Residency Program Overview

The First Year: The Basics

The internship year is designed to provide experience and education pertaining to all aspects of general care of the hospitalized and ambulatory pediatric patient. Rotations through the Greenberg Pediatric Pavilion allow comprehensive care of the diverse Komansky Center for Children's Health inpatient population, while ambulatory experience is gained through time spent at the outpatient clinics.

• Four-five blocks are spent in the general pediatrics inpatient unit, where interns are exposed to a wide cross-section of inpatient issues.

• Two blocks are spent in the pediatric emergency room, giving interns a feel for the important bridge between inpatient and outpatient care, and providing valuable experience with simple pediatric procedures.

• One-two rotations through the general pediatric oncology service at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center (MSKCC) provide an in-depth education regarding the care of oncology patients.

• Two-three rotations at NewYork-Presbyterian/Queens (NYPQ) provide interns with experiences in community hospital-based pediatrics.

• One rotation in the newborn nursery provides necessary experience in the care of well newborns and their families. Interns gain experience in the management of hyperbilirubinemia, hypoglycemia and other newborn conditions. Delivery room experience is gained during this rotation.

• Ambulatory rotations in pediatric cardiology and pediatric neurology provide sub-specialty experience while emphasizing those skills required by the general pediatrician.

• One block is devoted entirely to primary care, at one of our three outpatient continuity clinic sites.

The Second Year: Intensity & Leadership

The second-year resident spends much of their year in an increasingly independent and supervisory role in multiple settings.

• One block in Pediatric ED allows for further refinement of diagnostic and procedural skills learned during the previous year.
• One-two blocks of Neonatal ICU, allowing for further expansion of knowledge base in newborn medicine and experience with neonatal procedures
• One-two blocks of Pediatric ICU introduce the resident to the management of complex, critically ill children. Residents gain familiarity with the management of post-operative cardiology, oncology, neurosurgery and orthopedic patients, as well as many other common and uncommon conditions requiring acute monitored care.
• Junior residents at MSKCC have a senioring role on the oncology team".  
• Two blocks at NewYork-Presbyterian/Queens, where residents gain experience in community pediatrics and advocacy. Residents develop clinical and supervisory skills including a senioring role during this rotation.
• One block of anesthesia selective allows residents to further gain experience in sedation, airway management and intubation in a controlled setting working closely with pediatric anesthesiologists.
• One block of primary care, at one of our three outpatient continuity clinic sites
• The Hospital for Special Surgery, where residents focus on musculoskeletal diseases, i.e. orthopedics, rheumatology and sports medicine in both the inpatient and outpatient settings
• Four blocks of Individualized learning - residents choose, in consultation with the program director, ambulatory-based selective and elective experiences to meet their learning needs and career choices (rotations include gastroenterology, hematology/oncology, endocrinology, sports medicine, genetics, autism, radiology, global health, research, ophthalmology, otolaryngology, dermatology and rheumatology)

The Third Year: Independence & Training

The senior resident is allowed an increased level of responsibility and independence in both patient care and in teaching the other house officers and medical students.

• One block on the NYP general inpatient unit, where the senior resident is given the opportunity to exercise his/her independence as an educator and supervisor
• One block of resident-as-teacher selective - emphasis is placed on precepting medical students in the outpatient clinic, working with students on the inpatient unit on written and oral case presentations, and students' evidence-based medicine presentations (the resident also focuses on teaching in larger groups, i.e. journal club, morning report)
• One block in the Pediatric ED, where senior residents demonstrate their decision-making skills and ability to act independently (teaching skills are further honed)
• One block in the Neonatal ICU - senior residents gain experience in management of the most premature infants, and continue to expand their knowledge base and experience with neonatal procedures
• One-two blocks in the PICU, where residents are encouraged to think and act with increasing independence (during this rotation, the focus is on preoperative and postoperative cardiac care)
• One block of adolescent medicine solidifies the PGY-3's proficiency in caring for the teenage patient.
• Three blocks of individualized learning - residents choose, in consultation with the program director, ambulatory-based or inpatient selective and elective experiences to meet their learning needs and career choices (rotations include infectious disease, renal, general pediatrics, sports medicine, research, genetics, autism, radiology, pediatric burn medicine, global health, ophthalmology, otolaryngology, dermatology and rheumatology)
• One block of primary care at one of our three outpatient continuity clinic sites.
• Two blocks consist of two-three weeks of night shifts as team leader of an NYPH inpatient unit, with a remainder of time in ambulatory clinics.

All house officers spend approximately one half day per week participating in the Resident Group Practice where they follow a cohort of patients longitudinally through all aspects of sick and well patient care. In addition, residents spend block time in each year at their continuity site. There are three sites for continuity clinic; the main site is adjacent to the Hospital in the Helmsley Medical Tower, and there are satellite practices at NewYork-Presbyterian/Queens and the Long Island City Community Practice.

Every effort is made to ensure that patients see their own resident doctor at each visit, in order to forge strong physician-patient relationships. Residents in a group model see those same continuity patients for episodic illness and telephone triage. Residents often find their continuity clinic to be one of the most rewarding parts of their training.

Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center

The world's oldest and largest private cancer center, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center is a leader in patient care as well as innovative research. Pediatric residents at Weill Cornell have the opportunity to rotate through Memorial Sloan Kettering in both their intern and junior year on the oncology team. There is also an opportunity to do an elective in bone marrow transplant in junior or senior year. 

Hospital for Special Surgery

The Hospital for Special Surgery is the top-ranked orthopedic hospital in the nation, as well as one of the top hospitals for rheumatology and neurology. It is a center of excellence in the care of children with orthopedic and rheumatologic disorders, providing care for patients with some of the most complex musculoskeletal disorders in the world. Pediatric residents rotate through the Hospital for Special Surgery in their second year of residency, providing them with the unique opportunity to attend not only the busy general orthopedic clinics, but specialty clinics including the sports medicine clinic, pediatric rheumatology clinic and skeletal dysplasia clinic.

NewYork-Presbyterian Queens

Serving among the most culturally diverse populations in the United States, NYP Queens is a 439-bed acute care hospital that annually admits approximately more than 34,000 patients, and more than 133,000 outpatient visits, and treated 80,000 people through the emergency department. Through their experiences at NYP/Queens, residents are provided with an opportunity to gain increasing autonomy in inpatient management and build collaborative relationships with community-based pediatricians throughout Queens.

The Pediatric Simulation Program is a strategic partnership with the Pediatrics, Internal Medicine and Emergency Medicine programs in the Weill Cornell Medicine/NewYork-Presbyterian Simulation Center. The program focuses on collaborative research, innovations in medical education, and improving patient safety and quality of care at NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital/Weill Cornell Medical Center. 

Simulation provides exciting interactive learning opportunities for our residents to practice almost any kind of clinical encounter in a safe protected environment - without any risk of harm to our patients. This is especially valuable in pediatrics, where children are particularly vulnerable to medical errors, and where learning by experience is governed by the rarity of many important but uncommon clinical events. Using state-of-the-art simulation technology, our learners gain proficiency though crucial hands-on experience with interprofessional teamwork, medical decision-making and procedural domains. 

Working with expert multidisciplinary faculty, our pediatric residents are immersed in realistic high-fidelity simulations in the Pediatric Emergency Department, General Pediatric Inpatient Unit, the Pediatric and Neonatal Intensive Care Units (NICU and PICU), and in the Simulation Center. These simulations begin during the resident's intern orientation and continue throughout their three years of residency training. Each simulation is followed by an interactive debriefing session to promote self-reflection, collaborative teamwork, and the translation of learning into the improved care of children. Learn More.

The call schedule of the Pediatric Residency Program has been designed to comply with the New York State and ACGME restrictions on residents' working hours. The residency program supports the philosophy that cross coverage of inpatient units can be deleterious to patient care and resident education. For inpatient services, nights are covered for one week at a time via a night float system by two members of the team from that unit. Cross coverage is kept to a minimum with an emphasis on continuity of care. Thus, ambulatory selective and elective experiences can be carried out with no in-house call during the week, and occasional weekend calls.

In addition to weekly grand rounds and professors' rounds, there is a daily morning report and noon conference. Morning reports are attended by all residents on the pediatric inpatient service and those residents on ambulatory rotations as well as some of the faculty, including the program directors. It includes discussion of interesting cases in the inpatient and outpatient fields. Noon conference is a daily one-hour didactic teaching session given by attending physicians and is designed to provide a comprehensive pediatric curriculum for residents. In addition, there are resident-led lectures on general pediatrics topics given prior to each session of the Resident Group Practice Clinics. For interns, there are academic half-days in the beginning of the year to cover core topics such as oxygen delivery, fluid and electrolytes, and handoff.  Last, as part of a major medical center that includes Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, Rockefeller University and the Hospital for Special Surgery, there are numerous day and evening lecture opportunities covering a broad range of medical topics at which all residents are welcome.