The NYU Hospital for Joint Diseases' Spine Surgery Fellowship Program provides three orthopaedic fellows with comprehensive experience and training in the diagnosis and treatment of the full spectrum of spine-related problems and disorders. Fellows are exposed to a wide-range of pathologies including degenerative diseases, complex pediatric and adult deformity cases and tumors. Clinical judgment is vital in training a spine surgeon. Fellows play a major role and are given progressive responsibility in the pre-operative, intra-operative, postoperative and rehabilitative management of patients. Our program emphasizes proper patient evaluation, to include physical examination, diagnostic work-up, image application and treatment alternatives, both operative and non-operative. Outpatient experience includes pre-operative and postoperative evaluations in our spine clinics and in the private office setting.
Rotations
Fellows rotate between two institutions, NYU Hospitals Center (Tisch Hospital) and the Hospital for Joint Diseases (HJD) spending eight months at HJD and four months at Tisch Hospital. The HJD block time is broken up into two segments (four months each). The initial four months of the fellowship is focused on training on the basics of spine surgery. As their knowledge and experience grows, fellows perform increasingly more complex aspects of spinal surgery, including but not limited to lumbar discectomy, lumbar transpedicle screw insertion, and anterior cervical discectomy and fusion (including plating procedures). The second half of the fellowship includes more sophisticated understanding of the indications and outcomes of all spine procedures. Fellows' surgical experience will expand to more complex spine procedures including but not limited to revision spine surgery, anterior and posterior spine surgery and complex spinal deformity surgery. Additionally, they are exposed to many new and cutting edge techniques such as cervical and lumbar disc arthroplasty and minimally invasive surgery including percutaneous pedicle screw placement. The inpatient and outpatient facilities at Tisch Hospital and HJD are readily available to support our fellows' educational needs. The operating rooms are state of the art. Fellows receive technical support and supervision from spine faculty and hospital staff in their performance of spine surgery.
Educational Activities
Our spine faculty is dynamic and plays a significant role in maintaining an active scholarly environment. This is accomplished through mentoring, offering of technical support and guidance in educational and research activities. The program's educational activities include an ongoing series of didactic lectures and case presentations delivered by teaching staff, guest faculty, fellows and residents. Our educational program maintains a close collegial relationship with NYU School of Medicine clinical subspecialties, such as Neurosurgery, Rheumatology, Neurology, Radiology, Rehabilitative Medicine, Anesthesiology, Infectious Diseases and Pathology. Fellows have a major teaching and leadership role in the orthopaedic residency program as they are expected to prepare residents for weekly spine conferences as well as teach them both diagnostic and surgical skills.
Research
Clinical research activities are an important part of the program. The fellows are expected to participate in three research projects during the academic year and are given one research day per week to carry out the projects. Opportunities exist for clinical and biomedical research. Basic science and biomedical research is usually performed in conjunction with the Musculoskeletal Research Center, which is a departmental research center. Our program strives to create an environment for the discovery, application and dissemination of fellows' clinical work, as evidenced by peer-reviewed publications, articles, chapters in textbooks, and presentations at professional and society meetings.