Gastroenterology Fellowship (ACGME) - FAQ

It goes without saying that the pandemic COVID-19 has been extremely disruptive to every aspect of our lives, especially our country’s health care system. Despite the challenges, we remain committed to providing our fellows with excellent, well-rounded and diverse training.

During the COVID-19 Pandemic, fellowship training has continued to be of greatest priority for our department, and we have made efforts to sustain the high caliber of teaching quality. The inpatient consult service continues to have a high volume of consults. The volume of elective procedures decreased transiently with shelter-in-place orders, but we are now returning to a more typical schedule with pre-procedural COVID-19 screening for all patients to ensure the safety of all staff and trainees. The outpatient continuity and specialty clinics in (Regional IBD and Liver Clinics) have transitioned to predominantly virtual (video) visits, with in-person visits reserved for patients with severe illness or otherwise requiring an in-person assessment. The virtual visits are staffed by attendings and fellows via a 3-way video encounter to facilitate valuable learning gained from observing direct patient-provider interactions. We are gradually transitioning back to in-person office appointments as COVID-19 restrictions ease.

In accordance with the recommendations from The Coalition for Physician Accountability Work Group, and in an effort to promote an equitable and safe interview season, we will be conducting only online interviews and virtual visits during the upcoming interview season; there will be no in-person interviews or visits. We are committed to creating a robust virtual experience that will inform applicants about our program and culture. Rest assured that we remain dedicated to performing a holistic review of applicants.

The Coalition for Physician Accountability Work Group recommendations

Resident and fellow wellness is an integral part of our culture at Kaiser San Francisco. As a fellow at Kaiser San Francisco, you will have access to a robust Wellness Curriculum developed by the Resident Wellness Committee and led by one of our Lifestyle Medicine faculty, Dr. Rakesh Jotwani. The curriculum includes experiential learning and didactics on topics such as sleep hygiene and ergonomics.

We believe that the capacity to find joy and meaning in one’s work correlates with professional and personal resiliency and, to that effect, our wellness curriculum aims to connect trainees with the meaning of their work through narrative medicine and storytelling.

We also believe that physicians cannot operate at their full potential unless they attend to their own physical, psychological, and emotional wellbeing. Our residents and fellows participate in activities such as group hikes, intramural team sports, and free boot camp or yoga classes on campus. They also receive a stipend to join a gym of their choosing, and each year, the gastroenterology fellows receive departmental funding for their own full-day retreat. There is a full range of free counseling and mental health services available to fellows, and we provide education about physician burnout and specific techniques, such as a personal mindfulness practice, to build one’s resiliency. Lastly, all fellows are matched with a mentor to provide additional career counseling and support. After their first year, the fellows have the option of choosing another mentor to best meet their professional development needs.

Equity, inclusion, cultural competency, and diversity are core tenets of the gastroenterology fellowship program and Kaiser Permanente. We seek fellows from a variety of backgrounds, life experiences, and nontraditional paths as we hold the strong belief that training the next generation of diverse and culturally competent health care providers is vital to addressing the health disparities that exist today. Our application review process employs a holistic approach that considers all aspects of the individual’s background, including academic and clinical achievements, race/ethnicity, gender, socioeconomic background, and unique experiences that have shaped the person they have become.

KP has a longstanding tradition and is a national leader in the promotion of diversity, inclusion, and culturally competent medical care. We are fortunate to have a robust Diversity, Inclusion and Equity Committee that facilitates local and regional physician education opportunities, including the recently launched Culturally Responsive Care & Inclusion Educational Series. Our Associate Program Director, Dr. Nizar Mukhtar, serves as Diversity Liaison for our program to facilitate diverse fellow and faculty recruitment and lead their diversity, inclusion, and cultural competency training.

First-year fellows take 2-3 days of weekday call each week, including overnight call that is taken from home, such that you will only come in to the hospital at night for urgent or emergent procedures. Second- and third-year fellows will provide back-up weekday call coverage when the first-year fellow is away but will otherwise not take weekday call. Weekend call coverage is distributed across all fellows, such that you will only be required to provide weekend call coverage once per month.

All fellows are required to pursue research projects during their training. We pride ourselves on providing the flexibility necessary to enable these efforts. Jeff Lee, MD, MPH is the research lead for the fellowship program; he will help each fellow identify a clinical research project of their interest by the end of their first year and connect them with an appropriate research mentor. To help ensure completion of the research project by the end of fellowship, we will provide >6 months of dedicated time for research activities spread throughout your 3 years of fellowship; educational opportunities (e.g., online educational materials focused on clinical epidemiology along with support for coursework at UCSF); assistance from a dedicated GME Research Program Manager; and dedicated programming support from the Biostatistical Consulting Unit for cohort development and data analyses. Aida Shirazi, Ph.D., is our GME Research Program Manager, who will help assist fellows at each phase of a research project from research protocol development to statistical analyses to manuscript preparation. Dr. Shirazi also serves as a liaison with the Kaiser Division of Research, including its researchers, scholars, and the Biostatistical Consulting Unit. Lastly, many of our faculty members at Kaiser Permanente Northern California are national leaders in gastroenterology and hepatology; have published in numerous high impact journals (e.g., NEJM, JAMA, JAMA Internal Medicine, Annals of Internal Medicine, Gastroenterology, etc.); co-authored several clinical guidelines; and have extensive experience mentoring residents and fellows on research projects. Taken together, our program has the resources and personnel to help each fellow complete their research project by the end of their fellowship.

Compliance with the ACGME clinical and educational work hours requirements is a top priority. All fellows have a minimum of one day in seven free of clinical work and required education when averaged over four weeks, and at least eight hours off between all scheduled periods of clinical work and education.

All fellows have 20 days of paid vacation. Vacation time is taken during elective rotations or a prearranged time with the program director. There is also 1 week of educational leave for Fellows that can be used towards attending medical conferences, courses, or medical boards preparation.

Kaiser fellows enjoy very competitive salaries and generous benefits. GME offers subsidized employee parking, reimburses for medical license and DEA registration renewal fees, and provides a $720 wellness stipend and a $1500 educational stipend.

As a highly desirable place to live and work, the Bay Area has always had a relatively high cost of living. To help offset this, Kaiser Permanente San Francisco fellows receive an additional housing stipend of up to $3500 each year.

We encourage potential fellowship applicants to speak with one of our program leaders or chief fellows. Please contact Joel Barcelona, our program coordinator, via email at Joel.Barcelona@kp.org to be connected.