Endocrinology Fellowship

Our Pediatric Endocrinology Fellowship Program is designed to train pediatricians to become leaders in the research and clinical care of children and adolescents with endocrine diseases and diabetes mellitus. Within the Division of Pediatric Endocrinology at UPMC Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh, we provide our fellows with three years of combined clinical and research fellowship training. Our program is ACGME- accredited and accepts three fellows per year.

The first year of the program is dedicated to acquiring clinical expertise in pediatric endocrinology and diabetes. Fellows are assigned at least a week of inpatient consults where they care for children with newly diagnosed diabetes, diabetic emergencies, hypoglycemia, adrenal insufficiency/crisis, and evaluation and management of diabetes insipidus. Fellows also rotate through diabetes, general endocrine, and subspeciality service clinics. During all rotations, fellows work closely with the attending physician, resident team, and other members of the diabetes team such as diabetes nurse educators, dietitians, social workers, and advanced practice providers. One month of protected time is guaranteed to interview potential mentors and plan individual research projects. All fellows must form a Scholarly Oversight Committee (SOC) that includes the fellow’s primary mentor and 2-4 senior faculty members with expertise relevant to the fellow’s proposed research project.

For the second and third years, our program offers two potential tracks: research and clinician educator. We make every effort to tailor electives and schedules to focus on fellows’ chosen pathways and achieve their future career goals. Our fellows are prepared for careers as clinicians, clinical educators, and much more with great success!  

For fellows on the research track, the second and third years are devoted to completing basic, clinical, translational, and/or health services research with faculty mentorship; they often complete additional coursework through the University of Pittsburgh at the Graduate School of Public Health, the Clinical and Translation Science Institute (CTSI), and/or the Institute of Clinical Research Education (IRC). Research fellows are expected to write and submit at least one manuscript to a peer-reviewed journal on this track. Attendance and presenting at national meetings such as those held by American Diabetes Association, Endocrine Society, Pediatric Endocrine Society, ISPAD, ESPE etc. is also expected.

On the clinician educator track, fellows focus on conducting clinical research, making quality improvements, and teaching while completing additional clinical time. Clinician-educator track fellows also complete a research project with an individual focus with faculty guidance. Projects may range in scope from clinical/translational research, health services research, quality improvement, and/or medical education that comply  with ABP and ACGME standards.