Abstract
Background
Advanced clinical fellowships are important for training surgeons with a niche expertise.
Whether this additional training impacts future academic achievement, however, remains
unknown. Here, we investigated the impact of advanced fellowship training on research
productivity and career advancement among active, academic cardiac surgeons. We hypothesized
that advanced fellowships do not significantly boost future academic achievement.
Methods
Using online sources (eg, department webpages, CTSNet, Scopus, Grantome), we studied
adult cardiac surgeons who are current faculty at accredited United States cardiothoracic
surgery training programs, and who have practiced only at United States academic centers
since 1986 (n = 227). Publicly available data regarding career advancement, research productivity,
and grant funding were collected. Data are expressed as counts or medians.
Results
In our study, 78 (34.4%) surgeons completed an advanced clinical fellowship, and 149
(65.6%) did not. Surgeons who pursued an advanced fellowship spent more time focused
on surgical training (P < .0001), and those who did not were more likely to have completed a dedicated research
fellowship (P = .0482). Both groups exhibited similar cumulative total publications (P = .6862), H-index (P = .6232), frequency of National Institutes of Health grant funding (P = .8708), and time to achieve full professor rank (P = .7099). After stratification by current academic rank, or by whether surgeons pursued
a dedicated research fellowship, completion of an advanced clinical fellowship was
not associated with increased research productivity or accelerated career advancement.
Conclusion
Academic adult cardiac surgeons who pursue advanced clinical fellowships exhibit similar
research productivity and similar career advancement as those who do not pursue additional
clinical training.
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Article info
Publication history
Published online: July 31, 2020
Accepted:
June 15,
2020
Identification
Copyright
© 2020 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
