Curriculum

James Goldstein, MD, FACC, FSCAI
Director, research and education
Corewell Health William Beaumont University Hospital

I have had the honor of being faculty at this fantastic institution for almost 30 years. One of my goals as director of research and education was to develop a curriculum that was thoughtful, hands-on, and comprehensive. We have recruited our most experienced faculty to provide daily noon lectures to our fellows, encompassing the broad range of topics in the field of cardiology. In addition to our superb Corewell Health faculty, the noon conference series includes regular contributions from local and regional experts in congenital cardiology, lipidology, and cardiac transplant who augment our state-of-the-art lectures. One of the program highlights is a monthly world-class visiting professor who delivers a formal grand rounds lecture, together with two separate one-on-one interactive didactic sessions with the fellows. Personally, I provide interactive didactic sessions on hemodynamics, and weekly physical exam rounds to sharpen bedside diagnostic skills. I hope you enjoy our educational curriculum.

Our CCU has 20 beds and sees a broad variety of pathology including cardiogenic shock, heart failure, pulmonary embolism, myocardial infarction, endocarditis, arrhythmias, and cardiac arrest (all cardiac arrest patients who need targeted temperature management come to the CCU) as well as peri-procedural cases. The team consists of a teaching attending, residents, a pharmacist, and the 1st year cardiology fellow. In addition to a fantastic nursing staff, we also have a portable C-arm for bedside fluoroscopy for placement of Swan-Ganz catheters and transvenous pacemakers. The CCU fellow is also responsible for responding to any STEMIs or emergent MI consults from the emergency room. Fellows find the three months in the CCU challenging and rewarding with high procedural volume and great educational opportunities.

The consult rotation is a high-volume service with daily rounding by our academic faculty. The team consists of residents, medical students, and the cardiology fellow. The fellow leads the team and is responsible for organizing rounds and initial decision making. Each fellow rotates on this service once per year.

Our renowned catheterization lab at Corewell Health William Beaumont University Hospital is a special rotation for fellows at every training level. We have 6 catheterization labs including one hybrid catheterization lab/OR. Not only is there substantial volume (fellows can expect over 50-60 procedures each month), but our fellows get in-depth, one-on-one instruction by our experienced teaching faculty operators. That is to say, we never have two general cardiology fellows in the same lab, even in the first year. By the end of the first year, fellows are competent in obtaining femoral and radial access and performing diagnostic angiograms comfortably. The lab annually ranks in the top 10 nationally among PCI volume and was the site of many “Firsts” including the first TAVR done in North America.

The echo lab at Corewell Health performs over 30,000 echocardiograms annually and is a fantastic learning opportunity for both performing and reading transthoracic and transesophageal echocardiograms. Each afternoon, our fellows read with dedicated teaching faculty who provide detailed training in interpretation.

We regard the ability to read EKGs highly and have dedicated 3 months to our heart station rotation during which fellows read over 1,000 EKGs monthly with comprehensive feedback. After the first month, the rotation is paired with either nuclear cardiology or cardiac rehabilitation.