CAST-approved fellowships are available in the areas of endovascular, functional, peripheral nerve, and spine. Please contact the appropriate Fellowship Director for further information.
Endovascular: Jan-Karl Burkhardt, MD
Functional: Casey H. Halpern, MD
Peripheral Nerve: Eric L. Zager, MD
Spine: Ali K. Ozturk, MD & Jon J.W. Yoon, MD, MSc
Complex Spine Fellowship
As a fellow within the Complex Spine Fellowship, you will be exposed to a great variety of cases within the field of spine surgery. You will have an opportunity to learn complex minimally invasive surgical techniques such as endoscopic spine surgery, advanced lateral techniques (anterior-to-psoas, lateral ALIF), MIS deformity/fusions, spine robotics and others. In addition to a plethora of MIS procedures, you will have the chance to immerse yourself in other principles of spine surgery such as deformity, oncology, trauma, degenerative spine disease and others.
There are numerous opportunities in clinical, translational, and basic science research in spine surgery as well. During your fellowship year, we want you to develop as a clinician-scientist and a thought-leader on the national and international stage. Under the guidance of Dr. Yoon and Dr. Ozturk, you will be pushed to become a future leader in spine surgery.
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Neurointerventional Endovascular Fellowship
The neurointerventional endovascular fellowship at Penn is an interdisciplinary fellowship including faculty from neurosurgery, neuroradiology and neurology and is SNS/CAST approved. The 2-year program offers comprehensive training in cerebrovascular disease of the brain, neck and spine using both radial and femoral access techniques. We use state of the art biplane angiography machines in 3 hospitals including 3 hybrid biplane icono Siemens OR rooms in our new hospital (the pavilion). Besides diagnostic cerebral and spinal catheter angiograms our fellows will learn techniques of balloon occlusion test, inferior petrosal sinus sampling, WADA testing and all available techniques for endovascular embolization.
We treat over 2000 endovascular procedures yearly at Penn and this represents one of the largest cerebrovascular volume in the nation, which will allow our fellows to be best prepared for their faculty position after completion of the fellowship. Working alongside Dr. Burkhardt and Dr. Pukenas, you will have the opportunity to gain more first hand experience than most fellows could ever imagine.
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Peripheral Nerve Fellowship
There are only 9 CAST-approved Peripheral Nerve Fellowships in the country and Penn Medicine is a leader among the group. Peripheral nerve surgery (PNS) deals with the evaluation and treatment of patients with traumatic nerve injuries, entrapment neuropathies (e.g., CTS, cubital tunnel syndrome, etc.) and mass lesions associated with peripheral nerves (e.g., tumors and cysts). PNS also includes distinguishing surgically treatable peripheral nerve problems from primary peripheral neuropathies and those secondary to systemic diseases such as diabetes.
During your time within the fellowship, you'll be reporting to Dr. Ali and Dr. Zager who are two trailblazers of this subspecialty of neurosurgery. Working out of the only comprehensive nerve center in the region, you'll have the opportunity to work on conditions ranging from common to the most complex. For example, you'll be exposed to Dorsal Root Entry Zone Procedures, Gracilis Free Functional Muscle Transfers, Neuroma Resections, Nerve Grafts, and much more.
Stereotactic and Functional Neurosurgery Fellowship
Penn Medicine offers a CAST-accredited Stereotactic and Functional Neurosurgery Fellowship, directed by Dr. Casey Halpern, which is a year-long mentorship opportunity for clinical instructors who have completed their residency training in neurosurgery. This fellowship will provide opportunities across all domains of this subspecialty, and offers flexibility for the fellow to design their curriculum with input from Dr. Halpern, should specific interests exist in one particular area of our division.
At Penn, over 120 deep brain stimulation and 100 transcranial focused ultrasound procedures are performed annually, and this high volume program is well-complemented by a robust epilepsy surgery and pain practice that the fellow can also experience. There will be three neurosurgical faculty mentoring this fellow, Drs. Halpern, Chen, and Cajigas, all of whom are also involved in federally funded research programs including novel trials that further improve the breadth of experience to be had. In addition to this busy clinical training program, the fellow will be expected to be involved and even lead research endeavors that match their interest with 1 protected day for research per week at least. The aim of this mentoring opportunity is to train our subspecialty’s future leaders, and being at Penn on the same campus as the University makes this very possible.
Pediatric Neurosurgery Fellowships
Through our affiliation with the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP), our Neurosurgery Department offers world-class Pediatric Fellowships under the guidance of program director Gregory Heuer, MD, PhD. You will routinely be exposed to some of the most complex cases in pediatric neurosurgery as CHOP is one of the busiest centers of its kind in the nation completing over 1,400 surgeries a year.
This year long Fellowship will have a curriculum that will be able to be tailored to your interests with time for research also built in. For more information on pediatric neurosurgery fellowship positions, you can contact either Chief of Pediatric Neurosurgery, Phillip “Jay” Storm, MD or Gregory Heuer, MD, PhD directly.
Guggenheim Family Neurosurgery Scholarship
The Guggenheims established the Guggenheim Family Neurosurgery Scholarship with the residual estate of their late son, Jean-Pierre, to provide funding for medical students who are interested in pursuing Neurosurgery training through an annual summer research program. The Guggenheim Research Fellowship will be able to support a total of four Penn 1st or 2nd year medical students annually during Summer Session. Students interested in applying should send their resume, brief research proposal description and letter of support from their Neurosurgery faculty research mentor to Susan Small, Residency Program Coordinator. Each selected candidate will have a $2,500 award for 8 weeks of summer research. For more information and to apply, email susan.small@pennmedicine.upenn.edu. Please note, students receiving concurrent funding are not eligible for the Guggenheim Fellowship.
Penn Reviewed
Application Deadline: March 31st
Decision Letters: April 15th