Division of Rheumatology Mission

Clinical Services: To provide state-of-the-art care for patients with all types of rheumatic disease.

Teaching: To teach medical and dental students, medical residents, rheumatology fellows and to provide comprehensive state-of-the-art CME for physicians, dentists, nurse practitioners and medical assistants.

Research: To be involved in national and international clinical and basic research.

Rheumatology Fellowship

UConn offers a two year ACGME accredited Rheumatology fellowship.

Mission

The mission of this Rheumatology Fellowship Training Program is to produce physicians that are clinically competent in the field of rheumatology, are capable of working in a variety of settings, and possess habits of life-long learning to build upon their knowledge, skills and professionalism.

General Goals of the Fellowship

The purpose of this fellowship is to train board eligible/certified internists in the clinical diagnosis and management of patients with rheumatic diseases. This includes the comprehensive evaluation of the patient with rheumatic disease both clinically and by laboratory methods and the institution of appropriate management and therapy. The fellow will also develop the ability to expand medical knowledge related to this subspecialty. This will include the ability to access and critically review the medical literature related to the clinical problems encountered during the training period. Attention will also be paid to the development of professionalism, interpersonal communication and an understanding of the systems needed to provide comprehensive care.

Educational Methods

In order to achieve the goals and objectives for the fellowship program, the following experiences have been established for the purpose of teaching Rheumatology fellows. These include: the inpatient rheumatology experience, the ambulatory rheumatology experience, ambulatory rotations with other clinical subspecialties, didactic conferences, a research experience, continuing medical education and society participation, and development of teaching skills.

Fellows have had the opportunity to do clinical research and submission of a research paper in a peer reviewed journal or an abstract at national meetings is a requirement for graduation.

Musculoskeletal Ultrasound in Rheumatology

We realize the growing importance of ultrasound in the field of rheumatology. There has been an exponential growth in the utility of bedside ultrasound in the last decade with newer applications arising on a daily basis.

We strive to train our fellows to become exponents in the use of ultrasound and are able to take full advantage of it after they graduate and make a mark for themselves.

We have a well-defined year-long curriculum with equal emphasis on teaching the basics and fundamentals of ultrasound technique along with the required training to examine and inject every individual joint. We also provide guidance and training in writing procedure notes to meet the billing requirements, CPT billing codes, and in preparation for the certification exam.

Fellows get the major exposure and training on a weekly basis at the Newington VA Healthcare System and revision along with hands on experience on a monthly basis at UConn Health. The first year fellow also has a lot of opportunity and volume of patients to hone their skills in ultrasound guidance during their six month rotation at the VA Healthcare System.

We support our fellows in pursuing nationally recognized CME courses which prepare them for the certification exam along with providing the required CME.