Fellow and Attending Perspectives: Pediatric Orthopedic Surgery Fellowship

Abby Howenstein, M.D.:
It was really the wide scope of things that they offer here. They have specialists for everything. And then the partnership with UC Davis with a level one trauma center right across the street. I was able to do as much trauma as I wanted, see everything from limb deformity to hip preservation to general pediatric orthopedics. So really everything was offered and so many attendings offered me the opportunity to see so many different points of view and ways to manage different conditions.

Michelle James, M.D.:
Our partnership with UC Davis is absolutely essential to our function. It started in the mid 1990s with a group of people who had a really amazing vision of how Shriners could partner with UC Davis on, as we say, both sides of the street. It has grown, it has changed, but it still persists as a, I think, almost unique advantage to both institutions.

Claire Manske, M.D.:
Between the two institutions there's nothing in pediatric orthopedics that you're not going to see. It's an incredibly broad and diverse patient population that we serve. Both sides of the street, meaning UC Davis and Shriners Hospital really are experts in taking care of those broad, diverse conditions.

Holly Lesikar, M.D.:
It's a really unique fellowship and I think that's because oftentimes you have a place like Shriners where you have all the zebras and you have some of the most unique pediatric orthopedic conditions. And that's what you're doing day to day and that's all you see. And sometimes that comes with a lower volume. When you combine it with the busiest level one trauma center in California, it becomes all of a sudden a incredibly high volume program with not just the zebras, but the day to day things that you're going to be seeing in any sort of practice that you go into.

Abby Howenstein, M.D.:
Every subspecialty represented, and there's really a thought leader in all of pediatric orthopedics represented in each one of those. And all of the attendings are really excited to have you around to teach you to offer up their experiences. And even beyond that, once I unfortunately have to leave, they have offered to always be willing and always be ready to answer any questions I might have going forward when I'm out on my own.

Joel Lerman, M.D.:
I have really have an incredible group of partners and really good teachers, really good surgeons. They're all people I'd be happy to send my own kid to.

Holly Lesikar, M.D.:
We see our roles as teachers in the fellowship program, basically to take somebody who is probably a phenomenal resident and been a great learner, their whole residency, and then build them into a pediatric orthopedic surgeon.

Nicole Friel, M.D.:
The fellows are totally dedicated to what they're doing. So we work with their residents as well, and they're wonderful to work with, but the fellows come in with usually a plethora of experience and they're great surgeons already and we're just building on top of that with, just kind of, their charisma to learn even more about our patients.

Claire Manske, M.D.:
They're just such eager learners, they come in just as wanting to be a sponge, wanting to just take advantage of everything this opportunity has to offer, everything this fellowship has to offer. I love when they get excited about taking care of the patients that we treat, really getting invested in the child's care and taking care of that patient and families.

Michelle James, M.D.:
They are far enough along in their training that they look at it with new eyes and might question things that we do, and sometimes those are really good questions and we need to reconsider the way that we take care of kids. So I enjoy it from both angles I learned from them and hopefully they learn from me.

Abby Howenstein, M.D.:
It's really great having so many attendings here who all really want you to be around and are really excited to teach you. And it offers a lot of flexibility, so it's kind of a choose your own adventure type situation. Where if there's something really exciting case I get to be there and there is no question about other people getting in the way or that type of thing. It's really a ability to know what I want to do with my future and make sure I'm getting that education. We have everything from hip arthroscopy, which isn't offered in many pediatric orthopedic fellowships to the P-A-O and many times on the same patient. And then we see the surgical hip dislocation side of things. So really any pathology involved that my need hip preservation is represented here. And again, I'm the only fellow so I'm involved in all of those cases if I want to be.

Abby Howenstein, M.D.:
One of the beautiful things about Shriners is not only does it have a general pediatric orthopedics base, but it also has the once in a career type cases that come along and you get to see those multiple times per year. So, being able to treat the really crazy conditions helps me be ready for the general stuff that I will probably see once I get out into practice.