Curriculum
Goals
- To educate the next generation of physicians in hospice and palliative care, meeting a new specialty standard of care that includes the benefits of high-quality interdisciplinary care readily available to patients confronted with life-limiting illness and at the end of life.
- To train physicians to demonstrate competence in specialist-level expertise in palliative care. The program helps physicians develop academic, clinical, research and administrative skills that are consistent with the practice, development and improvement of palliative medicine and to rise to leadership in the field.
- To help physicians develop a broad base of knowledge and analytical skills in palliative medicine. The program emphasizes communication, care planning, symptom management, relief of suffering, mentoring complex decision-making, and provide competence in the regulatory and administrative processes essential to serve patients and loved ones challenged by life-limiting illness or at the end of life.
Rotations
- Palliative services (seven months)
- Palliative pediatrics (two weeks)
- Hospice service (three months)
- Radiology & oncology (two weeks)
- Selective (one month)
- Elective (one month)
- Scholarly (one month)
Clinical rotations
Inpatient palliative care consultation service
Inpatient hospice unit
Home and long-term care
Outpatient clinic
Electives
Didactics
Regional fellows’ conferences
In order to foster camaraderie and collegiality with all the Chicago-area fellows, we have established a regional fellows’ conference series with the other hospice and palliative medicine fellowships in Chicago at Northwestern Memorial Hospital, The University of Chicago, Rush University/Stroger Hospital of Cook County.
These monthly half-day sessions are rotated between institutions to allow the fellows to learn from all the academic palliative medicine faculty in Chicago. The sessions lay the foundation for core topics in palliative medicine through a formal, structured teaching session over the course of the academic year. The series is presented in a variety of formats, including didactic, interactive, case-based discussions and role play. Fellow’s time is protected to enable meeting this attendance requirement.