Weill Medical College of Cornell University

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Infectious Diseases Fellowship

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The Division of Infectious Diseases' Fellowship Training Program in Infectious Diseases at the NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital/Weill Cornell Medical Center provides individualized training through faculty guidance, clinical rotations, mentored research, and didactic coursework. Our objective is to foster clinical and academic excellence.  Graduates of the program are highly qualified for the practice of infectious diseases, bench and clinical research, and for leadership roles in medicine. Our clinical fellows have uniformly received university academic faculty appointments and/or positions in state, federal, or international public health organizations, following certification by the ABIM.

Rotations: Fellows see inpatients at three institutions: NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital/Weill Cornell Medical Center, the Hospital for Special Surgery (HSS) and Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center (MSKCC).
NewYork-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell is a 840-bed tertiary care facility which is the primary teaching hospital for the Weill Cornell Medical College. The hospital services patients with a broad range of socioeconomic and cultural backgrounds, which reflect the diversity of New York City. NewYork-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell provides an extensive assortment of services through its Level I Trauma Center, Comprehensive Cancer Center, Burn Center, Bone Marrow and Blood Stem Cell Transplant Program, surgical services including neurosurgery and solid organ transplant (heart, lung, renal, liver and pancreas), OB-GYN, pediatric, neurologic and psychiatric departments. Fellows therefore learn to manage patients with both common and rare infectious diseases in a myriad of medical settings.

At NewYork-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell fellows are supervised by members of the Division of International Medicine and Infectious Diseases which has 34 full-time and 17 voluntary faculty members. The inclusion on the consult service of voluntary as well as academic faculty permits training in the intricacies of conducting private practice based patient care. Pharm Ds with expertise in infectious diseases round daily with the consultation team and provide information and teaching regarding the appropriate use and monitoring of antimicrobials. In addition, medical students and residents are integrated into the team.

Expertise in the care of HIV infected patients through the Weill Cornell HIV/AIDS Clinical Trials Unit (CCTU) and the Center for Special Studies (CSS), which is a New York State-designated AIDS Center located at the NewYork-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell. CSS offers innovative, multi-disciplinary, continuous, one-class care to over 2,000 patients at all stages of HIV disease. It has a renowned paradigm of team care for patients, serving a large number of women, minorities and IDUs. Social workers, nurses, psychiatrists as well as the primary physician function in concert as partners. In addition, a founding principle of CSS is that the care of HIV infected individuals should be all encompassing. Therefore in addition to primary medical care CSS provides a wide range of additional services including dental and OB-GYN. CSS also strives to address the impact of the disease on the entire family.

NewYork-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell is contiguous with the Weill Cornell Medical College as well as physically connected to the 192-bed Hospital for Special Surgery (HSS). HSS provides orthopedic and rheumatologic care including specialized surgical services for the hand and upper extremity, hip and knee prostheses, orthopedic trauma, scoliosis, spine, and arthritis surgery. The HSS affords our fellows an unusually broad exposure to infectious diseases involving bones and joints and prosthetics.

MSKCC is located across the street from NewYork-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell and is a designated National Cancer Institute Comprehensive Cancer Center. The 775-bed private hospital specializes in oncologic evaluation and treatment. It provides a full range of services through departments which include neurology, pediatrics and gynecology and psychiatry and offers multiple treatment modalities including pharmacologic, surgical and radiation therapy as well as bone marrow transplant. MSKCC affords the fellows an unusual opportunity to study infection in the immunocompromised host. The Infectious Disease Divisions of NewYork-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell and MSKCC are independent but have a close affilitiation. MSKCC fellows rotate on the NewYork-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell in-patient service in a reciprocal fashion and attendings at MSKCC have faculty appointments at Weill Cornell Medical College. A combined TransYork NewYork-Presbyterian/MSKCC Infectious Disease clinical case conference is held once per month. The combined areas of expertise of the NewYork-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell, HSS and MSKCC and location in a major urban center provide a rich clinical experience which ensures that fellows see the full spectrum of infectious diseases. Inpatient rotations at these institutions are primarily confined to the first year.

In addition to clinical in-patient rotations, during the first year fellows spend 2 weeks in the NewYork-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell Clinical Microbiology Laboratory and with the Epidemiology service. Annually the Microbiology lab performs 250,000 requested procedures and is a major reference laboratory which allows the fellows opportunities to learn how to evaulate samples for all major classes of infectious agents including bacterial, viral, fungal and parasitic. On the epidemiology service they learn the essentials of infection control for a major medical center. This experience is augmented by the attendance at monthly meetings of the service in which both acute and ongoing epidemiologic issues are managed.

Outpatient clinics
During the first two years fellows have weekly one half day continuity clinic sessions which alternate between the CSS/HIV and the general ID clinic.
In the general outpatient ID clinic fellows evaluate patients referred from the community as well as continuity care for patients seen on the NewYork-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell inpatient service. Expertise is therefore gained in the acute and longitudinal care of patients with infectious diseases as well as outpatient antibiotic management. Experience in the care of outpatients with HIV/AIDS is acquired through training individually with a CSS physician at one of two outpatient clinics: the Bernbaum Unit at NewYork-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell or the Rogers Unit which is located off-site at the Gay Men's Health Crisis (GMHC) in Chelsea, Manhattan.

Fellows also rotate in the International Health Care Service Clinic (IHCS) which services ~ 3,000 people annually. At the IHCS they gain experience providing pre- and post travel advice and infectious disease consultations in international traveler's and immunizations. Fellows obtain experience in the management of sexually transmitted diseases in The Baumgartner and Riverside Health Centers. Both clinics contain sexually transmitted disease (STD) clinics run by the the New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, Bureau of Sexual Transmitted Disease control. As public clinics for STDs in the city of New York the full spectrum of sexually transmitted diseases is seen.

Elective-Rotations
Subspecialty elective-rotations (2 - 4 weeks) are available on the clinical in-patient service. These rotations provide fellows with more intense and dedicated exposure to specific types of infections that occur on the general consult service. The rotations are staffed by senior clinicians with specific clinical expertise/research interests in the area. Current electives include:
• Cardiovascular and post-surgical infections
• Orthopedic/rheumatologic infections
• Infections in the neutropenic host
• Infections in transplant recipients
• Infections in HIV/AIDS patients