Mission

Our mission is to be the region's most valuable gastroenterology training program using the resources available to us. Our graduates will excel in all areas of the ACGME core competencies as articulated in the milestones for the gastroenterology subspecialty. We are committed to the education and competency of quality patient-centered care and safety in an environment rich in scholarly activities. Upon graduation, we expect each trainee to be able to enter an an academic position or unsupervised practice of evidence-based gastroenterology with an enthusiasm for life-long learning, practice improvement and professional growth.

Program Aims

The aims for the gastroenterology fellowship program are:

• Graduate proficient gastroenterologists in all cognitive and procedural aspects, are quality patient-centered and highly focused on safety, able to excel in practice or academia.
  • A series of faculty-supervised activities throughout the three years of training, with the goal to provide a comprehensive clinical experience to our learners. Activities include: hospital consult service; transplant hepatology, inpatient and outpatient (at Mayo Clinic Florida); continuity clinic; hepatology clinic; an IBD clinic experience; inpatient and outpatient general and interventional endoscopy; rotations dedicated in nutrition; radiology; pediatric gastroenterology.
  • We focus on quality patient-centered care where fellows are evaluated by patients in clinic and evaluated on safety by faculty through endoscopy score report tracking of perforation, bleed, etc.
  • We aim to graduate the region’s most valuable gastroenterologists and expect that most gastroenterologists in our area will be from the UF College of Medicine – Jacksonville.
• Develop physicians who are able to critically appraise medical literature, to conduct investigator-initiated studies and participate in scholarly activity.
  • All fellows receive a list of the faculty’s research projects or they can initiate an independent project with faculty supervision. All fellows participate in teaching rounds (minimum twice a week). The fellow should have at least one manuscript submitted for publication upon graduation.
  • Monthly journal club is held for continued life-long learning and development of critical literature appraisal skills.
• Graduate fellows with a life-long commitment to learning that excel in the gastroenterology competencies and have a complete understanding and goal of continuous practice improvement.
  • Didactics: traditional lectures, M&M, pathology, research and endoscopy conferences. Each has a different format allowing auditory, visual and kinesthetic learners to complement the clinical curriculum.
  • All fellows participating in a required quality improvement project or discussion teach practice improvement.
  • The gastroenterology in-training examination (GTE) is yearly. Individual’s results are used to identify knowledge gaps and tailor educational needs by assigning lecture presentations on the topics/competencies in which they are most deficient.
• The program director will monitor for improvement in the competencies by reviewing average board scores with the expectation being above the national average.

Goals and Objectives

The three-year fellowship training program in gastroenterology, hepatology and nutrition at the UF College of Medicine – Jacksonville is geared towards producing the gastroenterologists and hepatologists of the future. The goal of training is to combine excellent clinical training with research, to produce outstanding gastroenterologists. Research may be at the basic science level or may be clinical in nature. Elective opportunities are available to help meet individual fellow’s needs, interests and career goals, including rotations within the division to gain additional expertise in specific areas (ERCP, EUS, motility studies and nutrition) or in specific disease states (IBD, pancreatitis, liver diseases and transplantation hepatology) and rotations in ancillary areas (pathology, radiology).

The part of the fellowship devoted to clinical training utilizes the gastroenterology core curriculum as the basis for training. This core curriculum represents a joint collaborative effort among the national gastroenterology societies – the American Association of the Society of Liver Diseases (AASLD), the American College of Gastroenterology (ACG), the American Gastroenterological Association (AGA) Institute and the American Society of Gastroenterology Endoscopy (ASGE). This curriculum provides a framework for developing an individual plan of study and growth that should be tailored to meet the needs of each individual trainee based on the strengths and special qualities of each individual training program. Key areas include: motility, diverticular disease, functional illness, acid-peptic disease, pancreatic disorders, gastrointestinal hormones, diarrheal diseases, inflammatory diseases, gastrointestinal malignancy, hepatology, biliary tract diseases, gastrointestinal endoscopy, gastrointestinal bleeding, nutrition, pediatric gastroenterology, gastrointestinal and hepatic pathology, gastrointestinal radiology, surgery and research. The Gastroenterology Core Curriculum, Third Edition - May 2007 identifies two levels of training:

• Level 1 training is the core clinical curriculum which requires a minimum of 18 months of patient care experience and consists of a traditional inpatient and outpatient consultative and specialized care experience. A longitudinal outpatient ambulatory experience is mandated for the full 3 years of training. A central feature of training remains the requirement for dedicated training in hepatology. Additionally, basic endoscopic skills and a substantive research experience are requirements.
• Level 2 training, which is enhanced and focused training in defined areas that permit the acquisition and mastery of specific areas of knowledge or procedural competency. These areas of advanced training may include, for example, advanced therapeutic endoscopy, endoscopic ultrasonography, hepatology, transplantation, IBD or motility disorders.