Neonatal/Perinatal Medicine Fellowship
Program Overview
The Neonatal-Perinatal Fellowship Training Program — offered jointly by Nemours Children’s Hospital, Delaware, Christiana Hospital, and Sidney Kimmel Medical College at Thomas Jefferson University (TJU) — provides a unique and comprehensive training experience that will lead to a career in academic or clinical neonatology.
The program, leveraging the diverse strengths of all 3 hospitals, provides a well-rounded experience in the clinical care of critically ill newborns and extensive training in the principles of clinical and basic science research.
- Curriculum
- Research & Training
- Salary & Benefits
- Location & Living
- Faculty & Participants
Our Fellowship Program
The fellowship program in Neonatal-Perinatal medicine offers the unique opportunity to provide clinical care at three distinct settings in the Delaware Valley. Your clinical experience will range from the largest delivery center in Delaware at Christiana Hospital, through a large inner-city delivery experience at Thomas Jefferson University to a referral children’s hospital NICU at Nemours Children’s Hospital, Delaware. The clinical program will provide training across the full breadth of neonatal care from the care of the periviable premature neonate to providing ECMO to the critically ill term newborn.
While experiencing high-level clinical training you will also be fully immersed in a vibrant academic environment, including weekly dedicated lecture time, multiple clinical conferences and a defined research and simulation curriculum. As your fellowship progresses and research becomes more prominent, you will be presented with an abundance of research opportunities ranging from bench basic science research, through clinical database design to qualitative research methodology.
Our fellowship program graduates clinically and academically excellent Neonatologists that we anticipate to become future clinical and academic leaders in the field.
Program Components
Unique Clinical Settings
You’ll do your rotations at all hospital facilities. Although the campuses are located within 45 minutes of each other, you’ll work at only one of these clinical sites on any given day:
- Nemours Children’s Hospital, Delaware, located in Wilmington, Del., is one of the top children’s hospitals in the United States providing high-level clinical care and cutting edge academic research. Part of your clinical experience will occur in the 14-bed Cardiac Intensive Care Unit where you will care for infants with congenital heart disease both before and after surgery. In the 32 bed referral NICU you will learn the care of the surgical infant, the infant requiring ECMO and those requiring multiple complex subspecialty referrals. Your experience will include the Advanced Delivery Program focusing on the care of the fetally diagnosed neonate requiring immediate access to post-delivery care.
- Thomas Jefferson University Hospital, the Intensive Care Nursery (ICN) at Thomas Jefferson University Hospital, located in Philadelphia and affiliated with Sidney Kimmel Medical College, is a 40-bed Level III NICU associated with a busy delivery room and a maternal fetal medicine department that serves as a referral service for high-risk pregnancies. The ICN is also a tertiary referral site for neonates requiring photocoagulation therapy for retinopathy of prematurity and therapeutic hypothermia for hypoxic ischemic encephalopathy. Its urban setting exposes you to a highly diverse patient population with a particular focus on premature neonates born as early as 22 weeks gestation and opiate exposed neonates with neonatal abstinence syndrome as a part of the Maternal Addiction Treatment Education & Research (MATER) program.
- Christiana Hospital, located in Newark, Del., is the only general tertiary care facility in the state and is a high risk obstetrics referral center. With more than 7,000 annual deliveries, the hospital has an active maternal fetal medicine department that evaluates high-risk pregnancies and a 86-bed, single bed, Level III NICU. The NICU has an annual admission rate of 1,500 newborns and an average daily census of 55. Our training environment is enriched by the hospital’s advanced neonatal transport team which has served as a mobile NICU for more than 25 years. Our Tiny Baby collaborative group focuses on providing evidence based guidelines and quality improvement initiatives for infants born as low as 22 weeks gestation. The NICU collaborates with the pediatric subspecialists at Nemours, the NICU provides neonatal palliative care services through the IMPACT team which is comprised of a neonatologist who is board certified in hospice and palliative medicine, physicians and nurses from neonatology and obstetrics, advanced practice clinicians, social work and pastoral care. Our neonatology group is active in quality improvement, clinical research and trainee education.
Program Activities
With fellows from other programs, you’ll participate in a variety of didactic sessions, including basic research training and statistics, as well as pediatric grand rounds.
Other activities include:
- Daily teaching rounds during clinical rotations
- Orientation lectures on ventilator management, transport and ECMO
- Neonatal-perinatal, laboratory and radiology rounds
- Fellow physiologic lecture series (weekly lectures that cover the entire content of the subspecialty certifying examination)
- Classic and neonatal journal clubs
- Fellow board review
- Conferences and seminars on fellow research, quality improvement, professionalism/communication, case conferences, morbidity and mortality and fetal therapy
Master's Opportunity at Thomas Jefferson University
You may also pursue a Masters degree through Thomas Jefferson University, concurrently or following your fellowship training. They offer programs in:
- Human clinical investigation
- Public health
- Health care quality and safety
These fulfill the scholarly activity requirement of the American Board of Pediatrics.
Unique Features of Our Program
- Strong clinical training in three different types of NICU
- One of the bigger programs (total 12 fellows, planning to increase to 15)
- ECMO managed by the NICU team
- ECMO training and certification, ECMO simulation program
- Research opportunities (Basic/Translational/Clinical/QI projects)
- Robust research program (Strong representation at national meetings, manuscripts)
- Protected time for the didactics
- Research grant for the fellows
- Clinical mentors program
- Bedside ultrasound training
- Simulation training
- Research curriculum lecture series
- Fellows’ retreat
- Research mentors-first year fellows meeting
- Neonatal Critical Care Transport training
- Joint Neonatology Surgery conference
- Joint Neonatology Cardiology conference
- Joint Neonatology Neurology conference
- High risk deliveries at Nemours Children's Hospital, Delaware
- High risk babies follow up program
- Quality and safety curriculum
- Global health (clinical and research opportunity)
- Masters program
- Diversity
Research Opportunities for Fellows
Thomas Jefferson University Hospital
The division of neonatology at Thomas Jefferson University is actively involved in basic science, translational, clinical research and quality improvement projects. The basic science and translational research are focused on epigenetic changes and lung inflammation in an animal model of chorioamnionitis and BPD. We are collaborating with the division of maternal fetal medicine on the impact of fetal environment on DNA methylation changes in cord blood cells. The faculty at TJU are involved in clinical research on neonatal abstinence syndrome, hypoxic ischemic encephalopathy, early onset neonatal sepsis, gastroesophageal reflux, neonatal iron deficiency, non-invasive ventilation and point-of-care ultrasound. The quality improvement projects include: antibiotic stewardship, improving iron status at discharge in preterm infants, reducing BPD and NEC and improving overall nutrition in preterm infants. Thomas Jefferson University is part of the NICHD Global Network to improve maternal and child health in low- and middle-income countries. The division of neonatology and MFM at TJU is collaborating with several centers in India on clinical trials to improve iron status in mothers and children, improve outcomes in infants with HIE and iron deficiency, and reduce mortality with infection in preterm and term infants. The fellows will have an opportunity for an independent research project on global health at collaborating centers in India and other LMICs.
Nemours Children’s Hospital, Delaware
At Nemours there is an expanding research program ranging from basic science projects looking at the genetics of BPD and pulmonary hypertension, through quality improvement work on reducing medication errors to multi-center projects looking at variation in neonatal end-of-life care. Faculty are also available to mentor fellows interested in pursuing research on ECMO, palliative care and the neo-surgical patient. The research efforts of the division are rapidly growing and expanding and we appreciate the participation of neonatal fellows in ongoing projects or in the initiation of a new project. Interested fellows are welcome to contact faculty directly to discuss potential research projects.
Learn More About Research at Nemours
ChristianaCare Hospital
The Division of Neonatology at Christiana Hospital has 14 attending neonatologists who are active in a wide variety of scientific research activities. The research topics are diverse and fellow participatory activities would primarily be in the areas of clinical and translational research and quality improvement. Examples of recent fellow-based research include detailed pulmonary physiology and mechanics, cytokines, breastmilk nutrition, transfusion medicine, transport medicine, parent decision aids and communications, spirituality/mindfulness for parental coping, neonatal resuscitation, and epidemiologic analysis of retrospective and prospective database studies. Through your fellowship training, you will learn research design, methodology, ethics, informed consent, process control, quality improvement, database management and statistical procedures. There are additional opportunities to collaborate with maternal-fetal medicine, obstetrics, pediatric radiology and global health.
Salary & Benefits
Salary
- PGY 4: $ 80,904
- PGY 5: $ 84,139
- PGY 6: $ 87,505
- PGY 7: $ 91,005
Benefits
- Medical
- Dental
- Prescription drug coverage
- Malpractice insurance
- Office space
- Cell phone
- Educational stipend
About Our Hospital in Delaware
The Nemours Children’s Hospital, Delaware is a multispecialty, tertiary care teaching institution located on a 300-acre estate in the scenic Brandywine Valley in Wilmington, Del.
Among the hospital’s amenities for all staff are:
- Free parking
- Park-like setting
- Gym/fitness center
- On-site child care center for children of staff
Living in Delaware Valley
Because of our location in the tri-state area of Delaware, New Jersey and Pennsylvania, we offer unique living/working opportunities. For example, you can choose to live in the downtown Philadelphia area and easily commute to our park-like hospital campus in Wilmington.
Train With Recognized Leaders
If you’re looking for a rewarding program built on academic excellence and family-centered care, Nemours Children's offers outstanding medical, surgical, pharmacy, nursing, therapy and psychology programs. Train with faculty who are respected leaders in their fields, a patient care model that stands apart and access to groundbreaking research.
Apply Today
Currently Accepting Applications
1. Eras Application
Our program is committed to ensuring a fair and comprehensive interview process. Beginning in 2025, we will be utilizing program signals to better understand the interests and preferences of our applicants. These signals help us tailor our interview approach to align with the specific aspirations and backgrounds of our candidates. It is important to note that program signals are not used for ranking or evaluating candidates. They will not influence the selection or ranking process in any way.
Questions About Applying?
Zubair Aghai, MD
Program Director
zubair.aghai@nemours.org
Clara Greskoff
GME Program coordinator
clara.greskoff@nemours.org