The Minimally Invasive Gynecologic Surgery Fellowship curriculum provides traditional and nontraditional training activities in a variety of clinical and classroom settings and instructional formats.
Curriculum Components
- Didactic program
- Simulation program
- American Association of Gynecologic Laparoscopists, or AAGL, video curriculum
Over the course of the program, trainees participate in weekly didactic sessions. Reading material on a clinical topic is assigned to the trainees and is supervised by faculty. Particular attention is given to areas of controversy and new research. Assignments include the AAGL core reading articles. Discussion topics closely follow the AAGL educational objectives and reference the most recent literature and/or textbooks, including but not limited to the AAGL reading list.
Women’s Health and Fellowship Didactic Series
Each Thursday morning, fellows participate in five hours of protected departmental and subspecialty learning. Trainees attend grand rounds, a gynecologic pre-op conference, a gynecologic patient safety conference and the departmental journal club. Fellows also engage in small-group interactive discussions on a wide range of minimally invasive gynecologic surgery topics, as well as journal club, simulation and research meetings — all facilitated by faculty.
In addition, fellows are scheduled for protected, autonomous and self-directed study time tailored to their individual needs.
Clinical Training & Research
Fellows’ rotations are designed and scheduled to optimize technical and clinical skills and provide the ability to design and conduct a required research project. The program provides three months of protected research time over the course of the two-year program with monthly research meetings. The remaining 21 months are composed of clinical training in which fellows are assigned progressive levels of responsibility for medical and surgical management in the provision of patient-centered care.
Year 1
- 7 months minimally invasive gynecologic surgery
- 1 month oncology
- 2 months research
- 1 month colorectal surgery
- 1 month pediatric gynecology
Year 2
- 6 months minimally invasive gynecologic surgery
- 1 month oncology
- 1 month research
- 1 month pediatric gynecology
- 1 month female pelvic medicine and reconstructive surgery
- 1 month reproductive endocrinology and infertility
- 1 elective month
From Great Ideas to Clear Results: Data, Epidemiology & Statistics for Clinical & Population Health Investigation
Ideas to Results is a yearlong course that starts in mid-August and uses a mix of didactic and flipped classroom sessions and mentored laboratory exercises, with a synchronous class occurring weekly. Topics covered include epidemiology, study design, data computing and biostatistics, all at an introductory level. Participants will learn to use Stata to manage and analyze data, and to interpret basic statistical analyses in the clinical literature.
To make the course as engaging and efficacious as possible, learners are expected to attend at least 85% of classes. The programs hopes this will also yield an inspirational cohort effect among the participants.