Training the next generation of pediatric Heart Doctors at Dell Children’s

Families all over the United States have come to Dell Children’s Medical Center in Austin, Texas, for highly specialized care for some of the most complex pediatric heart conditions.

Behind that world-class care is a team of specialists caring for children with conditions ranging from congenital heart disease and advanced heart failure to those requiring ventricular assist devices or heart transplantation. 

Now, that expertise is helping prepare the next generation of doctors who will go on to care for our children.

Through the Pediatric Cardiology Fellowship at Dell Medical School at The University of Texas, based in the Texas Center for Pediatric & Congenital Heart Disease at Dell Children’s, doctors training to become pediatric cardiologists are learning alongside the specialists who have helped build Central Texas’ only nationally ranked pediatric heart program.

For Christopher Mardy, MD, pediatric cardiologist and fellowship program director, the program represents another chapter in the continued growth of pediatric heart care in Central Texas.

It is an opportunity to take the expertise that already exists inside Dell Children’s and pass it forward.

Built on a foundation of complex heart care

The Texas Center for Pediatric & Congenital Heart Disease brings together specialists across cardiology, congenital heart surgery, cardiac intensive care, heart transplant and other pediatric heart subspecialties.

That established foundation is also what made the fellowship possible.

“We wouldn’t have been able to start something from scratch in a program that didn’t have high-complexity patients, high-volume patients or excellent cardiac surgical expertise,” Dr. Mardy said.

For fellows, that means learning within a heart program already caring for children with some of the most complex heart conditions.

The path to becoming a pediatric cardiologist

Becoming a pediatric cardiologist takes years of specialized education and training.

After medical school, doctors interested in caring for children first complete a three-year pediatric residency. Some then choose to continue their training in a pediatric subspecialty.

For pediatric cardiologists, that means another three years of fellowship training focused specifically on caring for children with heart conditions.

At Dell Children’s, three fellows make up each incoming class. The program will eventually include nine fellows across the three years of training.

For the doctors in fellowship, those three years are about much more than learning from a textbook.

Learning from the people behind the program

Some of the most important lessons in medicine happen by being in the room.

In the program based at Dell Children’s, fellows learn directly from experienced pediatric cardiologists, cardiac intensivists, imaging specialists, electrophysiologists and congenital heart surgeons.

That includes dedicated educational opportunities with senior congenital heart surgeons.

Each week, Charles D. Fraser Jr., MD, Chief of Pediatric and Congenital Cardiothoracic Surgery and Executive Director of the Texas Center for Pediatric and Congenital Heart Disease at Dell Children’s, leads a dedicated weekly training, continuing education session where fellows learn alongside members of the cardiac team as they review recent patient cases and discuss approaches to care.

For Dr. Mardy, opportunities like this are personal.

During his own fellowship training, one of his most influential teachers was a surgeon. When helping develop the Pediatric Cardiology Fellowship program at Dell Medical School, he wanted fellows here to have similar opportunities to learn not only what decisions are made in complex heart care, but why they are made.

“This is deliberately for your education because you’re going out and becoming a cardiologist,” Dr. Mardy said. “We are starting this program with a lot of people who are not just talented clinically, but talented from an educational and mentorship standpoint.”

Preparing pediatric cardiologists for what comes next

For Dr. Mardy, success will ultimately be measured by what fellows are prepared to do after they complete their fellowship.

Some may continue into additional subspecialty training.

Others may join academic medical centers or pediatric heart programs across the country.

And, he hopes, some will choose to stay.

“I think it would be a badge of pride if some fellows did stay with us,” Dr. Mardy said.

But wherever they go, the goal is the same: that they complete the fellowship prepared for the patients who will one day depend on them.

Prepared because they have seen complexity.

Because they have learned from experienced doctors.

Because someone took the time to teach them not only what to do, but how to think through the difficult decisions that come with caring for a child with heart disease.

The Pediatric Cardiology Fellowship based at Dell Children’s represents another way the expertise that is being built can reach children and families.

For families, that means the pediatric cardiologists training at Dell Children’s are learning from children with a wide range of heart conditions. They see how care decisions are made before surgery, during a hospital stay and through follow-up.

Those experiences help prepare fellows to recognize complex heart conditions and understand when a child may need more advanced care.

Today, that expertise is caring for children with some of the most complex heart conditions.

Through the fellowship program, it is also being passed forward.

The specialists shaping the next generation of pediatric cardiologists are also caring for children and families every day. Learn more about the Texas Center for Pediatric & Congenital Heart Disease at Dell Children’s.