Welcome to the Christiana Care Cardiology Fellowship.
Our Cardiovascular Disease Fellowship Program is accredited by the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education (ACGME) and is designed to provide the knowledge and clinical skills necessary to pass the American Board of Internal Medicine Subspecialty Examination in Cardiovascular Diseases. Graduate fellows will be fully prepared to enter clinical practice or to pursue further academic training.
Christiana is an amazing environment for training. We are an 1100 bed hospital system and the largest private employer in Delaware. We are an active training facility with more than 250 medical and dental residents and fellows. We are the only level 1 trauma center in Delaware. with an extremely busy clinical patient exposure. We have more than 52,000 admissions annually and see over 200,000 people in our emergency departments. We have an extremely busy cardiology program with more than 4,000 cases annually in the cath labs including a dedicated structural heart room and team.
As a fellowship, Audrey, Ijeoma and I pride ourselves on being an advocate for the fellows. We focus on a work life balance and are fortunate that our high clinical volume allows all the fellows amazing exposure and scheduling flexibility. This allows us to make sure we can customize yearly rotations for each fellow to make sure they get maximize exposure to their desired areas after they complete their COCATS requirements.
We have dedicated faculty made up of private and employed cardiologists who work with the fellows closely. We are proud of the fact that we run all of our services with, not on the fellows. We have found a unique blend of autonomy and supervision.
Lastly, we are a very close-knit and diverse group. I pride myself on a close relationship and interaction with the fellows to make sure they have a balanced and productive experience while at Christiana. My door is always open and located just down the hall from the fellows’ room. We hold monthly sit-downs for me to keep up to date on issues and help solve and trouble shoot problems. Faculty leadership also see the fellows on a weekly basis as we preside over a weekly clinical case conference, where mystery cases are presented by the fellows, followed by a short didactic session.
Thank you for your interest in our program. The rest of the content spells out many more particulars about the program and we are always here if you have any questions.
Dr. Leon Shao
- Educationally driven administration and faculty.
- Many one-on-one rotations with a committed cardiology faculty – excited about teaching and mentoring fellows.
- Outstanding Department of Medicine and Internal Medicine Residency Program.
- Learning experiences in small group and bedside settings.
- Collegial environment that promotes interaction with Internal Medicine residents and students and those in other specialties. Opportunities to teach both residents and medical students are important elements of the program.
- Cardiology Section provides tertiary care to a referral population of more than one million.
- Balanced didactic curriculum with plenty of “hands on” training.
- Program structure provides graduated independence and responsibility necessary to become excellent clinical cardiologists.
- Flexible elective opportunities, including interventional cardiology, EP, ECHO, nuclear, offsite cardiac transplant and MICU rotations.
- Opportunities for research and academic development.
- Outstanding ancillary support.
- Computerized medical record system.