Curriculum of the Infectious Disease Fellowship

Our curriculum offers variability and flexibility to best fit your needs and interests. You will have autonomy when creating your schedule while maintaining ACGME requirements.

Didactic Experiences

These didactic experiences are required for fellows:

Clinical Infectious Disease Case Conference

Our weekly, accredited ID case conference is the premier conference in our fellowship. As a fellow you will present an in-depth literature review of approximately 8 topics throughout fellowship. We also encourage you to meet with experienced mentors who have presented worldwide to fine-tune your academic presentation skills.

Attendees can claim CME, ABIM MOC, and/or ABP MOC credit from this conference.

Didactic Curriculum

Graduates say our ID curriculum sessions are one of the top fellowship experiences. This multidisciplinary conference includes presentations from biostatistics experts, pediatric ID faculty, guest lecturers and foundational sessions based on ID core competencies.

We review and plan session content according to fellow feedback, expert review, and developments in the field.

Rotating Conference (Journal Club, Research Conference)

Throughout the year, we offer rotating conferences in place of the clinical infectious disease case conference.

• Journal Club. Fellows present once per year. You'll work one-on-one with an expert mentor to develop skills in fundamental strategies for hypothesis generation, study design, analytical methodology and discussing practical conclusions with the ID community.
• Research Conference. Present QI and/or research project progress in this yearly conference. Share your work, gain direct and in-person feedback from world-renowned researchers and prepare for presentation at national conferences.
• Patient Safety Conference. Present a root cause analysis of a patient safety event under expert guidance, in collaboration with colleagues from other disciplines.

Development Sessions

For these monthly lunch sessions, fellows collectively identify topics related to their interests, career goals, and the business of medicine.

We then invite experts and guest speakers to make small-group, in-depth presentations on the chosen topics. Favorite sessions have included a graduate panel on job searching, managing the outpatient clinic and in baskets, and managing a research program as a PI.

Board Reviews

We sponsor weekly fellow-led board review sessions. We provide each fellow with an infectious disease board review text and host guest speakers, identified by the fellows based on need.

Microbiology Rounds

Held weekly for additional education in microbiologic techniques. Multidisciplinary microbiology-based review of current or recent cases of interest.

We also offer many conferences led by our division faculty and academic partners. We encourage you to participate in as many of them that suit your professional interests.

Clinical Experiences

Through all of your inpatient and outpatient rotations, you'll be part of multidisciplinary patient care teams that include pharmacists, advanced practice providers, and learners.

Required Rotations

• Year 1: Two-week micro laboratory rotation with the UW Health Microbiology lab.
• Year 2: Two-week UW Health HIV intensive clinical rotation

General Infectious Disease, UW Health

This rotation has the widest breadth of patient population and infectious disease diagnoses.

You'll gain exposure to regularly encountered inpatient infections and special situations, including community- and nosocomially-acquired infections, new diagnoses and complications of HIV, impaired hosts, illnesses of travelers, and sexually transmitted infections.

Transplant Infectious Disease, UW Health

This rotation focuses on the diagnosis and management of the immunocompromised inpatient adult. Because UW Health has one of the largest transplant programs in the nation, you'll gain expertise in transplant ID that few fellowship graduates in the country have.

You'll learn to manage immunocompromised patients through pre-transplant infectious disease assessment, therapy and immunosuppressive agents, inpatient follow-up, and inter-team communication.

Surgical Infectious Disease, UW Health

This rotation includes consults from surgical subspecialties. It focuses on adult inpatients from a variety of backgrounds.

General Infectious Disease, William S. Middleton Memorial Veterans Hospital (VA)

During this rotation, you will provide the full spectrum of infectious disease care to veterans. Our VA hospital is a center of excellence for lung, heart, and liver transplants.

You'll function as a consultant physician on a team that includes an APP and pharmacist. You'll gain exposure to regularly encountered inpatient infections and special situations, including HIV/AIDS, impaired hosts, illnesses of travelers, nosocomial infections, sexually transmitted infections, and the epidemiology of infectious diseases.

This service also offers the experience of care coordination with the Community Living Center, a skilled nursing home that works in conjunction with the VA.

Infectious Disease Continuity Clinic, UW Health

By attending outpatient clinics at the UW Health ID Clinic, you'll gain exposure to general infectious disease, impaired hosts, illnesses of travelers, nosocomial infections, sexually transmitted infections, and epidemiology of infectious diseases.

We encourage you to seek out and follow interesting cases, especially to gain experience with the full continuum of patient treatment.

HIV/AIDS Outpatient Continuity Clinic Experience, William S. Middleton Veterans Hospital

During this experience, you'll manage new and established HIV patients and rotate in the PrEP HIV clinic. You'll have time to read key HIV literature and learn about the primary care care environment for HIV patients.

ID Continuity Clinic, William S. Middleton Veterans Hospital

In this clinic, you'll gain exposure to general infectious disease, HIV, impaired hosts, illnesses of travelers, nosocomial infections, sexually transmitted infections, epidemiology of infectious diseases, and travel medicine.

See grid below for a sample schedule. Fellows typically average one weekend every five weeks.

Sample Monthly Schedule

Specialized Electives

We are committed to building a clinical experience that suits your needs. Your non-service time can allow for a broad array of elective experiences, including antimicrobial stewardship, infection prevention, community ID care, global health, public health, and wound care, among others.

Scholarly Activity

Research

Fellows identify a research mentor during their first few months of the fellowship. This mentor works closely with you throughout training to assist with publications and your required conference presentation.

See our fellowship research page for more details on our robust opportunities and support.

Quality Improvement

The Department of Medicine’s QI Curriculum for Fellowship teaches fellows how to apply quality improvement knowledge and skills directly to clinical practice.

You're required to participate in the UW Health QI symposium at least once during your fellowship.

Teaching

The Department of Medicine's Fellow Medical Education (FAME) Training Track trains fellows to become effective clinician-teachers and scholars.

Leadership

Each year, we appoint a senior fellow as the education fellow—a role similar to a chief resident. Duties include assisting and guiding the onboarding process for incoming fellows, representing fellows in planning meetings for didactic sessions, and maintaining the board review series with program support.

Certifications

All first year fellows take the SHEA Primer on Healthcare Epidemiology, Infection Control & Antimicrobial Stewardship certification which is paid for by the program.

Several of our pathways include financial support for additional certification, such as tropical medicine certification. We also consider additional training support on a case-by-case basis.