Postdoctoral Fellowship

The overarching goal of the post-doctoral fellowship program in Pediatric Gastroenterology/Hepatology at Yale is to equip the subspecialty resident with the clinical and research skills to become independent and productive academic pediatric gastroenterologists. Yale University has a prestigious pediatric gastroenterology fellowship training program. Yale fellowship training program in pediatric gastroenterology was first established in 1988 by Dr. Frederick Suchy and since then the Yale University School of Medicine has pioneered the training of academic scholars. NIH support was first obtained in 1990 with training focused on developmental gastroenterology first with Dr Frederick Suchy as the PI (1990-1996), then with Dr Susan Moyer as the PI (1996-2002).

Former fellows have gone on to hold positions of Section Chief, director of pediatric liver center, and residency program director in medical schools and hospitals across the country as well as becoming independent NIH-funded investigators. Our fellowship program remains highly competitive. This is a 3-year program that enrolls one fellow/year. It ranks among the top training programs in US for placing fellows in academic positions. All of the fellows in the program participate in bench or patient-oriented research during years 2 and 3 and they are supported by two separate NIDDK-funded Institutional Training Grants in Investigative Gastroenterology (DK070171) and Investigative Hepatology (DK07356). The training environment and program is highly developed, exposing trainees to the full spectrum of pediatric gastrointestinal diseases while maintaining the strong tradition of providing outstanding opportunities for research training.

Fellows enter the program after completing three years of residency in pediatrics and are expected to commit three or more years to our postdoctoral program. We accept one candidate into the program each year for combined clinical and research training. Research activities are supported, in large part, by training grants from NIH/NIDDK mentioned above.

The program is designed so that postdoctoral fellows experience a continuum of learning in both the clinical gastroenterology/hepatology and research over three years. Throughout the training we emphasize importance of continuity of patient care for children who have chronic illnesses and require long term therapy. Similarly, the complexity of contemporary research, both clinical and basic, requires the progressive acquisition of research skills and sufficient time to become familiar with and expert in research technologies. Consequently, the Pediatric Gastroenterology/Hepatology Program allows intense clinical experience during all three years as well as an early introduction to either laboratory or patient oriented research in the first year of the program.