Clinical Cardiology Training Program
The Training Program in Cardiovascular Medicine at the University of North Carolina encompasses three year core fellowship and provides excellent clinical and research opportunities which serve as a strong foundation for each trainee's development as a consultative cardiologist. The training program is balanced and well-rounded, providing experience that will be enduring and useful whether the physician ultimately elects to embark on an academic career or enter clinical practice.
We emphasize clinical excellence and consider it important for the trainee to have a wide variety of patient contacts in order to develop diagnostic skills and judgment. This is achieved through a series of inpatient and outpatient consultative rotations that span the entire three years of fellowship. All fellows are also expected to master clinical laboratory techniques essential to the modern practice of cardiology. These include electrocardiography and clinical electrophysiology, exercise stress testing, echocardiography, nuclear cardiology, Swan-Ganz catheter placement, temporary pacemaker insertion, and diagnostic cardiac catheterization.
All fellows are encouraged to engage in research activities. Early in the first year, each fellow is expected to identify a primary area of interest so that academic goals can be pursued during the second and third years of training. A broad spectrum of basic research opportunities is available and active clinical research programs are ongoing in all cardiac diagnostic laboratories, outpatient clinics, and on the Inpatient (CCU) Service. There are opportunities for epidemiological work with the University of North Carolina School of Public Health and we have a strong collaborative research program in clinical outcomes, based at the Medical Review of North Carolina in Raleigh.
Teaching is an important responsibility of all trainees. In their daily work, our fellows teach medical students, technicians, nurses, housestaff, and colleagues in the cognitive aspects of cardiology, as well as the appropriate clinical application and performance of technical procedures. Each trainee also prepares and presents formal divisional teaching conferences.
In addition our T32 research positions, our division also offers opportunities for extended training including 4th year positions in basic and translational research, molecular cardiology, interventional cardiology with peripheral vascular experience, clinical cardiac electrophysiology and heart failure/transplantation. Completion of an ACGME-accredited three-year training program is required prior to entry into advanced clinical programs. Programs in basic/translational research and molecular cardiology can be developed before, during or after clinical training depending on individual goals.
Application to Training Program
The Training Program uses the ERAS online application service. All documents must be processed through ERAS. Please note that, in addition to the Dean's letter and transcript sent directly from your medical school, we require three letters of reference. One of these letters must be from the Director of your internal medicine training program and one reference must be from a faculty member in the Division of Cardiology at your current institution. We do not require a letter from the Chairman of Medicine at the medical school from which you graduated. We would appreciate receiving your application and letters of support as soon as possible. Please indicate your interest in any of the 4-year programs.
The deadline for all application materials is August 30. Regarding visas, our institution only sponsors J1 visas at this time.
If you have any questions, please feel free to contact our Training Program Coordinator, Kira Oshima, by email at kira_oshima@med.unc.edu.
Sincerely,
Park W. Willis IV, MD
Professor of Medicine and Pediatrics (Cardiology)
Vice-Chief for Academic Affairs
Director, Training Program in Adult Cardiovascular Medicine
Burnett-Womack Building, 6th Floor
Campus Box 7075
Chapel Hill NC 27599-7075
