Interventional Cardiology Fellowship

The Interventional Cardiology Fellowship Program offers a core procedural experience in the following diagnostic techniques: coronary arteriograms, ventriculography, hemodynamics, intravascular ultrasound, intracoronary Doppler flow and pressure monitoring.

The program also offers core experience in the following interventional techniques: balloon angioplasty, stent implantation, saphenous vein graft and arterial graft interventions, distal embolic protection during angioplasty, urgent angioplasty for acute coronary syndromes, primary angioplasty for acute myocardial infarction, directional and rotational atherectomy techniques, intra-aortic balloon counterpulsation and other techniques of mechanical circulatory support, intravascular ultrasound and coronary flow-pressure measurement (coronary flow reserve, fractional flow reserve). Additional techniques employed, based on the frequency of the cases, include laser atherectomy techniques, thrombectomy techniques, cardiac valvuloplasty, endomyocardial biopsy, intravascular radiation therapy and local drug delivery (only as part of investigational protocols).

Fellows will gain experience in the management of procedural complications and the appropriate use of mechanical and pharmacological agents. In addition, all fellows will gain experience in the full range of arterial vascular access techniques. These include both transfemoral approaches and approaches from the arm (brachial/radial). Each fellow will acquire experience treating the full range of coronary lesion morphologic subsets. This includes type A, B and C lesions, total occlusions, heavily calcified lesions, saphenous vein graft lesions, and lesions accessed via arterial bypass grafts.

The program is organized in three rotations (level I, level II and level III) that denote the stepping of the fellows from simple cases to more complex cases progressively. Each interventional cardiology fellow will participate in a minimum of 300 and maximum of 500 coronary interventional cases during the one-year program. The clinical experience of each fellow will be supplemented by weekly cardiac catheterization and interventional cardiology conferences, hemodynamics and interventional cardiology didactic lecture series, monthly quality assurance conferences, interventional cardiologycardiothoracic surgery conferences, endovascular grand rounds and clinicopathological conferences of the Department of Medicine.

Finally, all fellows will have the opportunity to participate in clinical research projects and a variety of educational activities. Fellows are expected to present abstracts and publish scientific papers stemming from their academic work.

In addition to procedure skills, each interventional cardiology fellow will acquire clinical experience in the care of patients who are evaluated for interventional therapy including:

1. Case selection for interventional or surgical cardiac therapy for heart disease in the outpatient setting and longitudinal follow-up after such procedures are performed.
2. Pre- and post-procedure patient care (in-hospital, acute ischemic syndromes).
3. Subspecialty consultation in interventional cardiology in the setting of hospitalized patients, emergency unit patients, coronary care unit patients and surgical intensive care or surgical wards.