Medical Toxicology Fellowship Program
The ultimate goal of training at UMass Chan Medical School is to prepare graduates for leadership roles in academic medicine and medical toxicology.
The clinical experience offered by UMass Chan's training program is unmatched. Located in Worcester, the second largest city in New England, UMass Memorial Medical Center is the sole referral facility in Central Massachusetts; poisoned patients are drawn from northern Connecticut, Rhode Island, New Hampshire, and southern Vermont. Consequently, fellows receive an excellent education in all aspects of medical toxicology, including industrial, occupational, and agricultural exposures, adverse drug reactions and drug interactions, toxicity of veterinary drugs in humans, substance abuse, as well as toxicity from therapeutic agents.
The operations of the Medical Toxicology Service are supported by the hospital's excellent laboratory system, which offers standard as well as customized toxicologic analyses with rapid turnaround times.
Because division members serve as faculty for highly regarded educational programs such as the Harvard Macy Institute, fellows receive the latest educational and training experiences. These efforts are reflected in the outstanding relationships with other academic departments at UMass Chan Medical School such as Addiction Medicine, Quantitative Health Sciences, and Psychiatry. In addition, the Division of Medical Toxicology faculty are involved in Clinical and Translational Science Awards programs through both UMass Chan and Harvard Medical School. Through these collaborative relationships toxicology fellows to gain an unparalleled breadth of exposure to relevant academic disciplines and innovative teaching methods.
With a track record of NIH funding in human subjects and basic science investigations dating to 1989, UMass Chan's Division of Medical Toxicology offers unequaled mentoring to fellows seeking academic excellence. Interested fellows will learn an interdisciplinary approach to team science in the development of a research plan addressing questions of public health importance.
Program faculty serve on NIH, CDC, and FDA grant review committees, federal expert advisory committees related to drug abuse, chemical terrorism, adverse drug event surveillance, overdose prevention, and infectious disease, as well expert panels convened by major research corporations. Fellows benefit from this extensive experience by learning the public health relevance of a wide variety of medical and toxicologic issues. In addition, UMass Chan aculty collaborates in important international investigations related to environmental health.
Finally, UMass Chan toxicology faculty are adept at forging collaborations with successful academicians whose research involves HIV, drug abuse ethnography and epidemiology, computer science, and pharmaceutics.
Our comprehensive fellowship training consists of instructional, clinical, and research components. After completing their toxicology fellowships with us, our alumni have gone on to become leaders in both medicine and academia.
The Division of Toxicology, housed within the University of Massachusetts Department of Emergency Medicine, consists of a team of nine physician scientists and up to six toxicology fellows. Applications are accepted from June to September, and fellows are selected through the NRMP match. After completing their toxicology fellowships with us, our alumni have gone on to become leaders in both medicine and academia.
The University of Massachusetts is home to the sole toxicology referral center serving Central Massachusetts, and we receive poisoned patients from Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New Hampshire, New York, and Vermont. High-volume inpatient consultation service provides bedside care to children and adults in the emergency, critical care, inpatient, and outpatient settings. Meanwhile, our outpatient clinic treats patients with environmental, occupational, agricultural, and recreational drug exposures.
Instructional Component:
- Comprehensive mentorship in clinical toxicology, education, original research, medical writing
- Two didactic sessions per week
Clinical Care:
- Daily rounding with attending toxicologists on admitted patients
- Clinical emergency medicine shifts
- Consultation call for UMass Memorial Medical Center
- Massachusetts-Rhode Island poison center call
- Toxicology Clinic at UMass Memorial Medical Center
Clinical Scholarship:
- Medication safety
- Peer review
- Drafting of clinical policies
- Delivering didactics to residents and students
- Developing educational material for patients and lay community
Research:
- Fundamental research and academic writing skills
- Developing research questions
- Conducting literature reviews
- CITI and GCP training
- IRB application drafting
- Case report publication
- Chart review techniques
- Writing book chapters
- Advanced research skills
- Scientific peer review
- Original research abstract presentation
- Original research platforms and keynotes presentations
- Original research publication
- Managing collaborations
- Dissemination of research findings via social media
- Identifying extramural funding sources (foundations, NIH)
- Grant writing
Academic Conferences:
- New England Regional Toxicology Conferences
- Funding for two annual national toxicology meetings: NACCT, ACMT
Professional Development Opportunities:
After completing fellowships with us, our alumni have gone on to become leaders in toxicology in both medicine and academia. Contact Stephen Bird, MD for more information.
