The cardiovascular disease fellowship is a three-year program, with incremental exposure each year to the type of training that will best serve the fellow after graduation. Some may use the fellowship to begin an academic career or to combine an academic setting with private practice. There are 12 fellows in the program, with responsibilities distributed according to the level of experience. Ordinarily, during the three-year fellowship, thirty months (clinical and research) will be spent at Robert Wood Johnson Medical School/ Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital and three months (clinical and research) at the VA New Jersey Health Care System. Approximately, one-half of the fellow’s time is spent in patient care responsibilities.
The cardiology fellow spends at least two month-long rotations during the three-year fellowship in the following areas: Coronary Care Unit; inpatient consultation services; outpatient consultations; clinical research; electrophysiology; echocardiography; heart failure; catheterization laboratory; exercise stress physiology; and nuclear cardiology.
Fellows attend regularly scheduled ECG conferences; morning conferences; echo conferences; Board Review conferences; cath lab conferences; MICU/CCU conferences; Heart Center conferences; journal clubs; combined surgical conferences; and weekly Medical and Cardiology Grand Rounds.
Regularly scheduled Department of Medicine conferences include: morning report; Medical Grand Rounds; Art of Medicine and Business of Medicine conferences; radiology conferences; general medicine journal clubs; and subspecialty conferences. There are residency programs in all major specialties, and fellowship programs in all Department of Medicine subspecialties.
During the clinical inpatient rotations, the fellow is responsible for the work-up of patients referred for cardiovascular disease consultation, as well as primary cardiology service patients. Fellows participate actively in student and resident training.
Fellows participate in research projects with any of the fulltime faculty members in the division. Research interests of the faculty include cardiac electrophysiology, coronary revascularization, cardiac MRI, atherosclerosis risk factor control and heart failure. Clinical trials of new therapeutic agents and devices are conducted.
The interventional cardiology fellowship is a one-year program that accepts one trainee per year who has completed three years of a cardiology fellowship at an accredited institution.
The curriculum for the Cardiovascular Disease Fellowship Program is a three-year ACGME accredited training program that includes (each rotation represented in months):
| First Year | Second Year | Third Year | |
| Cardiac Consulation: | 2.0 | 1.0 | 0.5 |
| CCU: | 1.0 | 1.0 | 1.0 |
| Cardiac Cathaterization: | 1.5 | 1.0 | 2.0 |
| Echocardiography Laboratory: | 2.5 | 1.5 | 2.0 |
| Nuclear Cardiology: | 1.0 | 1.0 | 1.0 |
| Heart Failure: | 1.0 | 1.0 | 1.0 |
| Electrophysiology: | 1.0 | 1.5 | 0.5 |
| Elective: | 0.0 | 2.0 | 4.0 |
| VA (Non-invasive): | 1.0 | 1.0 | 1.0 |
| Vacation: | 1.0 | 1.0 | 1.0 |
Navigate through our Cardiology Fellowship pages to learn more: