Hospice and Palliative Medicine Fellowship Program

Program Overview

The University of Pittsburgh Hospice and Palliative Medicine Fellowship offers comprehensive training designed to prepare physicians for leadership in clinical care, education, and research within palliative medicine. Fellows develop expertise in managing complex medical, psychosocial, and ethical challenges for patients with life-limiting illnesses across a wide range of settings, including inpatient, outpatient, home hospice, and long-term care. The program emphasizes interdisciplinary collaboration, patient- and family-centered care, continuity across care settings, and the development of teaching and leadership skills. Four fellowship tracks accommodate diverse career goals: a one-year adult track, a one-year pediatric track, a two-year academic track, and a three-year combined palliative medicine and hematology/oncology track.

Clinical training includes longitudinal rotations across inpatient consult services, home and inpatient hospice, outpatient clinics, long-term care, and specialty palliative programs. Fellows follow patients across settings, building skills in interdisciplinary teamwork, communication, and quality improvement. The program also provides robust opportunities for scholarly activity, including research and education projects, quality improvement initiatives, the Case of the Month publication, and presentations at local and national conferences.

Fellows train at a variety of high-quality clinical sites, including UPMC Presbyterian-Montefiore, UPMC Shadyside, UPMC Mercy, Hillman Cancer Center, Family Hospice, and UPMC Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh. Under the mentorship of nationally recognized faculty, fellows gain exposure to innovative models of care, cutting-edge research, and high-acuity patient populations. Graduates of the program emerge equipped with the clinical expertise, academic experience, and leadership skills necessary to advance palliative care locally, nationally, and internationally.

Mentorship

Structured Didactics

The fellowship embeds a robust longitudinal didactic curriculum that complements clinical training and prepares fellows for academic and leadership roles:

Principles and Practice of Palliative Care

This course provides fellows with a thorough introduction to the evidence base and skill set needed for the clinical practice of palliative care. This clinical knowledge base not only prepares fellows for their clinical work in palliative care but also guides and informs their choice of a research interest. The course meets for one hour each week July through March.

Didactic Thursday

This educational series occurs twice a month for 2 hours and includes a wide variety of topics including early communication skills, case-based ethics discussions, reflective reading and writing, mindfulness training, music therapy, dignity therapy, navigation of legal matters, and career advisement, and open case discussion.

Communication Skills

Fellows receive comprehensive, longitudinal training in communication across clinical and educational settings. Training begins with a summer intensive series during Didactic Thursday, introducing the fundamentals of the fellowship’s communication mental model and skills in Motivational Interviewing. Fellows also attend a three-day regional communication retreat (Pallitalk) alongside palliative and geriatric fellows, providing hands-on practice in challenging conversations. Following the retreat, fellows participate in sessions with professional-simulated patients, guided by expert faculty, focusing on complex scenarios such as responding to requests for hastened death, discussing opioid misuse, and disclosing medical errors. In addition, fellows complete a six-week Teaching Communication Skills course, designed to equip them with practical skills to teach communication effectively, both in simulated settings and real-time clinical encounters. This training ensures that fellows develop expertise not only in patient communication but also in instructing others in these essential skills.

Communication Training

Well-Being Curriculum

In order to provide a comprehensive fellowship training that lays the foundation of a long and fulfilling career in Palliative Care, we strongly believe that our fellows need to develop sustainable skills in coping and resiliency.  We have created a Well-Being curriculum that supports our fellows as both a bonded group and as individuals. This includes a monthly process group, a robust mentorship program, reflective reading and writing sessions, mindfulness-based self-care, and a 4-session museum-based education (MBE) curriculum in partnership with the Carnegie Museum of Art. The MBE curriculum focuses on such areas as perspective-taking, the culture of medical training, sitting with our own difficult emotions, and building skills in resiliency such as self-compassion, meaning, connection, and gratitude.

Well-Being Curriculum

Fellows in the two-year program can choose additional elective courses, based on their individual interests and planned research program. Electives that suit the individual fellow’s goals can be selected from courses offered by the ICRE, as well as from other locations, including the Center for Bioethics and Health Law, the Graduate School of Public Health, the School of Social Work, and the School of Nursing.

Faculty Committment