dedicated to the field of Infectious Diseases, with supplemental clinical rotations (including in Intensive Care Units). Pursuit of research investigations or quality improvement projects, with concentration in topics relevant to Critical Care Medicine (e.g., sepsis, catheter-related infections, treatment of multidrug-resistant pathogens), will be emphasized during the first two years. The third year will be dedicated to the field of Critical Care Medicine, conferring board eligibility to that subspecialty as well.

The dually trained specialist in this field will have the expertise to diagnose and manage serious infections appropriately and in a timely manner, resulting in improved outcomes of critically ill patients, and to be well-poised in recognizing and managing serious infectious disease outbreaks and public health crises. Graduates from the ID-CCM training program will be competent in antimicrobial stewardship and in infection prevention and control in the intensive care environment. In addition, graduates will have the in-depth knowledge and technical skills necessary to provide comprehensive care to a broad range of critically ill and injured patients, and to lead an interprofessional team of ICU providers.

Upon completion of the 2 years of ID fellowship training, the fellow will be eligible for board certification in ID, and after completion of their CCM training, the fellows are eligible for board certification in CCM. The ID-CCM fellow will share didactics, journal clubs and other formalized learning opportunities with the fellows in both the ID and CCM fellowship programs.

Residents interested in the combined training in ID/CCM are invited to apply for fellowship training in Infectious Diseases and are asked to specifically state their interests in ID-CCM in their personal statements and apply directly under the ID/CCM track via ERAS. One fellow will be selected for ID/CCM fellowship track each year.

Nephrology/Critical Care Pathway

The Critical Care Nephrology subspecialty program has emerged as a new and exciting opportunity for new aspiring nephrologists. Over half of the patients admitted to the intensive care unit (ICU) develop acute kidney injury, fluid overload, electrolyte abnormality and severe acidosis. Critically ill patients frequently require renal replacement therapy.

Fellows who match in the Nephrology/Critical Care program will practice general nephrology including transplant and vascular access for the first and second years with the 3^rd year being dedicated to critical care medicine.

One Fellow will be accepted each year into the Nephrology/Critical Care Medicine combined track, with some critical care training integrated into the first two years in the form of electives. In the Critical Care, training Year (F3) there will be a heavy focus on pure critical care training encompassing all aspects of intensive care medicine.

Participating Sites:

During the third and final year of the combined Nephrology/Critical Care Program, the Critical Care Fellow (F3) is required to rotate to all (or most) of the following sites:

Downstate Health Sciences University campus

Kings County Hospital Center (NYC HHC)
University Hospital of Brooklyn (SUNY)

Affiliated institutions

Brooklyn Veterans Administration Medical Center (VA New York Harbor Health Care System)
Coney Island Hospital (NYC HHC)
NYU-Brooklyn Medical Center

Each participating has qualified and board-certified intensivists who are vested in supervising and teaching critical care fellows.

The Critical Care year will be run under the directorship of Dr. Robert Foronjy.

Educational Program:

Each F3 fellow will be required to participate in the weekly didactic core conferences at SUNY DMC in addition to the conferences held at the participating sites.

Summer Series: This series of orientation lecture sets comprising of Attending driven lectures and workshops that covers a wide range of topics fundamental to the practice of Critical Care Medicine like airway management, introduction to bronchoscopy, ventilator management, capnography, acid-base balance, basic physiology.

Following the summer series, multidisciplinary clinical conferences are scheduled two days per week throughout the academic year.

These include:

Critical Care Core Conference: Every Wednesday
Journal Club: Once per month. This is one-hour review in the methodology and results of up-to-date publications critical care pulmonary, nephrology and Infectious diseases.
M&M Conference:Monday morning once per month to discuss and highlight cases of interest and educational value.
Board Review Series: this series takes place routinely throughout the academic year.
Internal Medicine Grand Rounds: Weekly Department of Internal Medicine conference by SUNY DMC faculty and invited speakers
City-wide Case Conference (Briscoe Lung Club)- this conference is hosted by Weill Cornell Medicine with the Division of Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine of various institutions sharing in the presentations on a rotating basis which include topics not limited to pulmonary but encompassing critical care including nephrology and or Infectious diseases
Research Lectures: These lectures will be interspersed within the core conference lectures to advance fellows Knowledge of the basic principles of research, including how research is conducted, evaluated and applied.
QA/QI Presentations:A series of the fellows ’ scholarly activities in form of QA/QI projects under dedicated mentorship are highlighted and presented in the Month of May of each academic cycle.

There is the availability of “GoToMeetings” to enable maximum participation by all the fellows rotating at the affiliate hospitals.