Curriculum

Our Child Neurology Residency is a five-year program offering two years of pediatrics training and three years of child neurology training. The curriculum meets the requirements established by the American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology (ABPN) and the American Board of Pediatrics (ABP).

Rotations

During the child neurology training, residents complete two years of child neurology rotations and one year of adult neurology rotations. Download our sample rotation schedule and learn more below.

Child Neurology Rotations

Residents will spend one year in required rotations, and one year focusing on subspecialties and research. Our rotations include:

• Inpatient Child Neurology Rotations: These rotations occur throughout the three-year training program. Cincinnati Children’s has a dedicated neuroscience inpatient floor with a nursing staff that specializes in managing neurological and neurosurgical problems. The child neurology resident supervises the pediatric resident inpatient team and is exposed to a variety of experiences related to general neurology, epilepsy and headache.
• Consult Rotations: Consult rotations occur throughout the three-year training program. Consults occur throughout the hospital on general and specialty medical, surgical and intensive care units. This provides residents with opportunities to gain broad clinical experience. The resident conducts rounds on active consults and presents new consults to an attending child neurologist. The consult resident also takes part in educating and mentoring medical students.
• Outpatient Rotations: These rotations are an important part of first-year residency and continue for all three years of the program. The goal of the outpatient rotation is to expose residents to a wide variety of neurological conditions as they are most commonly seen in clinic. This training includes neurology clinics in epilepsies, headache, neuromuscular disorders, movement disorders, neonatal disorders, concussion, metabolic disorders, neurooncology and tuberous sclerosis. This rotation is designed to help residents identify possible areas of specialization. These electives also provide a strong clinical foundation for those interested in pursuing General Neurology. In the final year of training, residents may elect to spend more time in outpatient clinical areas, based on their interests.
• Pediatric Epilepsy Inpatient Rotations: This one-month rotation provides exposure to intractable epilepsies, pseudoseizures, and other epilepsies and paroxysmal disorders. Educational opportunities include experience with long-term EEG monitoring, EEG reading, epilepsy surgical planning, epilepsy surgery, and sophisticated neuroimaging techniques such as FMRI, PET, SPECT and MEG scans.
• Elective Clinical Rotations: These rotations occur throughout the three-year training program. Required “electives” in this rotation include training in electrophysiology / EEG, psychiatry, neuropathology and neuroradiology. Other optional electives include study of specific epilepsy programs, headache, neuromuscular disease, movement disorders, tuberous sclerosis, neurosurgery, neuropharmacology, neurogenetics, neonatal neurology, metabolic diseases, learning disabilities, multiple sclerosis / inflammatory diseases, neurooncology, neuropsychology, palliative care and rotations abroad or at other institutions.
• Continuity Clinic Rotations: During all rotations, residents care for their own patients in the weekly outpatient continuity clinic, supervised by an experienced senior faculty member. Continuity clinic includes a broad range of neurological conditions.
• Research Rotations: Throughout training, we provide a structured framework for designing and performing research, including dedicated research conferences and support from a PhD statistician. This provides an opportunity to train in research methodology, as well as complete and present a mentored protocol in clinical or basic research. Download our current resident research projects to learn more.

Adult Neurology Rotations

Residents complete one year of adult neurology rotations at the University of Cincinnati Medical Center. Rotations are distributed over three years, and include six months of inpatient/consult rotations and six months of outpatient rotations.

The experience working with adult neurology patients gives residents the opportunity to gain understanding of neurological diseases and processes that start in childhood but persist into adulthood. In addition, residents see important conditions like stroke, dementias and multiple sclerosis in adults in ways that enhance our understanding of these conditions in childhood. Furthermore, the annual training examination and the board examinations are still heavily weighted toward adult neurology, so this training prepares our residents for those examinations.

Didactics

We have a broad didactic curriculum designed around ACGME and ABPN requirements. We offer a range of lectures and discussions which include core clinical topics as well as ethics, humanities, diversity and social issues. Presenters include current residents, faculty, invited guests and patients. These are well attended and occur during protected education time. Download our sample block didactic schedule.