Fellowship
The Infectious Diseases Training Program at the Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center is a fully ACGME accreited program that offers a comprehensive clinical program and many different research opportunities. Trainees joining our program will care for a diverse population of patients on both the East and West Campus sites of the medical center. The following represents a snapshot of our hospital's clinical services:
- 621 licensed beds, including 419 medical/surgical beds, 77 critical care beds and 60 OB/GYN beds
- Medicare-certified Bone Marrow Transplant and Solid Organ Transplantation programs
- A comprehensive Cardiovascular Center
- The Women's Center, with over 5,000 births annually
- Level One trauma center and roof-top heliport
- Emergency Department that provides over 54,000 patient contacts per year, and features 42 patient stations and a unique 8 bed Critical Decision Unit
- A multi-specialty and multi-disciplinary program for the care of patients with AIDS and other HIV-related complications, providing care for more than 1500 HIV+ patients in the region
- The Harvard-Thorndike Laboratory, the nation's oldest clinical research laboratory, has been loated on this site since 1973
- Close collaboration with institutions such as the Dana-Farber/Harvard Cancer Center, the Joslin Diabetes Center, and Children's Hospital provide unique opportunities to manage infections associated with these special populations
BIDMC is noted for a truly state-of-the-art, wireless and paperless Online Medical Record system.
Trainess will rotate on consult services and the ID Urgent Care Clinic within the Medical Center, the Clinical Microbiology Laboratory, and to the Children's Hospital during their clinical year. Fellows begin a one-half day per week continuity clinic in their first year. This includes follow up of inpatients, new outpatient referrals, and longitudinal care for a minimum of 20 HIV+ patients per fellow. In the Second Year, fellows have the opportunity to extend their continuity clinic experience to several community health centers including The Dimock Community Health Center with Dr. Wong, the Outer Cape Health Center (in Provincetown, MA) with Dr. Rowley, and the Bone Marrow Transplant ID Clinic and Transplantation ID Clinic with Dr. Wong.
The trainee will spend the subsequent years of fellowship as determined by his/her chosen track. The three options available to the trainee are the Clinician Scholar track , the Clinical Investigator track and the Basic Investigator track . Those trainees entering the field of Infectious Diseases to provide direct patient care and consultations should choose the two-year Clinician Scholar track. Trainees with an interest in an academic career focused on original clinical investigation should seek the Clinical Investigator track. Candidates planning a career in basic laboratory investigation should choose the Basic Investigator track. Fellows pursuing training in the Clinical Investigator and Basic Investigator tracks should plan for a minimum of three years of fellowship training.
All fellows will work with a designated mentor. A fellow may have more than one mentor, each addressing specific aspects of the fellow's overall experience. The Division highly encourages such relationships in order that the trainee develops the necessary skills and collaborations for starting a successful academic career. For most, the mentorship relationship also extends to supervision in generating grant applications. Fellows choosing to pursue the "Clinical Effectivenss" course at the Harvard School of Public Health, or a Masters in Public Health degree are strongly encouraged to have formulated projects in place that can be applied to the programs.
All fellows are expected to pursue a scholarly project in their second year. This may be laboratory-based, translational research, or clinical research. Examples of projects include:
- illucidation of mechanisms of antimicrobial resistance
- identification of correlates of immunity in HIV or other retroviral infections
- assessment of HIV suppression and efficacy, and emergence of resistance in resource-poor populations
- identification of Mycobacterium tuberculosis antigens to better identify active infection
- characterizing risk factors associated with opportunistic infections within the allogeneic stem cell transplant recipient population
- participation in Phase II-VI anti-infective trials
- development and utilization of OMR and computer-based databases to charachterize patterns of disease outcomes in order to develop clinical best-practices approaches
We welcome trainees at other stages of their medical education to spend time with us. The Division offers unique inpatient and outpatient rotations for medical students and residents of this and other institutions.
