Surgical Training
The focus of our program is surgical training; fellows are expected to participate in surgical cases from the beginning of their first year and gain increasing autonomy as they progress through fellowship. Our surgical volume is among the highest for academic vitreoretinal surgery fellowships with fellows completing 500+ primary cases over 2 years.
As a tertiary referral center for our region, our fellows are primary surgeon for some of the most complex cases. One of our greatest strengths is the diverse training background of our faculty; fellows will learn a variety of different surgical approaches and techniques. In addition, although we are a small program, we have faculty representation of all of the major subspecialties within retina (oncology, uveitis, and pediatrics). This wide range of surgical experiences allows our graduating fellows to feel confident and ready to take on these types of challenging cases in their future careers.
Types of surgical cases our fellows will perform include:
- Complex diabetic retinal detachments
- Proliferative vitreoretinopathy retinal detachments
- Intraocular foreign bodies and complex retinal detachments associated with ocular trauma
- Primary retinal detachment repair by both pars plana vitrectomy and scleral buckling
- Vitrectomy for vitreomacular interface disease: macular hole and macular pucker
- Scleral fixated and scleral sutured secondary intraocular lenses
- Surgical approaches to complex uveitis patients
- Plaque radiotherapy for choroidal melanoma
- Laser for retinopathy of prematurity
Clinical Training
Fellows will work closely with faculty in their clinics. In addition, fellows will have autonomy in their own fellow-based clinic as well as staff resident patients in clinic.
Our fellows are exposed to some of the most complex retinal diseases including
- Endophthalmitis
- Uveitis and ocular immunology
- Diabetic retinopathy
- Age related macular degeneration
- Retinal vascular disease
- Retinal tears and detachments
Training will provide numerous opportunities to master
- Intravitreal injections
- Laser retinopex
- Cryopexy
- Pneumatic retinopexy techniques.
Our center continues to be a tertiary referral destination for the tri-state region for complex ocular inflammatory disease.
Fellows will become proficient in the diagnosis and management of a wide range of ocular inflammatory disorders including
- White dots syndromes
- Sarcoidosis
- Infectious uveitis
- Non-infectious uveitis
- Ocular lymphoma
- Paraneoplastic syndromes
The breath and volume of our ocular inflammatory service is truly unique and special amongst training programs in our field. There is certainly the potential to become well versed in steroid sparing therapies in the management of ocular inflammatory disease.
Surgical approaches include:
- Diagnostic vitrectomy
- Retisert implant
- Repair of complex retinal detachment associated with ocular inflammatory conditions
Teaching Opportunities
Our fellows are important members of our vitreoretinal surgery service and serve a critical role as part of our teaching staff for the residents. Trainees work closely with the residents to staff their patients with retina related concerns both in the clinic and in-hospital consults, and we expect our fellows to act as mentors and leaders to the residents to help us train outstanding future ophthalmologists.
Educational Conferences
- Fluorescein Conference: Monthly conference prepared by the fellows where interesting or notable cases are discussed with the retina faculty and residents. This is an interactive case-based discussion led by the fellows.
- Surgical Conference: At least quarterly conference prepared by the fellows. Surgical videos are edited and presented to highlight interesting or complex surgical cases. Retina faculty and fellows discuss critical aspects of cases, alternative techniques, and feedback for the fellows.
- Retina Journal Club: Conference for residents, fellows, and retina faculty. Each faculty member and fellow picks an interesting or relevant article and leads discussion.