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Ultrasound Fellowship

 

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Our Mission

UCSD’s Emergency Medicine Ultrasound Fellowship was created in 2010 to advance the use of bedside emergency ultrasound to improve patient care and create educators within the field. Our program is EUFAC-accredited, and while it is structured around general ACEP guidelines, it provides value and opportunity far beyond. Our ultrasound faculty tailor a curriculum to meet the fellow’s interests, ideas, and career goals. Our fellows are trained to become leaders in both academic and community settings.

 

Fellow Opportunities & Responsibilities

Teaching

The fellow will improve their skills as an educator by teaching medical students and second-year emergency medicine residents rotating in Emergency Ultrasound with both clinical and didactic sessions. There will be additional (paid) opportunities to perform didactic teaching and hands-on courses involving emergency residents, as well as with our new School of Medicine second year ultrasound curriculum. Additionally, the fellow will give one lecture to the UCSD emergency medicine faculty and residents during their weekly conference at some point during the year.

Specialty Learning

A certain portion of your scanning shifts (described below) will be scheduled flexibly by the fellow in conjunction with the fellowship director to facilitate specialty rotations. At UCSD we have a unique culture of interdepartmental collaboration that allows for specialized training. For example, the fellow will train with regional anesthesiology performing nerve blocks, sports medicine to train in MSK ultrasound and joint and PRP injections, cardiac anesthesiology to perform and become certified in transesophageal echocardiography, pediatric POCUS training at Rady Children’s hospital, and advanced OB ultrasound with our OB colleagues. 

Journal Club, Quality Assurance, and Scanning Shifts

Weekly QA sessions will be led by the fellow and attended by at least one ultrasound faculty along with rotating residents and medical students. The sessions begin with journal club, with review and critique of emergency ultrasound literature. There is both structure and flexibility to ensure a comprehensive review of the relevant literature by year’s end, guaranteed to make you a more skilled, thoughtful, and learned clinician and sonographer. 

Quality Assurance (QA) then follows, whereby ED-performed scans will be reviewed in video clip format. Interesting scans are catalogued and feedback is provided to residents, medical students and faculty regarding their scans. The fellow will be encouraged to work on and/or complete one quality assurance project during fellowship to improve upon the practice, organization or teaching of emergency ultrasound.

The QA session is followed by a live hands-on scanning shift in the emergency department. During scanning shifts the fellow will provide active teaching to medical students and residents and learn from US faculty in the emergency department during the shift. The majority of these scanning shifts are conveniently combined JC/QA sessions to limit the non-clinical scheduling burden on our fellow. 

Clinical Shifts

Fellows are expected to maintain their primary clinical skills in the ED with 6 clinical shifts (48 hours) monthly. Clinical shifts will be scheduled at UC San Diego Health academic and community sites depending on the fellow’s prior training. 

Research

The fellow is encouraged to design an ultrasound study and advance it through UCSD’s Institutional Research Board. Guidance will be provided by US faculty throughout the course of the year, with the goal to submit at least an abstract to a national convention. Multi-year longitudinal projects are usually available for the fellow to contribute depending on their interest and the specifics of the project.

 

Additional Opportunities and Compensation

Ultrasound Around the Globe

At UCSD we are constantly exploring international opportunities for teaching and learning, with prior trips to Mozambique, Nepal, and Mexico. We are developing a relationship with the non-profit Ondas de Latinoamerica which trains ultrasound fellows throughout Latin America to offer further bidirectional teaching and training opportunities to our fellow. We tailor these opportunities to the preference of the fellow, with funding available to realize the fellow goals.

Conferences

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The fellow will be funded to attend SCUF annually. Additional funds are set aside for flexible use throughout the year, including international teaching and educational opportunities as described previously. If you are presenting research, UCSD will provide additional funding for travel and attendance to SAEM, AIUM, or ACEP.

Salary and Compensation

The 2024-2025 salary scale here is currently in effect, with ongoing negotiations by the House Officers union for a pay raise that is yet to be determined. In addition to the salary described, you will receive a $1,000 monthly stipend. This is separate from the fellowship funds described above that will be used to fund SCUF and other educational endeavors. Full benefits including medical and dental, and 4 weeks of vacation will also be provided by UCSD during the fellowship. All conferences at which the fellow presents research will be paid for by the Emergency Department as described previously. 

We at UCSD are well aware of the financial ramifications that emergency physicians face in deciding to spend a year to specialize in advanced clinical ultrasound. It is our belief that UCSD’s combination of competitive pay, benefits, moonlighting opportunities, light clinical workload (6 shifts, 48 hours monthly), paid teaching opportunities throughout the year, fellow discretional funds, monthly stipend, and priceless networking opportunities that come with being a top-tier academic institution, allow us to demonstrate significant benefit from both the financial and professional development perspective. 

For Any Questions:

Contact Fellowships Program Coordinator: 
Maeve-Anne Malong mmalong@health.ucsd.edu

 

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