Winter 2021
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Pediatric Urgent Care Fellowships
By Theresa E. Guins MD and Deena Berkowitz MD MPH
The rapid growth of urgent care and proliferation of pediatric specific urgent care centers over the past several years has created a growing need for providers trained in this developing pediatric specialty.
Academic urgent care fellowships join the growing ranks of one-year fellowship programs. Currently, four pediatric urgent care (PUC) physician fellowships exist at children's hospitals in the US and an additional four are in development. There are also several PUC fellowships that are specifically designed for the training of Advanced Practice Providers. Additional information on established fellowships for both physicians and APPs can be found on SPUC’s website.
Most fellowships are housed under divisions of emergency medicine. Directors are either pediatric or pediatric emergency medicine (PEM) physicians. Fellowships are financed either by graduate medical education, emergency medicine, or pediatric departmental funds or a combination thereof.1 The primary goal of these training programs is to focus on development of clinical excellence, procedural competence and the delivery of high quality pediatric urgent care. A curriculum for pediatric urgent care fellowships is currently in development and a set of core competencies has already been put forth by members of the Education Committee of the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) Section on Urgent Care Medicine (SOUCM). These competencies can be found on the SPUC website under the Fellowships/Training heading.
An association of academic pediatric urgent care fellowship directors was established in 2018 to ensure collaboration among institutions. This group, which includes directors of both existing programs and emerging programs, meets bimonthly to ensure ongoing communication, comparable training, and a unified educational vision. The group is preparing site-specific applications for accreditation by the Academic Pediatric Association, with the aim of American Board of Pediatrics accreditation within five years. Please contact Dr. Deena Berkowitz (hyperlink to dberkowitz@childrensnational) if your division is interested in starting a physician PUC fellowship.2
- Berkowitz D, Cohen J, Shaukat H, Willner E, Herold S, Coco T, Pattishall A, Bhandari N, Ramsook C, Vinograd A, Yen T, Guins T, Berg L, Koutroulis I. Development of Academic Pediatric Urgent Care Fellowships. J Pediatr. 2021 Jan;228:4-7.e2. doi: 10.1016/j.jpeds.2020.07.001. Epub 2020 Jul 5
- Ibid.
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