Enfolded fellowships

[guest199523]

How common is it for programs to offer enfolded fellowships? Is there a spreadsheet somewhere where I can see which programs do and do not offer enfolded fellowships?

[Guest]

They’re becoming increasingly common. Unfortunately, the general trend is that as they become more common, they become less respectable, especially compared to a post-graduate fellowship. I say this as a neurosurgeon who has both, and believe me jobs look far more favorably on post-graduate fellowships these days.

[Guest]

(01-30-2022, 06:46 PM)Guest Wrote: They’re becoming increasingly common. Unfortunately, the general trend is that as they become more common, they become less respectable, especially compared to a post-graduate fellowship. I say this as a neurosurgeon who has both, and believe me jobs look far more favorably on post-graduate fellowships these days.

Agree with above. I actually asked about this interviewing for residency and I’d say half of the folks were lukewarm on enfolded fellowships, even the CAST accredited ones. Couple also said that post grad is important if you actually want an academic job because it brings connections.

[Guest]

(01-30-2022, 06:46 PM)Guest Wrote: They’re becoming increasingly common. Unfortunately, the general trend is that as they become more common, they become less respectable, especially compared to a post-graduate fellowship. I say this as a neurosurgeon who has both, and believe me jobs look far more favorably on post-graduate fellowships these days.

Agree with above. I actually asked about this interviewing for residency and I’d say half of the folks were lukewarm on enfolded fellowships, even the CAST accredited ones. Couple also said that post grad is important if you actually want an academic job because it brings connections.

[Guest]

Almost all of the programs i interviewed at a few years ago had some form of enfolded fellowship. The difference now is that they can only be "CAST approved" if they are done after your chief year, so you're looking for programs with PGY-6 chief and PGY-7 fellowship year, which is fewer but still fairly common.

The question you have to ask yourself is what is the purpose of that fellowship. Are you trying to be more marketable for subspecialty jobs when an employer reads your resume, or for your website/advertising to patients? An enfolded fellowship does help that. It can also make you more comfortable with certain procedures, essentially more practice.

Are you trying to learn new techniques and approaches to problems? Enfolded fellowships are worthless for that, you're just getting a more distilled version of the training you already have. Are you trying to get new connections and recommendations? Again, enfolded fairly useless for that.

[Guest]

Agree that enfolded Aren’t worth much these days. Even non-academic, hospital-employed or private practice positions prefer post-graduate fellowships over enfolded when they are trying to build a specific service line (primarily applies to spine)

[Guest]

I think it really depends on where you train and what your enfolded fellowship looks like. The reality is that the job market is so ridiculously good right now that very few places (especially in the community) care, as long as you're BE. There are a few places around the country that allow for external enfolded fellowships. One of the Mayo residents is doing a full CAST year away as a PGY-7, after chief year as a PGY-6. Barrow has dedicated time to go elsewhere for more training/connections, although it's pre-chief year so no CAST.

[Guest]

Absolutely useless. Nobody cares in the community as long as you can do a TLIF. Nobody cares in academia unless it is a full PGY-8 fellowship at a different place than where you did your residency.

Yeah sure there is so-and-so from X program who landed a job at Y program. The phone call from your chair still goes a long way in neurosurgery. But don't fool yourself, there is always a price to pay.

[Guest]

At this point, programs that don’t offer them are actively choosing to put their residents at a disadvantage. Some jobs require “fellowship” without actually needing a fellowship-trained surgeon, and being able to slap that label on to a CV, even if meaningless in the eyes of some major academic programs, helps a lot when getting a job in other places.

[Guest]

Enfolded fellowship just means you did more of the exact same stuff you were doing during residency with the exact same people. The point of a fellowship is to get another perspective or learn something new. By definition enfolded fellowships are pointless.