The Saint Vincent Sports Medicine Fellowship has a longitudinal curriculum structure. We believe this offers our fellows a number of important educational advantages.
The longitudinal structure optimizes continuity of care. The fellow can be present through the entire course of an injury or problem. The fellow would be part of the initial diagnostic evaluation, would help to formulate a treatment plan, and can be present for follow-up visits to assess response to the initial treatment plan and can be part of return-to-play decisions.
The longitudinal structure optimizes working relationships with the faculty. The fellow can see patients with the same faculty members on a weekly basis. This allows the fellow and faculty members to develop close working relationships. The faculty can better assess strengths and weaknesses of the fellows and focus on helping fellows to improve their skills during the course of their fellowship. The increased trust that comes from this relationship also allows the fellow to gain greater participation in clinical decision-making.
A longitudinal structure allows us to take advantage of multiple clinical teaching sites. Each of these sites provides exposure to a different mix of patients but all provide invaluable clinical experience. Fellows spend time every week at Saint Vincent Sports Medicine, the Penn State Behrend training room, a high school training room and the Sports Medicine Clinic at the Family Medicine Residency Program. The longitudinal experience allows the fellow to feel at home working in each of these sites. The fellows receive exposure to competitive college athletes, high school athletes, active wellness-minded adults, as well as common orthopedic conditions in a primary care practice.
Scholarly Activity
Each fellow is expected to prepare and submit a clinical case presentation or poster for one of the national sports medicine meetings. We are actively exploring opportunities to increase our scholarly activity and quality improvement initiatives in our various clinical sites.