Newborn Medicine | Fellowship Program

Our ACGME accredited and long-established neonatal-perinatal medicine fellowship program strives to protect research time and to provide outstanding research and clinical mentors.  About half of our trainees perform research in basic science departments outside the Division of Newborn Medicine, including Cell Biology and Physiology, Pharmacology, Molecular Biology, Immunology, Neurobiology and Genetics.  This is an especially attractive option since the Washington University School of Medicine is ranked in the top five among medical schools in the country.  In 2005, the School received $377 million in grants from the National Institutes of Health, making it the fourth largest recipient of NIH dollars among all US medical schools.  Fellows enjoy two years of protected research time with carefully selected and committed mentors.  The Department of Pediatrics’ own research activities moved into the state of the art, $70 million dollar McDonnell Pediatric Research Building in the Spring of 2000.  Recently, the Children’s Discovery Institute, a unique collaboration between St. Louis Children’s Hospital and the Department of Pediatrics, has established centers for the investigation of congenital heart disease, pediatric cancer, pediatric pulmonary disease, and musculoskeletal disease.

Clinical training takes place in the NICU at St. Louis Children's Hospital and on the labor and delivery service at Barnes Hospital. Fellows have a great deal of responsibility, usually running work rounds and managing very sick infants with the guidance of a faculty of fourteen attendings. This facilitates development of teaching and leadership skills. Clinical time is performed in two six-month blocks to provide continuity for both the clinical and research portions of the fellowship.

A didactic program for fellows includes weekly journal clubs devoted both to clinical research and to molecular medicine. These serve not only to raise awareness of current literature but also to teach principles of experimental design, biostatistics and epidemiology, and molecular methods. Fellows also play an active role in division clinical case conferences and morbidity and mortality conferences and present their research to the division at regular intervals.

The Department of Pediatrics, under the leadership of Alan Schwartz, M.D., Ph.D., continues its commitment to excellence in residency and fellowship training. Departmental conferences and Grand Rounds are an important part of the intellectual environment of the fellowship program. Selected journal clubs, seminars and visiting lectures throughout the School of Medicine contribute another dimension to fellowship training.

Please visit the faculty web pages (links are available on the personnel page) to view recent publications and grant support. This record of productivity and competitiveness demonstrates the vitality, excitement and exceptional quality of the training environment within the division. Our fellows routinely present their research at national meetings, publish at least one first-authored scientific paper and obtain extramural support for their research. Fellows who complete the program have gone on to choose academic or clinically oriented careers in approximately equal numbers.

We are pleased that you have taken the time to learn about our neonatal-perinatal medicine fellowship.  The clinical opportunities available are unique and the research opportunities encompass not only the Department of Pediatrics but many opportunities within the Medical School and the University at large.  Application to the training program is through the Electronic Residency Application Service (ERAS) and selection of fellows is through the National Resident Matching Program (NRMP).  Please contact Brian Hackett, M.D., Ph.D., if you have further questions.

Interested individuals may also want to review the Washington University Graduate Medical Education Policies.