Endocrinology, Diabetes and Metabolism Training Sites

Ben Taub Hospital is the tertiary care referral center for the residents of Harris County, Texas, the third most populous county in United States. It is an elite Level I Trauma Center and serves as one of the two major public hospitals in Harris County. Staffed by Baylor College of Medicine, it has 444 licensed beds and cares for more than 80,000 emergency patients each year. While rotating at BTGH, Endocrine Fellows see a wide array of complex pathology, including thyroid emergencies and other endocrine disorders. Fellows also work in several specialized endocrine clinics: the Diabetic Ketoacidosis Clinic, which has published important work in the area of ketosis prone diabetes; the OB-Endocrine clinic, where fellows see endocrine complications in pregnant women including diabetes, thyroid, adrenal and pituitary pathology; FNA clinic, where fellows are trained in thyroid ultrasound and fine needle aspiration of thyroid nodules; and Non Alcoholic Fatty Liver Disease (NAFLD) clinic (in conjunction with Gastroenterology), where fellows learn management of metabolic diseases. Smith Clinic, the General Endocrine continuity clinic for fellows over the two years of fellowship, is also within the Harris Health System. Here the fellows have their own panel of patients with a wide array of endocrine disorders and they are also trained in the numerous endocrine dynamic testing protocols and interpretation. 
 

MD Anderson Cancer Center is ranked as the top hospital for cancer care by U.S. News & World Report. It is recognized around the world for research and patient care. The faculty at MD Anderson are leaders in thyroid cancer, multiple endocrine neoplasia and adrenal neoplasia. The rotation also provides exposure to endocrine issues in the context of active treatment of malignancy. Trainees manage post-operative thyroid and pituitary surgery patients and see endocrine immune related adverse events from checkpoint inhibitor therapy. Fellows are also exposed to the use of systemic therapy (TKIs, immunotherapy) for advanced thyroid cancer patients.  
 

Baylor St. Luke's Medical Center, is a private teaching hospital for adult patients at Baylor College of Medicine. Jointly owned by Baylor College of Medicine and Common Spirit Health, it is part of the CHI St. Luke’s Health System. BSLMC is an 881-bed hospital with active programs in heart, liver and renal transplantation. Diabetes is a major focus of training in both the inpatient and outpatient experience. Fellows learn how to manage complex patients with diabetes on parenteral nutrition and learn to operate & interpret the latest insulin pumps/continuous glucose monitors. Fellows also train in thyroid ultrasound/FNA and learn about molecular gene testing in the Thyroid Clinic. They attend Multidisciplinary Endocrine Neoplasia clinic (under the umbrella of the Dan Duncan Cancer Center) and learn management of endocrine malignancies, especially thyroid cancer. While at BSLMC, the fellow also sees consults of adult patients from the Texas Children’s Hospital Pavilion for Women, which provides state of the art care in obstetrics and gynecology and is a source of referrals for gestational endocrine disease.

The Michael E. DeBakey Veterans Affairs Medical Center serves as the primary health care provider for more than 113,000 Veterans in southeast Texas. Veterans from around the country are referred to the MEDVAMC for specialized diagnostic care, radiation therapy, surgery, and medical treatment including cardiovascular surgery, gastrointestinal endoscopy, nuclear medicine, ophthalmology, liver transplant, renal transplant and treatment of spinal cord injury and diseases. The hospital is a state-of-the-art facility with 350 acute care beds, a 40-bed Spinal Cord Injury Center, and a 141-bed Community Living Center. Diabetes in patients who have had cardiothoracic surgery or organ transplant is a major focus of the inpatient service, as well as the evaluation of patients with fragility fractures, and endocrine disorders and complications in hospitalized Internal Medicine patients. The outpatient general endocrinology clinics see a broad range of pathology including pituitary, thyroid and adrenal neoplasia, hypogonadism, transgender medicine, and metabolic bone disease, and the insulin pump / continuous glucose monitoring program is one of the largest such programs within the VA system.
 
 

Texas Children's Hospital is one of the largest pediatric hospitals in the country with 650 beds, and a premier academic institution. Texas Children's has 30 pediatric endocrinologists on staff. The fellow rotates with Pediatric Endocrinology fellows and faculty and participates in the care of both inpatients and outpatients. For the inpatient rotation, the fellow rotates on a diabetes service and a general endocrinology consult service, seeing children with newly diagnosed T1 and T2DM as well as a broad range of general endocrinology. The outpatient rotation provides a broad exposure to pediatric endocrinology including more DM technology (insulin pumps and continuous glucose monitors) and a gender medicine multidisciplinary clinic. The endocrine fellow on the Texas Children's rotation also sees newborn consults in the NICU at the Pavilion for Women.