Wake Forest University School of Medicine has been training fellows in the subspecialty of maternal fetal medicine (MFM) since the 1970s, making it one of the longest-standing, continuously run MFM fellowship programs in the country.

We provide a collaborative atmosphere where each individual is a learner as well as a teacher and mentor.  We foster close mentoring relationships and prepare fellows for all aspects of a professional career in maternal fetal medicine. Our fellows have pursued clinical practice around the country in both academic and private settings. 

Fellows are encouraged to pursue their passions while working with mentors to enhance their clinical skills, while also gaining valuable educational and research experience preparing them for a successful career.

Why Train at Wake Forest?

Fellows at Wake Forest receive exposure to a broad range of pathology in high-risk clinical obstetrics, both in the outpatient and inpatient settings.  Atrium Health Wake Forest Baptist serves as a regional referral center for complex obstetric cases from across the region.  As the only academic maternal fetal medicine practice with a MFM Fellowship program in the western half of North Carolina, we serve a large geographic area, which includes North Carolina, a significant part of western Virginia, the southern part of West Virginia and parts of Tennessee. 

  • Our fellows receive outstanding training in research design and study execution and also have the opportunity to participate in obstetric-related basic and translational research projects. 
  • Our section has a research infrastructure that fully supports the fellowship, ensuring that each fellow can design, conduct, and complete an exceptional thesis project that can be used to help achieve board certification.
  • Fellows will gain confidence in common and rare obstetric and maternal-fetal medicine-related procedures and clinical scenarios. 
  • Faculty from Wake Forest have designed a variety of procedure simulations and task trainers that provide fellows with the foundation needed to perform complex ultrasound-guided needle procedures.  The simulation curriculum is led by Dr. Nitsche, who together with Dr. Brian Brost designed the procedural simulation tools. 
  • Each fall, the Wake Forest section of Maternal Fetal Medicine holds an ultrasound-guided needle procedure bootcamp where MFM fellows from across the southeast come to Wake Forest to benefit from our expertise in simulation. 

Our fellows will gain enough experience in performing and teaching these procedures such that they routinely serve as workshop faculty for national postgraduate courses in ultrasound-guided needle procedures, even in the first year of their fellowship.

Wake Forest MFM Fellows are an important component of our education mission, where fellows serve as faculty members to our phenomenal obstetrics and gynecology residents.   The labor and delivery experience is focused at the Atrium Health Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center, where in July of 2019, we opened a brand new obstetrics unit and birth center.