San Francisco, California
Training Program Director: Michael Alvarado, MD
The number of breast surgeries performed at the UCSF Breast Care Center is the highest among medical centers in Northern California. Since its inception three years ago, our fellowship has become highly competitive. This year, we are accepting one general surgeon into our program.
About the Program
The clinical breast surgery fellowship is a one-year intensive clinical experience in all aspects of general and oncology breast surgery. This fellowship is offered to candidates who have completed a general surgery, plastic surgery, obstetrics and gynecology, or other surgical subspecialty residency program and who are board-eligible/certified in their respective surgical specialty
The fellowship encompasses all aspects of breast surgery, including diagnosis and treatment of diseases of the breast, and all clinical aspects of breast oncology. These include pathology, radiology (mammography, ultrasound, and MRI and their related biopsies), and medical and radiation oncology. Fellows have primary responsibility for running the clinical breast service and working with general surgery residents at the R1 and R3 level. The dedicated breast fellow serves as first assistant on all breast surgical cases. The fellow will also work with a SPORE member (Breast Oncology Program) to develop a meaningful research project. In doing basic science research, the surgical fellow will be working closely with our clinical fellows to help with their clinical investigations.
Meetings and Conferences
The fellow receives an active academic and didactic teaching experience, including the weekly multidisciplinary breast tumor board, new patient conferences, and journal reviews. This included attendance at three national meetings: the American Society of Clinical Oncology, the Society of Surgical Oncology, and the San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium. Breast surgery fellows are expected to participate in the presentations at these conferences.
During the course of the year, the breast fellow will:
- Become knowledgeable about the preoperative, intraoperative and postoperative care of patients with breast tumors
- Collaborate with our interdisciplinary team, which includes basic scientists, oncologists, radiologists, nuclear medicine physicians, pathologist, radiation therapists and surgeons
- Become knowledgeable about preoperative radiology and nuclear medicine studies and minimally invasive and regular surgical techniques
- Take courses in outcomes, clinical trials design and management and ethics
- Participate in designing and conducting clinical trials
- Write clinical papers and present at local, national, and international breast surgical, general surgical and breast oncology meetings
- At the completion of their fellowship training, our fellows are exceptionally well-trained and versed in all aspects of breast oncology, including surgery, medical oncology, and clinical research.
Our objective is to help talented surgeons become knowledgeable, skillful, and caring breast specialist who will go on to become leaders in the field.
Recent fellows have taken clinical attending positions at programs in the Kaiser system hospitals and St. Luke’s Comprehensive Breast Center. We are proud of the success of our program to educate young surgeons from the USA and other countries.
Our clinical faculty includes Laura Esserman, MD, Cheryl Ewing, MD, Michael Alvarado, MD, Jasmine Wong, MD, and Rita Mukhtar, MD.
To apply for the Breast Surgical Oncology fellowship position please submit the following to the address below:
- A personal statement of intent to pursue a career in breast surgery
- Curriculum vitae
- Three (3) letters of recommendation
- Proof of citizenship status or copy of a work permit, board certification and CA license application
Contact Information
Training Program Director: | Michael Alvarado, MD |
Address: | Breast Surgical Oncology Fellowship UCSF Comprehensive Cancer Center 1825 4th Street PCMB 3rd Floor, Box 1710 San Francisco, CA 94158 |
Phone: | 415-514-7369 |
Fax: | 415-353-9571 |
Training Program Coordinator: | Janine Tomatis |
Email: | Janine.Tomatis@ucsf.edu |