Curriculum in the Disaster Medicine Fellowship

The fellow attends monthly meetings as a member of the emergency management committees at Sidney and Lois Eskenazi Hospital and either Riley Hospital for Children at IU Health or IU Health Methodist Hospital.

The official textbook for the Disaster Medicine Fellowship is Koenig and Schultz’s Disaster Medicine. Disaster medicine fellows complete regular reading assignments and discussions each week. Each month, the fellow is required to find, discuss, and critically appraise one current study in disaster medicine during journal club. Other recommended readings include Five Days at Memorial by Sheri Fink, The Great Influenza by John M. Berry, and The Johnstown Flood by David McCullough. Other books, podcasts, and films are assigned and discussed through a disaster medicine lens at bimonthly meetings throughout the year.

During the year-long program, the disaster medicine fellow develops and completes a research project, curriculum development project or other scholarly activity approved by the fellowship directors. Early in the year, the fellow meets with one of the IU School of Medicine Emergency Medicine research faculty, who will assist in developing the academic project. The project should result in a publication or a presentation at a national-level conference.

The traditional disaster medicine fellow works a total of six clinical shifts per month at Eskenazi Hospital and one of the IU Health community emergency departments. The fellow is responsible for direct supervision and clinical teaching of the Emergency Medicine residents and medical students in the department. In addition, the fellow is responsible for ensuring that clinical duties do not interfere with required fellowship responsibilities, and all scheduling is completed through the assigned departmental representative. Additional moonlighting clinical work may be available after discussion with the program director, though must not violate duty hour limits. Non-traditional fellows will coordinate equivalent clinical requirements on a case-by-case basis.