Oncology Fellow Advisor - Vol. 2, Issue 1 by McMahon Group

ONCOLOGYFellow

Vol. 2, Issue 1

S UPPORT & INFORMATION FOR THE NEXT GENERATION OF ONCOLOGY PRACTITIONERS

oncologyfellowadvisor.com Career Paths

Fellowship Training

fellowship training

Fellows learn the art of teaching and consult with interns, residents, and attending physicians alike.

A day in the life

We highlight the work of medical oncologist Karin Hahn, MD.

Oncology Fellow Advisor ® is brought to you as a professional courtesy by Lilly USA, LLC, and McMahon Publishing.

For the latest oncology-related news, please visit www.oncologyfellowadvisor.com

Mentor Memos

Survey Says

Physician Finance

Write a Winning Oncology CV

Career paths

Multiphysician partnerships are on the rise in medical oncology.

advisor

he curriculum vitae (CV), which loosely translates to “course of life” in Latin, is a standard component of any oncology fellow’s portfolio by the time he or she graduates and begins professional practice. The idea is straightforward enough, but because the CV is a representation of a physician’s professional life—with all its obstacles and successes—there are questions about the best way to create one. “It’s your story, and in a way, it’s your identity,” said Fadi Braiteh, MD, who

graduated from fellowship at the University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston. She is now an oncologist at the Cancer and Hematology Centers of Western Michigan and an investigator at the Van Andel Research Institute in Grand Rapids. From an employer’s point of view, the CV is the first impression of a potential new recruit. “The CV is basically the snapshot of the applicant, and it’s the first thing that [an employer] is going to look at,” see CV, page 7 

E-Prescribe: See Financial Gains

E-

prescribing, succinctly put, is the ability to write a prescription via a computer system and electronically transmit that information to a pharmacy. The Medicare Improvements for Patients and Providers Act (MIPPA) of 2008 includes financial incentives— bonuses of 0.5% to 2% of total Medicare Part B payments—for physicians who adopt electronic prescribing through 2013. Those who do not participate by that time will be penalized.1 “It’s coming pretty quickly if you want to qualify for federal stimulus dollars as a part of implementing electronic health records [EHRs]. There’s clearly

a financial incentive for doing that, and as time goes by, a financial disincentive for not doing it,” said Robert S. Miller, MD, FACP, clinical associate, Breast Cancer Program, Johns Hopkins Kimmel Cancer Center, Pavilion, IL. According to statistics provided by Surescripts, an e-prescribing network, 80 million prescriptions were written electronically in the fourth quarter of 2008, up from 10.5 million in early see E-Prescribing, page 5 

CAREER PATHS

Oncology Fellow Advisor • Vol. 2, Issue 1

Multiphysician Partnerships on the Rise

medical director for US Oncology. “I think oncology has mong medical specialties, oncology is a rapidly gotten very complicated, very expensive, [and] it’s not changing field, and like the medical advances that possible to deal with all of the regulatory problems, all of have transformed cancer care over the past several the complicated types of chemotherapy administration, decades, the business side of practicing oncology also without being in a larger group.” has undergone a fundamental transformation. For years, many independent physicians bucked the “Medical oncology is progressively becoming a practice trend and clung to the model of the solo practitioner. “In whose business model is faltering and not necessarily the past, physicians remained independent of each other allowing [individual] medical practices, like it was many in large degree because years ago,” said Ed George, they’ve been able to pracMD, chairman of the nation“The compensation part, I can tell you tice with a business model al physicians policy board that works and have their at US Oncology and a medbased on 30 years of experience, is own style, their own goverical oncologist with Virginia positive and better for physicians.” nance, be their own bossOncology Associates. —Ed George, MD es, and answer to no one,” These changes have been said Dr. George. “That cliboth clinical and finanmate has changed and precial. For example, clinical cipitated a need for people changes like the increased coming together and poolregulation of prescribing, ing resources, and maybe through Risk Evaluation beginning to find ways to and Mitigation Strategies accentuate each others’ (REMS), have made the positives and diminish the process of delivering medinegatives.” cations more labor intenFor many younger physisive. Likewise, the increased cians and fellows entering paperwork and data entry practice, the transformation third-party payers now currently taking place in clindemand has dramatically ical medicine mirrors these increased administrative new business realities, Dr. work and overhead. Beveridge said. Physicians More than anyone, these more frequently rely on evichanges have affected the denced-based care and seek solo and small practices to develop best practices that used to comprise the through consensus, which majority of medical oncoloinvolves a natural give-andgists in the United States, take with colleagues. said Dr. George. “The small “I think the collaborative practices that largely comapproach in terms of how prised oncology in this you treat patients is becomcountry, 1- to 3-physician ing more common, and if practices, have found it you accept that premise, then it’s getting easier for people very difficult to give the kind of care and have the kind of to work in a collaborative manner,” said Dr. Beveridge. time and access they need personally to deliver that care Although the clinical and financial benefits of mergin this current climate,” he said. ing small practices may seem straightforward, in actual The result: fewer small practices and a trend toward practice it is often very complicated, said Mary Lou private practice partnerships. These multiphysician partBowers, MBA, president and CEO of the Pritchard Group nerships, which can range in size from 3 or 4 physicians in Rockville, Maryland, which advises medical practices to dozens, seek to lower costs in 2 ways—by capitalizing and consults on practice mergers. on economies of scale and using specialized personnel Often, physicians contemplating a merger will focus in finance and law to handle the regulatory and business solely on the business aspects of the partnership, rather intricacies of a 21st-century medical practice. than the personalities involved. “You have to really look “This is exactly the trend,” said Roy Beveridge, MD,

Oncology Fellow Advisor ® is brought to you as a professional courtesy by Lilly USA, LLC, and McMahon Publishing.

CAREER PATHS

Vol. 2, Issue 1 • Oncology Fellow Advisor

at everything that might benefit you, as well as whether you can work with this person and the people that he or she brings with them,” said Ms. Bowers. Each physician will be inheriting the nursing and office staffs of the other, therefore physicians need to be fully aware of the culture of a partner’s office before formally joining, she emphasized. “You need to understand all of the little nuances because you don’t want to marry into someone else’s disaster without being aware of what you’re doing,” she said. More problematically, firings will almost invariably have to take place in order to achieve the benefits of partnership. “Physicians often are very reluctant to fire people,” said Ms. Bowers. This can be particularly difficult in the case of small, family-run medical practices, where the physician’s wife may be the office manager or a nurse. One of the reasons that physicians may overlook these nuances is because of the clear-cut benefits of a partnership, which often result in a reduction of hospital coverage and administrative work and an increase in compensation. “These [partnerships] are economically beneficial to physicians in a small practice or they wouldn’t be happening,” said Dr. George. “The compensation part, I can tell you based on 30 years of experience, is positive and better for physicians.” Having recognized the potential benefits, Ms. Bowers outlined problems she often sees when practices join. After practices have gone through the process of developing a business plan, capitalizing the new joint venture, and establishing governance and compensation structures, then the actual work of joining the practices begins. New agreements with insurance companies must be made, which are complex and time consuming; medical records systems must be merged; and coverage of additional hospitals must be hammered out. “These are tedious things that are easily forgotten,” said Ms. Bowers, and the time and labor involved can cut into revenue during the early part of a merger. Often, she says, these unforeseen expectations take the form of an inflexible win–win mentality as the partnership is being developed. “Inevitably you are going to lose some power and some control, especially if you are going from a solo practice to a group practice, but in any relationship you have to understand that you are going to give up some power and control, but what you are looking for in return is probably an easier life,” Ms. Bowers said. Although many oncology practices have changed significantly over the past decade to adjust to new regulations and practice demands, it is likely that the most significant changes are ahead, she said. “[Oncologists] want security in the future and of course that’s an impossibility to get,” said Ms. Bowers, “because security is not something that is on the horizon for anyone that practices in health care. I think we are in for a bumpy ride for awhile.”

Editorial Board Karin Hahn, MD Associate Program Director, The University of Texas M.D. Anderson Hematology/Oncology Fellowship Chief of Medical Oncology Assistant Professor Lyndon B. Johnson General Hospital Houston, Texas Jamal Rahaman, MD Fellowship Director Division of Gynecologic Oncology Mount Sinai School of Medicine New York, New York

Andrew D. Seidman, MD Attending Physician, Breast Cancer Medicine Service, Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center Professor of Medicine Weill Cornell Medical College New York, New York

Marc Stewart, MD Program Director, Hematology/Oncology Fellowship University of Washington/Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center Medical Director, Seattle Cancer Care Alliance Professor of Medicine, University of Washington Seattle, Washington Copyright © 2010

Publisher of

Please visit

www.oncologyfellowadvisor.com to subscribe or send an e-mail to

oncologyfellowadvisor@mcmahonmed.com with your name, institution, e-mail address, and mailing address.

Oncology Fellow Advisor ® is brought to you as a professional courtesy by Lilly USA, LLC, and McMahon Publishing.

Fellowship Training

Oncology Fellow Advisor • Vol. 2, Issue 1

Fellows Learn the Art of Teaching

lthough fellowship represents, perhaps more than anything, a time of intense learning, it also is the period when young oncologists and hematologists begin teaching their subspecialty in earnest. Typically, fellows have at least 12 months of clinical training, during which they will oversee the care of patients in both ambulatory and inpatient settings, as well as consult with interns, residents, and attending physicians daily. At the University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center, in Houston, for example, fellows spend at least 2 months running the inpatient service at Lyndon B. Johnson General Hospital, where they oversee residents and interns in the day-to-day care of patients. Initially, the prospect of teaching can be daunting. “There is some inhibition, in terms of ‘Do I know enough to teach the house staff?’ ” said Christopher Lieu, MD, chief fellow for education at M.D. Anderson Cancer Center. However, fellows quickly realize that they can make a significant impact. At the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in Boston, fellows are required to present cases in more formal didactic lectures. “These are very sophisticated talks that draw the most senior faculty,” said Robert J. Mayer, MD, the program director of the hematology/oncology fellowship at Dana-Farber. The idea behind developing fellows’ teaching skills with interns, residents, and faculty, Dr. Mayer said, is that fellows who are “good teachers and [can] explain things clearly, cogently, and concisely to their colleagues can do the same for patients, and that’s a skill that often distinguishes the good from the very good or outstanding clinician.” The most important concept, both Drs. Lieu and Mayer emphasized, is to know your audience. The majority of internal medicine residents or medical students rotating through an internship on the oncology service ultimately will not become oncologists or hematologists. “The [fellows’] responsibility is to lead the consult service and so there is an expectation that [fellows] teach the residents, through every single patient that they see and being able to give them some clinical pearl, but also didactic teaching in a sit-down fashion,” Dr. Lieu said. These “pearls” should not be lost in the minutiae of advanced cancer care. “The key for fellows teaching residents is to keep it applicable to internal medicine,” Dr. Lieu said. “Everything that I teach my residents when I’m on service is something that they can expect to see oncology-wise on the boards or what I would expect them to work up as an internist. I always try to teach bread-andbutter kind of stuff.” Beyond the boards, Dr. Lieu focuses on oncologic emergencies, symptoms caused by the presence of cancerous tissue or side effects of cancer therapies, that Oncology Fellow Advisor ® is brought to you as a professional courtesy by Lilly USA, LLC, and McMahon Publishing.

an internist would likely see covering inpatient service in practice.1 More generally, a sense of the possibilities and limits of oncology is also important to impress on residents and interns. “I typically focus on giving a general sense of when to really push hard in hopes of curing somebody, versus when to maybe lay off a bit,” said Dr. Lieu. Patients with cancer are unique in that many have developed close relationships with their oncologists over the course of months, or even years, of treatment, and by the time they arrive on the inpatient service, their prognosis for recovery is very poor. “For a primary care resident who is starting on an oncology rotation, it isn’t important to know the drug regimen du jour, or all the data about the probability of surviving this or that [disease],” said Dr. Mayer. “I think what the experience of oncology offers to a resident or intern is the ability to develop a skill set in talking to patients and their families—knowing how you sit down with a family, how you talk to them, how you pace it, how you convey information. “With oncology patients, there is a teaching opportunity at all levels,” Dr. Mayer added, “to demonstrate how you are to relate to your patient and to their family, and I find that’s probably the single most important thing that everybody can get out of an oncology rotation, particularly people who don’t have [oncology] as a career goal.” Perhaps even more important than communicating clinical information directly with residents and interns, fellows demonstrate “the intimate combination of humanism and science that characterizes oncology,” Dr. Mayer said, and in this way serve as ambassadors for the subspecialty. Many of the fellows whom Dr. Mayer accepts into DanaFarber’s fellowship program came into their residency thinking they would be primary care physicians or cardiologists, for example. But in residency, “they met these [oncology] fellows who were so excited about what they were doing and were so involved in the care of a patient that it opened their eyes to something that was entirely new,” Dr. Mayer says. By example, then, the educational role fellows play in residents’ lives is much more than simply helping them to pass the boards. “In a sense,” Dr. Mayer said, “fellows are the greatest salespeople for our profession.”

Reference 1. Higdon ML, Higdon JA. Treatment of oncologic emergencies. Am Fam Physician. 2006;74(11):1873-1880.

Physician Finance

Vol. 2, Issue 1 • Oncology Fellow Advisor

Table 1. Advantages of E-Prescribing

E-Prescribing continued from page 1

2006.2 It is likely that these numbers will continue to climb. Collectively, practices could reap billions of dollars by implementing EHR systems, of which e-prescribing is a major feature. “It’s a fairly new technology—developed in the last few years—but it’s slowly gaining traction,” said David Artz, MD, medical director, information systems, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center. Some states provide incentives as well. “New York State is planning to pay physicians in 2010 for using e-prescribing for Medicaid prescriptions because it could reduce administrative overhead for the payer, and the state is hoping it will also reduce medication errors,” said Dr. Artz. Furthermore, $19.5 million was allocated in the economic recovery act in 2009 for spending on health care technology.3 “The organization in Washington responsible for deciding how that money will be dispersed has said they intend to promote the use of e-prescribing,” said Dr. Artz. Prior to joining Johns Hopkins, Dr. Miller was part of an 8-member oncology group in Sacramento, California, that made the shift to e-prescribing at the dawn of that technology’s availability. The group did not have a fullfeatured EHR system in place at the time and instead used a freestanding, Web-based e-prescribing system. As most trailblazers do, the group ran into a little turbulence, both internally and externally. “The internal problems were people and workflow issues,” Dr. Miller said. There was mild resistance from some staff members who were less than comfortable with new technology. “It took a little time for them to recognize that this was an improvement over a traditional, paperbased system,” Dr. Miller said. Some physicians also were skeptical of the change. “Everyone was in favor of the concept, but when it came to how to integrate e-prescribing into the workflow, that’s where we hit some snags,” Dr. Miller said. The concept was that physicians would write prescriptions at the point of care via workstations set up outside patient exam rooms. Initially, some physicians preferred to delay prescribing until later in the day or requested that a nurse take care of it. Ultimately, they adopted the point-of-care timetable. It took some time for the pharmacies to adjust, also. “It was a learning curve for quite a few pharmacies—even the big chain pharmacies,” Dr. Miller said. Physicians would send in a prescription electronically, the patient would show up for the medicine, and the pharmacist would claim to have never heard from the doctor or received a fax. To educate pharmacists, the provider of Dr. Miller’s e-prescribing service issued index cards that patients could present to their pharmacists explaining how e-prescribing works and that their doctor is using the program.

Once these problems were addressed, • Eliminate paperwork the program quickly • Improve record keeping showed its worth • Streamline refill management (Table 1). One of • Receive federal stimulus money the biggest advantages e-prescribing has over traditional pen and paper is record keeping. “It gave us a fairly airtight mechanism for knowing what medicines patients got and when they got them,” Dr. Miller said. The e-prescribing method also streamlined refill management. “Before e-prescribing, we had a dedicated phone line with an answering machine, and it would take a staff member up to an hour each day to listen to all the messages from pharmacies,” Dr. Miller said. Now that refill requests come in electronically, nursing and clinical staff can attend to them quickly. “The beauty of e-prescribing is that the doctor or other practitioner can sit in front of the computer and easily send out a prescription or refill request on their own schedule at any time of day. It’s extremely painless,” Dr. Artz said. “From the doctor’s standpoint, this concept is phenomenal—as long as the pharmacy is paying attention to the prescriptions coming in electronically and doesn’t let unfilled electronic prescriptions sit around.” A downside to e-prescribing for oncology is that the Drug Enforcement Administration does not allow e-prescribing of Schedule II drugs, which include all narcotic pain medications commonly given to cancer patients and must be written on designated prescription pads. While acknowledging that dealing with scheduled drugs is a hassle, Dr. Miller’s office found it still manageable. “When we had a Schedule III, IV, or V drug, we would enter it at the point of care into the system. This enabled us to use all the benefits of the system—checking their formulary, looking for drug interactions—and capture it electronically so that it was in the database. But instead of sending it electronically, we’d print it out at the workstation, sign it, and hand it to the nurse to fax,” he said. “It adds complexity, but it’s not the end of the world.”

References 1. E-prescribing worth the effort? J Oncol Pract 2009; 5(4):212-213. 2. Surescripts e-prescribing statistics. http://www.surescripts. net/e-prescribing-statistics.html. Accessed December 7, 2009. 3. New York medical electronic prescribing incentive program: interim guidance. http://www.nyhealth.gov/health_care/ medicaid/program/update/2009/2009-11spec.htm. Accessed December 7, 2009. Oncology Fellow Advisor ® is brought to you as a professional courtesy by Lilly USA, LLC, and McMahon Publishing.

Mentor memos

A Day in the Life of Karin Hahn, MD …

ncology Fellow Advisor presents our Day in the Life

Oncology Fellow Advisor • Vol. 2, Issue 1

Medical oncologist Academia Hospital based

Toronto, researching what would later be recognized as HER-2/neu in breast cancer. series. In each segment, we interview a prominent Following this research experience, Dr. Hahn was thought leader about how he or she got into the field of inspired to work directly with cancer patients. Although oncology and a typical work day. no one in her family had been diagnosed with cancer, In this issue, we interview Karin Hahn, MD, MSc (Micro), her father’s ongoing cardiac problems—which during Dr. MPH, MSc (EBHC), FRCPC, assistant professor, University Hahn’s first year in medical school evolved into end-stage of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center, associate program heart disease—exposed her to the reality of caring for a chronically ill person with a life-threatening illness. director, M.D. Anderson Hematology/Oncology Fellowship “My experiences with my father paralleled part of the Program, and chief of medical oncology, Lyndon B. Johnson reason I went into oncology—that long-term relationship General Hospital, in Houston. Dr. Hahn serves as an editowith a patient,” said Dr. Hahn. “Breast cancer in particular rial board member of Oncology Fellow Advisor. can have that chronic disease component—there’s a lot of listening and talking involved Growing up as the in the experience.” third of 4 children born “My practice has evolved from a fairly Her father’s illness helped to a draftsman and stayshape Dr. Hahn’s approach to at-home mom in Nova narrow breast cancer focus to include patient care. “When we’re talkScotia, Karin Hahn had a large teaching component, to overing about textbook answers as zero interest in pursuing a seeing our medical oncology program to how long somebody might career in medicine. live, I always say, ‘no one is a “I loved school and in one of the county hospitals here in textbook.’ For my father, that thought I’d probably be a Houston, caring for people who don’t would have been 2 years, but teacher,” she said. have access to health care.” he lived almost 11 years with After she graduated end-stage heart disease, and from high school, Dr. Hahn —Karin Hahn, MD most of those years contained attended college and pura pretty good quality of life.” sued a degree in biology. That personal experience She thought she would go also informed Dr. Hahn’s ability to communicate on difon to a PhD in microbiology so that she could teach at the ficult topics with patients. “We’d talk about DNRs (do university level. While studying for her master’s degree, not resuscitate orders) every time my dad went into the however, she found the lab component tedious. “There hospital, about how aggressive we should be—all those was not enough people contact,” said Dr. Hahn. “So I had difficult discussions. That really had a profound impact to rethink my plans.” on what my choices were going through medical school, Her late father-in-law, an MD and PhD, pointed out that residency, and fellowship, and to this day how I practice if she went to medical school she could also teach, so and what I enjoy about my practice.” she started investigating whether a medical career would These days, Dr. Hahn wears many hats. “My practice be a good fit. A 1-year stint as a part-time unit clerk on has evolved from a fairly narrow breast cancer focus to a neurology ward helped Dr. Hahn overcome what could include a large teaching component, to overseeing our be a problem for an aspiring doctor—an aversion toward medical oncology program in one of the county hospitals medical institutions stemming from her father’s chronic here in Houston, caring for people who don’t have access cardiac problems. “I got over my fear of hospitals and to health care,” she said. This component touches her went to medical school at the University of Toronto [in Canadian core and her support of socialized medicine. Canada],” she said. Three out of 5 days each week, Dr. Hahn works at the Dr. Hahn had hoped to go into infectious disease, but county hospital with a team that sees between 50 and 70 calls to the microbiology department while applying for a cancer patients each clinic day. “In clinics, much of my research position in the summer after her first year went day is spent teaching and overseeing patient care, with unanswered. “So I started looking for similar types of some MD Anderson and county hospital administration research in different fields,” said Dr. Hahn. She got a posiissues thrown in,” she said. tion working with a physician at Mount Sinai Hospital in

Oncology Fellow Advisor ® is brought to you as a professional courtesy by Lilly USA, LLC, and McMahon Publishing.

FELLOWSHIP TRAINING

Vol. 2, Issue 1 • Oncology Fellow Advisor

CV continued from page 1

said Lisa Carey, MD, medical director of the University of North Carolina Breast Center in Chapel Hill, and chairelect of the American Society of Clinical Oncology’s Career Development Subcommittee. There are certain things to keep in mind regarding what a CV is and is not. “[CV] Table 2. CV Must-Haves is itself a technical term. It’s a technical document • Education and so it should be factu• Academic honors or al; it shouldn’t have paraleadership positions graphs about life history • Research or personal interests,” said • Internships, residencies, Jessica Joseph, president and fellowships and CEO of eMatchPhy• Practice experience sicians.com, a Web site • Publications that matches physicians • Presentations with employers. • Professional memberships All fellows need a CV and licensure to get into their fellow• Professional awards/ ship, and although the honors time pressures of fellow• Language skills ship are intense, fellows should try to continuously keep their CV updated. At a minimum, the CV should include all professional activities and accomplishments (Table 2). “If you put the basics together, it’s a lot easier to update it than to try to create it from scratch,” said Dr. Carey. Dr. Braiteh said he watched this process unfold last spring. “I had people graduating with me at the end of June, and by March they didn’t have a CV ready,” he said.

Her 2 academic days are primarily focused on the fellowship program at M.D. Anderson, attending the fellows’ core educational sessions; Dr. Hahn sits on the thesis committees for a number of fellows pursuing master’s degrees in clinical investigation. “I’m also involved in our institutional review board committee overseeing research in the institution,” she said. “In my spare time, I try to do a little research of my own.” Dr. Hahn spends what little downtime she has relaxing with her 2 golden retrievers, walking, doing Pilates, and occasionally taking a creative writing class. She acknowledges that striking a balance between work and personal life is difficult, if not impossible. “A day in the life is from 7:30 or 8:00 in the morning until whenever it takes to get [my work] done; weekdays are often 12 hours and I use weekends to get some research or writing work done. So it’s busy.”

“It’s really important to start early and not just to do it once, but revisit it once a month.” Maintaining an existing CV, or starting one early in fellowship also provides a roadmap for future priorities. “You create a skeleton early on and then you identify gaps, especially toward the type of career you want,” said Dr. Braiteh, who also sits on the Career Development Subcommittee of the American Society of Clinical Oncology. “Early on, it gives you a template to focus on the weaknesses of a CV; it gives you the privilege of 2 or 3 years to work on it rather than 2 months before you start the interview process, when it’s a bit too late.

Examine a mentor’s CV to help generate ideas for novel accomplishments to add or ways to effectively format the document.

“For fellows, I’d say put everything [on your CV], even a relevant paper when you were a medical student, especially because your CV may not be big. Even if it’s beyond 5 years, just leave it there,” says Dr. Braiteh. “It makes sense because someone looking at your CV is judging how you have progressed and they want to see your career curve— how you got from point A to point B to point C.” Although a paper published as a medical student in a completely different field of research may seem out of place, a fellow should think twice before removing it. “That can be naïve, if I’m interviewing people, I’m judging the productivity of a person and that’s how you see CV, page 8 

Given the demands of an oncology career, it is essential that those in pursuit of it are happy with what they’re doing, Dr. Hahn stressed. This requires frequent selfreflection—a component of learning that she feels is sorely lacking in medical training. “What I ask my fellows of late is what do you enjoy about what you’re doing? The answer needs to be more than, ‘I just like dealing with cancer patients,’ ” she said. “If it’s a clinic you like, what is it about that clinic: The patients? The atmosphere? If it’s the attending, what quality is it you like about the attending: The way they deal with patients, or interact with staff, or that they teach a lot?” Finding the answers to these questions can help guide fellows in making critical career decisions. “These things need to be explored and reflected on,” said Dr. Hahn. “Oncology is a tough field to be in, so you’d better try to set things up so you enjoy what you’re doing.” Oncology Fellow Advisor ® is brought to you as a professional courtesy by Lilly USA, LLC, and McMahon Publishing.

ONCOLOGYFellow S UPPORT & INFORMATION FOR THE NEXT GENERATION OF ONCOLOGY PRACTITIONERS

oncologyfellowadvisor.com

advisor

CP101

Oncology Fellow Advisor is a resource for the next generation of oncology practitioners.

Fellowship training

Oncology Fellow Advisor • Vol. 2, Issue 1

CV text is becoming too long, summarize the information and note that more detail is available on request, as an addendum to the CV. decipher it. There is a lot of reading between the lines,” “Physicians are trained to get to the point and to make said Dr. Braiteh. quick decisions based on the facts. They should treat Dr. Carey agreed. “In truth, some people start out their CV in the same way,” said Ms. Joseph. “Just as they doing something totally different and change over,” would want to review a case—see all of the facts without she said. “If a person also has worked in something that too much commentary—that might be completely unreis how their CV should be.” lated earlier in their career, Examine a mentor’s CV to it does speak to an inquisi“Every time you have a paper pubhelp generate ideas for novel tive mind and a philosophy lished, join a committee, or finish a accomplishments to add or of doing research as a genspecial course, it’s good to go back ways to effectively format eral approach to the world, the document. Junior facand that’s very valuable.” to your CV to add it on, because you ulty or physicians only a few Nevertheless, this inforsee that it’s like a plant growing, or years out of fellowship may mation needs to be preyour growing baby” be best because they reflect sented as precisely as possimilar career experiences. sible. “Clean, to the point, —Fadi Braiteh, MD Although writing a CV can factual, and without an be seen as yet another thing overwhelming amount of to do before graduation from fellowship, it’s also a chance detail is best,” said Ms. Joseph, of eMatchPhysicians.com. to reflect on one’s accomplishments. “Unless applying for an academic position, a really lengthy “Every time you have a paper published, join a comCV is when the roll of the eyes starts happening. A CV that mittee, or finish a special course, it’s good to go back to is 40 pages long, describing every paper, publication, or your CV to add it on, because you see that it’s like a plant abstract tells a lot more about a physician’s ego than their growing, or your growing baby,” said Dr. Braiteh. “It gives strengths.” you something immediate and tangibly rewarding.” A clean CV is one in which information that an employer finds important can be easily pulled from the document. Please visit www.oncologyfellowadisor.com It should not feel crowded with text, but should use bold to see sample oncology CV’s. font, or stylistic formatting to highlight key points. If the continued from page 7

Oncology Fellow Advisor ® is brought to you as a professional courtesy by Lilly USA, LLC, and McMahon Publishing.