Program Overview
Overview of the Surgical Critical Care Fellowship Program
Loyola Medicine's flagship hospital, Loyola University Medical Center, is a quaternary care facility with 547 licensed beds, a Level I Trauma Center, nationally recognized Burn Center and renowned Transplant Center.
Loyola University Medical Center provides top hospital care in all medical and surgical specialties including orthopaedics, nephrology, cardiology, oncology, ophthalmology and surgery. Loyola University Medical Center is also rated as having one of the highest patient acuity level in Illinois.
Loyola University Medical Center is located in the Chicago suburb of Maywood, IL.
Surgical Intensive Care Unit
The surgical intenstive care unit (SICU) is a 24-bed ICU which runs at 97% occupancy. The division provides comprehensive services in state-of-the-art resuscitation and intensive care units for patients of all ages with acute surgical illness or injury.
Patients in the surgical intensive care unit are managed by members of the division of trauma, surgical critical care and burns in collaboration with their primary surgeons.
A multidisciplinary team dedicated solely to the care of the critically ill and injured is led by attendings board certified in surgical critical care and the fellow.
Assisting them are surgical residents, advanced practice providers, clinical pharmacists, nutritionists and a social workers. All have expertise in caring for these complex, critically ill patients.
Level 1 Trauma Center
Loyola University Medical Center is the only American College of Surgeons-verified Level 1 trauma center in the State of Illinois. Loyola serves as a tertiary and quaternary referral center for trauma patients with complex injuries.
Loyola’s trauma service accepts all patients in need of high-level trauma care. Annually approximately 1,500 patients are seen and admitted by the trauma team.
ABA Certified Burn Center
Loyola’s American College of Surgeons and American Burn Association-verified Burn Center is nationally renowned for its comprehensive approach to burn care. Since the inception of the Burn Center decades ago, Loyola has been a regional referral center and leader in burn care and research.
Housed in a dedicated 10-bed Burn ICU, patients with burn injuries and soft tissue infections are treated by faculty, nurses, pharmacists, and dieticians all dedicated specifically to burn care.
Intra-abdominal Solid Organ Transplant Center
Loyola is one of only three centers in Illinois that perform transplantation of five major solid organs: heart, lung, kidney, liver and pancreas. We began our solid organ transplant program in 1971 with our first kidney transplant.
Loyola established Chicago's first heart transplant program in 1984, Chicago's first lung transplant program in 1988 and our liver transplant program in 1997.
The surgical ICU team works closely with the transplant service in the postoperative management of kidney, liver and pancreas transplants, including multi-organ transplants.
Burn and Shock Trauma Research Institute
The Burn and Shock Trauma Research Institute (BSTRI) of Loyola University Chicago is a unique community of scientists and clinicians devoted to the study of traumatic injury. As a multidisciplinary research institute, our programs include both clinical and laboratory research relevant to trauma injury and burns.
In our laboratories, our scientists investigate the body's reaction to injury and infection, with the hope that their research findings may someday lead to innovative therapies for trauma and burn patients.
In the hospital, institute members and clinicians work together on numerous clinical studies and clinical trials. To ensure the future of our research, the Institute also maintains a strong commitment to the research training of pre-doctoral, post-doctoral and clinical trainees.
Overall, the goal of our integrated programs is to reduce the devastating effects of traumatic injury.
Surgical Critical Care Fellowship Curriculum
The fellowship is structured in compliance with the ACGME requirements to optimize the experience of our fellows.
Surgical Intensive Care Unit at Loyola University Medical Center
- Fellows spend nine months in this core unit caring for a diverse patient population with high acuity surgical and critical care issues.
- Average patient census varies from 10 to 25 patients.
- Fellows will work on average of 60-80 hours per week, with a minimum of four days off per month with a small number of night, weekend and on-call responsibilities.
- Clinical responsibilities include management of ICU patients, leading trauma activations, completing bedside procedures including tracheostomies, PEGs, and bronchoscopies and operating on ICU patients.
Fellowship Electives
Fellows will spend three months on rotations outside of the surgical ICU. They can select rotations based on their clinical and career interests.
Elective Rotations
- Anesthesia
- Burns
- Trauma
- Cardiovascular ICU/ ECMO
- Ultrasound / Echocardiogram
- Medical ICU
- Pediatrics ICU
- Hines VA ICU
- Prehospital/ EMS
Research
- Fellows are afforded the opportunity to collaborate with team members and work on projects in areas of interest. They are encouraged to critically analyze and collect data on relevant research questions, leading to abstract submissions and publications.
- Clinical outcomes
- Quality improvement project
- Basic science
Education
Fellows will have the opportunity to participate and become instructors in the following courses:
- ATLS
- ASSET
- ATOM
SCORE Surgical Critical Care Curriculum
We encourage participation in local, regional, and national Surgical Critical Care and Trauma organizations. There are dedicated funds to allow the fellow to attend a national meeting.
Conferences
Multidisciplinary Bedside Rounds
Daily teaching rounds with the attending, fellow, residents, medical students, pharmacists, and nursing staff
Radiology Rounds
Daily table rounds with the Acute Care Surgery team to review trauma admissions, ICU imaging and discuss complex cases.
Trauma Performance Improvement
Monthly meeting reviewing the management of critically injured patients with a focus on quality of care provided and performance improvement from prehospital care to discharge.
SICU Quality Meeting
Monthly Multidisciplinary meeting looking at ICU patient safety and quality improvement metrics.
Critical Care Journal Club
Bi-monthly discussion centered on recent critical care articles. Collaborative journal club involving Pulmonary Critical Care & Neurocritical Care faculty and fellows.
Core Critical Care Lecture Series
Monthly conference led by attending staff with expertise in Cardiology, Nephrology, Neurosurgery, Infectious Diseases and other relevant specialties.
SICU M&M
Monthly conference reviewing ICU morbidities and mortalities.
ICU Resident Education
Weekly conference led by the attending on service and the fellow covering key topics of critical care – ventilator management, shock, sepsis, nutrition and renal failure.
Department of Surgery Grand Rounds
Weekly conference dedicated towards the diverse educational needs of the department of surgery.
Recent presentations have focused on wellness & surgical burnout, imposter syndrome, venous disease, implicit bias, management of esophageal cancer, geriatric burn care, and race & residency.
Department of Surgery M&M
Weekly conference reviewing surgical morbidities and mortalities.
Surgical Critical Care Fellowship Benefits
Benefits
For a list of your benefit options, please refer to the Trinity Health benefits page.
You will have 30 days from your hire date to elect benefits. Please note that you are responsible for making your benefits election in Workday in order to ensure coverage during your training period at Loyola.
All trainees are entitled to the benefits outlined in the benefits addendum which is part of the GME Agreement.
You may add, change or drop coverage ONLY during the annual open enrollment period, which is held once a year in the fall unless you have a loss of coverage or a change in family status. Changes in family status include marriage, divorce, birth, adoption or death. A change in coverage status due to loss of coverage or a change in family status must be made within 30 days of the event through the Human Resources office.
Retirement
Loyola employees are automatically enrolled in a retirement plan. If you would like to opt-out of this 2% payroll deduction, you must contact Transamerica Retirement Consulting within 30 days of your start date.
Short and Long-Term Disability
Disability insurance is offered by The Hartford Group. See information about continuing your group life and accidental death & dismemberment insurance after you complete training.
2020-2021 Salary Levels
PGY-1: $59,862
PGY-2: $63,731
PGY-3: $65,728
PGY-4: $69,062
PGY-5: $72,280
PGY-6: $75,202
PGY-7: $77,896