Trainee experience

Clinical training and rotations

Rotations include:

• Inpatient palliative medicine consult service 
• Outpatient palliative medicine clinic
• Inpatient End-of-Life Care (e.g., Inpatient Hospice Unit or Hospitalized Comfort Care Patients)
• Home-Based End-of-Life Care (e.g., Home Hospice Care)
• Medical Oncology
• Cardiology
• Hospital internal medicine
• Elective rotations (pending availability)

By the end of the year, you will be able to:

• Assess and treat complex pain and symptom management in the seriously ill patient
• Master advanced communication skills and techniques in caring for the seriously ill patient
• Provide high-quality and efficient patient care in both inpatient and clinic/ambulatory settings
• Participate effectively in a multidisciplinary team

Mayo Clinic School of Health Sciences is committed to developing and maintaining the best education programs. The curriculum and other aspects of this program are routinely assessed and changed as necessary to ensure the highest quality training.

Schedule and hours

For most of the fellowship, your learning experience will include approximately 8-10 hour days, 5 days per week. The average workweek being 40 to 50 hours.

Department and faculty

The Nurse Practitioner or Physician Assistant Hospice and Palliative Medicine Fellowship is coordinated and taught by the multidisciplinary team of both Mayo Clinic Arizona and Hospice of the Valley.  Our faculty and staff strive to be leaders in clinical practice, research, and education, with many having been published, working on research, and expanding lecturing and professorship initiatives in the field of hospice and palliative medicine.

Visiting professors and lecturers

A hallmark of higher education excellence is the breadth and depth of information and experience provided to you by faculty, staff and visiting experts. Many prominent educators visit Mayo Clinic each year to lecture in their areas of medical and scientific expertise.

As a Fellow at Mayo Clinic School of Health Sciences, you are encouraged to learn from these valuable resources by attending all relevant conferences, lectures and seminars prepared for students, interns, residents, fellows, and consulting staff.

Facilities

Mayo Clinic's Arizona campus has two main locations. Mayo Clinic’s location in Phoenix is home to the state-of-the-art Mayo Clinic Hospital, the first hospital entirely designed and built by Mayo Clinic. It has been recognized several times by Phoenix magazine as the "Best Hospital in Phoenix." Services in numerous medical and surgical disciplines are provided, including outstanding programs in cancer treatment and organ transplantation.

Mayo Clinic’s location in Scottsdale is centered around a beautiful, five-story outpatient clinic. This modern facility contains extensive exam rooms, an outpatient surgery center equipped for general anesthesia, a full-service laboratory, pharmacy, patient education library, endoscopy suite, and a 188-seat auditorium for patient, staff, and student education programs.

Evaluation

Mayo Clinic School of Health Sciences uses these evaluative tools:

• Written examination
• Demonstration of skills
• Self-assessment exercises
• Faculty reviews

Mayo Clinic's system of evaluation provides students and faculty with a comprehensive look at individual performance. This allows faculty and administrative staff to direct students who are experiencing academic difficulty to the appropriate support resources, including tutoring programs and counseling opportunities.

Graduation and certification

After successfully completing this fellowship, you will receive a certificate of completion from Mayo Clinic School of Health Sciences.

Upon graduation, our fellows are anticipated to be prepared and eligible to sit for specialty certification in hospice and palliative medicine. For nurse practitioner certification-specific information, please reference the Hospice and Palliative Nursing Association’s Advanced Certified Hospice and Palliative Nurse For physician assistant certification-specific information, please reference the National Commission on Certification of Physician Assistant’s Certification of Added Qualification for Palliative Medicine and Hospice Care.