questions re: residency in endocrinology

[Guest CLYL]

Hi guys,

 

I'm interested in specializing in endocrinology after med school, but all I know is that it's a sub-specialty of internal medicine. Does anyone know how competitive it is to get into this sub-specialty and how many years it would take in total for residency? Any help will be greatly appreciated! Thanks

[Guest summervirus]

I can't answer how competitive it is because I think it varies from year to year and from location to location.

 

Endocrinology is a two year residency program. The majority of people go through three years of general internal medicine and then two years of endocrinology as a "fellow" (an old term that I'm told I shouldn't be using anymore), making it five years. But, I know that there are some people that take a little longer to decide if they want to subspecialize and they go through the full four years of internal med before beginning endocrine, making it a total of six years.

[Guest Ian Wong]

Hi there,

 

I'd recommend checking out the above thread, which has descriptions for Endo:

 

pub125.ezboard.com/fpremed101frm25.showMessage?topicID=54.topic

 

I too have no idea how competitive it is. Certainly, there are lots more fellowships in the US than there will be in Canada, and it wouldn't be as competitive as Cardiology and GI (the two most competitive IM subspecialties currently).

 

In Canada, most people would enter a two-year Endocrine fellowship after completing three years of either an Internal Medicine, or a Pediatric residency. Of course, you'd have a different population base depending on whether you were handling adult vs peds endo. There's also a reproductive endocrinology (infertility) fellowship accessible through Ob/GYN. For that you'd have to do the five year Ob/GYN residency and then tack on additional time for the fellowship (1-2 years?)

 

Oh yeah, after you finish your residency and start your fellowship, you are no longer called a "resident", but rather a "fellow". I think that's pretty universal across North America. It's another rung up the medical hierarchy, just short of becoming a staff or attending physician. Of course, you could still be a staff doctor if you started work after finishing residency (you don't need a fellowship to work as a physician, it just gives you extra skills and expertise in a given area of your specialty).

 

Who told you not to call the fellows as "fellows"? What do you call them instead?

 

Ian

[Guest summervirus]

Ah, interesting.

 

Who told you not to call the fellows as "fellows"? What do you call them instead?

 

Oh, one of the profs that was giving a talk a few months ago about CaRMS matching mentioned that we're not supposed to call fellowships "fellowships" anymore; rather, we are to call them subspecialties (because that's how the Royal College of Physicians of Canada refers to it). She said, technically, fellowships don't exist in Canada. And, fellows are just "subspecialists in training." *shrug*

 

But, I don't think anyone is really adopting that lingo in everyday practice.

[Guest Carolyn]

My understanding is that endocrinology is actually quite a competitive fellowship/sub-specialization to get - mostly because there is only room for so many endocrinologists in each city.

 

The whole Fellowship vs. Subspecialization can be as semantic as PGY1 vs. Intern... However I think there are times when people are supposed to be referred to as Fellows. Sometimes people finish residency in an area (i.e. in plastic surgery), can be on staff and then decide to go complete even more subspecialized training (i.e. breast reconstruction). While they are doing that subspecialized training they are called fellows.