Curriculum

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Health care provider sitting at a desk next to patient reviewing a scan on a computer

Trainee experience

The Nurse Practitioner or Physician Assistant Hospice and Palliative Medicine Fellowship prepares you for professional practice in hospice and palliative medicine in an academic or community setting. The fellowship curriculum is comprised of clinical experiences, didactic, and lectures, with opportunities for a research or quality improvement project.

Clinical training and rotations

Rotations include:

Inpatient palliative medicine
Outpatient palliative medicine
Inpatient hospice
Home hospice
Oncology
Cardiology
Hospital internal medicine
Electives

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

Assess and treat complex symptoms in the seriously ill patient
Engage in highly complex conversations, including those on goals of care
Feel comfortable in practicing in an inpatient and outpatient setting
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 the majority of the fellowship, your learning schedule includes 8-10 hour days, 5 days a week. The average workweek is 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 clinical staff of Mayo Clinic and Hospice of the Valley. Faculty members are chosen for their commitment to teaching, as well as their clinical practice. Many have published and lectured extensively and are highly regarded in their fields.

You have direct access to these individuals throughout your training, giving you the opportunity to learn from experienced practitioners from Mayo Clinic across numerous divisions.

Visiting professors and lecturers

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

As a student 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 has two campuses in Arizona. The Phoenix campus includes 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.

Mayo Clinic's campus in Scottsdale, Arizona, 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, a pharmacy, a patient education library, an endoscopy suite, and a 188-seat auditorium for patient, staff, and student education programs. Services in numerous medical and surgical disciplines are provided, including outstanding programs in cancer treatment and organ transplantation.

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.