Clinical Experience & Teaching
All of the clinical experience occurs at Primary Children's Hospital. Fellows at Primary Children's Hospital and the University of Utah Health are exposed to a patient population from a large geographical area. Fellows work with all pediatric subspecialties at the only level 1 children's hospital in the Mountain West. In addition, our fellows have the opportunity to collaborate with providers in a variety of practice settings in this state and nearby states.
Typical Work Week
- Case conference covering all patients by all doctors including radiology and SW
- Children's Justice Center Multidisciplinary Team Staffing with CPS, law enforcement, attorney general, guardian ad litem, prosecutor and medical team.
- Didactic or Journal club
- Grand Rounds
- Fellow School (Nov-May)
- Department M&M
Typical Work Month
- Utah State Fatality Review Team
- 1-2 weeks per month
- Consult Service - Includes all inpatient consults, ED day consults, burn unit consults, and acute sexual abuse exams outside of scheduled clinic hours.
- 2-3 weeks per month
- Research
- Elective
- Potpourri Week
All call is home call with the potential you will need to return to the hospital. Call frequency is one night a week, one weekend a month, and two holidays a year.
Care Team
The Division of Safe and Healthy families has a varied, welcoming faculty. We have three Board Certified Child Abuse Pediatricians who have an array of interests including:
- Research
- Administration
- Advocacy
- Education
Topics of interest to our providers include: cognitive errors and implicit biases, screening and care for human trafficking victims, identification and treatment of pediatric traumatic stress, psychotropic drug oversight for children in foster care, developing collaborative interdisciplinary responses to children involved in the child welfare system, ethical issues and child maltreatment, implementing trauma informed processes and much more.
In addition, we have a full panel of therapists including psychologists, psychiatrists, licensed clinical social workers and the ability to provide evidence based therapies including Parent Child Interaction Therapy (PCIT), Dialectical Behavioral Therapy (DBT), and Trauma Focused-Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (TF-CBT).
There are Children’s Justice Centers (Utah’s Child Advocacy Centers) throughout the state in rural, urban, and frontier settings to provide sexual abuse evaluations as close to the patient as possible. We also have an accredited burn unit across the bridge at the University of Utah Hospital.
Our fellows collaborate with the medical examiner for the state of Utah with all pediatric cases handled in Salt Lake City. Moreover, they have the opportunity for unique clinical rotations including pediatric ophthalmology, toxicology, foster care, advocacy/prevention, ICAC, osteogenesis imperfecta/bone clinic at the Shriner’s Hospital, burn clinic, radiology, and foster care clinic.
Continuity Clinic
Clinic half a day to two half days a week first year, increasing over next two years. Clinic consists of sex abuse/acute outpatient physical abuse clinic plus additional clinic opportunities depending on interest (foster clinic, community CJC clinic, human trafficking).
Potpourri Week
This is a week regularly scheduled throughout the training that is meant to allow for longitudinal experiences as opposed to fixed electives. For example, a month of radiology is not as beneficial as a longitudinal experience wherein radiology pulls interesting recent cases of neuro or other imaging that may have findings related to abuse, trauma, pathology that can be confused for trauma, congenital anomalies that can be confusing, etc. Ophthalmology during potpourri week allows for time in the OR to become proficient at sedated eye exams and describing eye findings as opposed to whatever happens to come in during a fixed rotation time. Also during potpourri week, any scheduled forensic interviews or court cases can be observed, burn clinic to see patients longitudinally, ME to attend call outs on pediatric cases.
Elective
Fellows have the opportunity to choose elective time on non-clinical weeks. These can be tailored to the fellow's area of interest.
Research
Fellows have the opportunity to develop skills for “scholarly output” that match future career plans including the following:
- Quality Improvement
- Ethics
- Qualitative Research
- Survey Research
- Data Systems Management
- Graduate Medical Education
Didactics
Lecture Series and Journal Club: We are the hub for a Western Consortium on Child Abuse that includes regular participation by child abuse teams from Seattle Children's, Colorado Children's, New Mexico, Alaska, Wyoming, Idaho, Arizona. Topics are presented by fellows, attendings, internationally recognized experts on a wide range of topics. Presentations are collaborative and involve discussion of variations in practice and sharing of resources. Topics have included genetics, gender identity issues, ethics, toxicology, family violence/teen dating violence, refugee issues, trauma informed care, neuroradiology, biomechanical engineering, legal issues, surgical issues, and the spectrum of child abuse topics.
Teaching
Fellows have the opportunity to develop a working portfolio of educational and/or research talks for a wide variety of audiences. Speaking opportunities increase over the three years and include but are not limited to, noon conferences for residents in pediatrics, emergency medicine, family practice, in-services for nurses and social workers, talks to philanthropic groups, and trainings for law enforcement and child protective services. Fellows may also have the opportunity to participate in undergraduate curriculum development, post-graduate education for medical professionals, child protective services and law enforcement professionals as well as simulation training experiences for medical and non-medical professionals. Informal teaching to medical students, residents and fellows that rotate with Safe and Healthy Families occurs regularly. Educational development opportunities exist for those who express a specific interest in this professional development.
For more information about Child Abuse Pediatrics, visit these websites:
Subspecialty Journals about Child Abuse Pediatrics: