Program Description

Our three-year Pediatric Neurology residency training program is designed to:

• Foster the resident’s critical thinking.

• Provide the resident with the core knowledge, skills and experience that
  will enable the resident to provide children with neurological problems
  excellence in clinical care.

• Enhance each resident’s skills as a teacher.

• Provide each resident the opportunity to conduct supervised clinical   and/or laboratory research.

• Prepare the resident to sit successfully for examination by the American
  Board of Psychiatry and Neurology for Certification in Neurology (with
  Special Qualification in Child Neurology).

Year One

The first year of training is spent primarily on the adult neurology service and involves caring for patients with both acute and more long-term neurological problems under the direct supervision of staff adult neurologists.

The primary objectives of year one:

• The resident will learn to think about problems as a neurologist, with a
   focus on determining localization of the causative pathology. The
   emphasis is on learning clinical neuroanatomy and making
   functional/structural correlations, utilizing history, examination,
   neuroimaging, clinical neurophysiology, clinical neurometabolism,
   genetic testing and neuropathology.

• The resident will learn how to obtain a comprehensive neurological
   history.

• The resident will learn how to carry out a complete neurological
   examination, including a detailed mental status examination.

• The resident will learn to synthesize clinical data using the history and
   neurological examination, and will then develop a differential diagnosis,
   an investigative plan and an outline of different treatment approaches
   for each case.

• The resident will be exposed to the full spectrum of neurological
   disorders seen in adults.

• The resident will learn to manage acute neurological emergencies.

Year Two

During the second year of training, the resident will care for pediatric neurology patients seen in consultation in the pediatric neurology outpatient clinics at Boston Medical Center.

The primary objectives of year two:

• The resident will learn the sequence of normal development in the
   preterm and full-term newborn, infant, toddler, older child, adolescent
   and young adult.

• The resident will learn to obtain detailed developmental and neurological
   histories and conduct a neurological examination at each stage of
   development. The resident will also learn a variety of techniques to foster
   rapport with the child in order to complete a successful comprehensive
   examination.

• The resident will learn to communicate with and provide appropriate
   supportive care to the entire family unit.

• The resident will be exposed to in-depth teaching directed to the full
   spectrum of neurological disorders seen in children and will be
   encouraged to pursue critical reading about these disorders.

• The resident will learn to manage acute neurological problems in
   children, including those seen in the emergency room and the
   pediatric intensive care units.