Rotations & Curricula
VA Internship
ASA Interview with Drs. Mark Norris & Christopher Conley
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The Categorical Anesthesiology Program is a surgery-based clinical base year that is co-administered with the Department of Surgery at the Boston VA Healthcare System (BVAHS). The BVAHS provides tertiary surgical care at two campuses, one in West Roxbury and one in Jamaica Plain. This curriculum fulfills the American Board of Anesthesiology’s requirements and consists of the following rotations
• Anesthesiology
• Acute pain and regional anesthesia
• Cardiology (mornings focus on normal and abnormal ECG interpretation, then echocardiograms in the afternoons)
• Critical care medicine (2 rotations: on in ICU at the VA, and another in the Boston Medical Center SICU)
• Emergency medicine
• Otorhinolaryngology (with a focus on performing awake nasal fiber-optic examinations)
• The remaining time will be spent covering the general surgery wards, providing inpatient care to vascular, thoracic, and general surgery patients.
Four weeks of vacation will be provided during the year.
PGY-2/CA-1 Year
CA-1’s spend July and August on orientation, assigned 1:1 with either a senior resident or an attending anesthesiologist each day. The days are split between intraoperative care, introductory didactic sessions, and skill sessions in our new, high fidelity simulation center. After two months of orientation, CA-1 residents spend nine months rotating on anesthesia for general surgery, orthopedic surgery, ambulatory procedures, obstetric anesthesia, neuroanesthesia and a month in the surgical intensive care unit.
PGY-3/CA-2 Year
CA-2 residents rotate through the advanced cardiac, thoracic, and vascular rotations. Additionally, they spend one month as the consult anesthesiologist in our resident-run PATC. CA-2’s perform a one month introduction to pediatric anesthesia at Boston Medical Center, followed by two months of advanced pediatric anesthesia at Boston Children’s Hospital. CA-2 residents have the opportunity to tailor their rotation schedule to frontload subspecialties that they are considering for fellowship, so their applications and recommendation letters are ready well in advance of the NRMP fellowship match.
PGY-4/CA-3 Year
Senior residents in their CA-3 year revisit the ORs with a broader skillset and knowledge base, adeptly navigating senior rotations in thoracic, pediatric, vascular, and neuroanesthesia. Additionally our CA-3’s mentor the junior residents both in orientation to the general surgery service as well as on their senior obstetric anesthesia rotations. They cover the code pager and emergent airway service while on the PACU rotation, and learn to prescribe both opiate-based and opiate-sparing therapies for pain-reducing interventions on their acute pain rotation. Our excellent faculty encourage our CA-3’s to demonstrate a greater degree of autonomy, simulating life after residency. Upon graduation our trainees match into some of the most competitive fellowships and practices throughout the US.