Critical Care Fellowship

What Makes Our Program Unique?

Anesthesia Critical Care board pathway: The two-year fellowship is sponsored by the Department of Anesthesiology. Graduates of the program are eligible to sit for the Anesthesia Critical Care board exam. The curriculum is based off the typical ACGME Anesthesia CCM program. These core requirements are spread across the two-year period and interspersed with dedicated ultrasound months, electives, and emergency medicine months. This approach allows a wide variety of learning opportunities while helping to maintain core emergency medicine skills and an appropriate work-life balance throughout a demanding fellowship.

Integrated & concurrent clinical ultrasound fellowship: Point-of-care ultrasound (POCUS) has become an invaluable tool for both emergency medicine physicians and intensivists alike. In order to fully prepare our fellows in the field of POCUS, our program features a complete second fellowship in clinical ultrasound, performed concurrently with critical care training and spread across the two year period. In addition to the critical care boards, our graduates will also be eligible to take the clinical ultrasound board exam.

Comprehensive training in all areas of Critical Care & Burn Care: Augusta University Medical Center is the region’s only Level I Trauma Center, Comprehensive Cardiac Center, and Comprehensive Stroke Center. We feature dedicated medical, surgical, trauma, neurosurgical, cardiac, and cardiothoracic surgery ICUs, in addition to pediatric and neonatal ICUs. Our fellows also rotate through the largest burn center in the United States, which is located here in Augusta. Our fellowship offers an extensive range of opportunities, but still provides enough flexibility for fellows to focus on their areas of interest.

Emergency Critical Care Center (ED-ICU): The Emergency Department at Augusta University is home to one of the few dedicated ED-ICUs in the country. With seven beds currently and plans to expand to 15 beds total, it will also be one of the largest. This unit specializes in providing advanced resuscitation in the ED and ensuring that high quality critical care is consistently provided to patients from the very beginning of their hospitalization. A dedicated ED-ICU offers multiple training advantages to emergency medicine critical care fellows.

Following completion of the program, the fellows qualify for the American Board of Anesthesiology examination certifying: Added Fellow Qualifications in Anesthesiology Critical Care.

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Core Curriculum

Fellows are expected to attend and actively participate in all anesthesiology department conferences. They present complex cases at M&M conferences and are prepared to contribute to the discussion of cases presented by faculty.

Anesthesiology Critical Care (ACC) fellows are responsible for medical student and junior resident education through daily bedside rounds and direct supervision of care and will also participate as instructors in FCCS workshops.

A publishable research project and/or a grand rounds presentation is expected prior to graduation. Each fellow serves as a member of the Medical Center ICU committee during their fellowship and participates in Quality Improvement projects.

ACC training is provided at the Augusta University Medical Center, the region's only Level I Trauma Center. As a fellow, you will participate in simulation training at the Interdisciplinary Simulation Center on a regular basis. Fellows also rotate in the Joseph M. Still Burn Center, the designated Southeast Regional Burn Center and a part of the Georgia Trauma Care Network.

Didactics, Rotations & Electives

Didactics

Daily morning and afternoon bedside rounds
Multidisciplinary Fellows' didactic conference
Critical care teaching conferences
Departmental and multidisciplinary grand rounds
Morbidity and mortality conferences
Critical care ultrasound workshops
Fundamental Critical Care Support workshops

Rotations

Fellows rotate in several of the ICUs at the Augusta University Medical Center and at Doctor’s Hospital. Specific orientation to each unit will take place during the first few days of the rotation. The individual units and specialty include:

Surgical/Cardiothoracic ICU	12 beds	≈ 7 months
Trauma ICU	12 beds	≈ 1 month
Neuroscience ICU	10 beds	≈ 1 month
MICU	10 beds	≈ 1 month
Joseph M. Still Burn Center at Doctor’s Hospital		≈ 1 month
CT Anesthesia/Echocardiography (elective)		≈ 1 month

Electives

Fellows are evaluated by faculty on a monthly basis with regular written and direct feedback. They also have a bi-annual simulation scenario with multidisciplinary evaluation as a part of the required Milestone evaluations. Fellows meet regularly with the program director to go over their portfolio.

We strictly follow ACGME guidelines to not exceed an 80-hour work week.

Evaluation & Contact

Fellows are evaluated by faculty on a monthly basis with regular written and direct feedback. They also have a bi-annual simulation scenario with multidisciplinary evaluation as a part of the required Milestone evaluations. Fellows meet regularly with the program director to go over their portfolio.

We strictly follow ACGME guidelines to not exceed an 80-hour work week.

Vikas Kumar, MBBS, CHSE

Program Director

Margaret Eakins

Program Coordinator

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