Pathology Residency Program

To provide the optimal environment for residents to acquire:

• A solid foundation for the understanding of human disease processes.
• A knowledge base necessary to practice clinical and anatomic pathology in either a private or academic setting
• Problem solving and critical analysis skills necessary for the practice of pathology in a setting of graduated responsibilities

The Pathology and Laboratory Medicine Residency Program at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, offers training in Anatomic Pathology & Clinical Pathology (AP/CP). Residents beginning training in or after the 2009-2010 academic year may choose AP only training. Our program provides excellent training in all aspects of AP and CP, allowing for graduating residents to attain high-caliber fellowship and private practice positions, as well as a path towards academic careers in pathology.
     Current Resident Roster
     Recent Graduate Outcomes

The residents in our program have historically had a variety of specialty and career interests. We believe that this heterogeneity provides an optimal atmosphere for peer-to-peer teaching and for a variety of perspectives during training. The University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health is both a leading research institution as well as an important source of well-trained clinicians both in Wisconsin and throughout the country. To that end, our program attempts to provide optimal, and personally tailored training of physicians with career goals spanning a range of academic or private practice positions.

• Size – We have a total of approximately 18 residents (4-6 residents per class). The relatively moderate size of our program allows for a more individualized training program, more one-on-one teaching at the microscope, more opportunities for research and fellowships, and a more responsive Director and Coordinator.
• Faculty – Over 35 different faculty members are directly involved in the training of residents http://www.pathology.wisc.edu/Faculty/. Our clinical faculty come from a wide variety of high quality training programs, rather than all being products of our own program with a homogenous approach to pathology. They consistently receive high marks for their commitment to quality teaching by our residents. If you are looking for academically accomplished faculty with a host of translational research interests and a talent and enthusiasm for training young pathologists, our program may be a good fit.
• Fellowships – Our program offers specialty fellowships in cytopathology, hematopathology, surgical pathology, and transfusion medicine. While we encourage residents to seek specialty training outside of UW, the fact is that many fellowship spots across the country are filled by “internal” applicants, making the presence of clinical fellowships one important consideration in deciding on a residency program.
• Research – The Department of Pathology has made a commitment to resident research, providing small "grants" to residents so projects can get up and running, regardless of faculty funding. This is critical in getting research accomplished during a busy residency. Residents can become involved in basic to clinical research with any UW faculty member, regardless of department.
• Location – As a resident, you will be spending four or more years of your life in a new city at the same time that you will find you are growing tired of living like a poor student. Location is not just a superficial consideration when making residency choices. Madison is a small city of about 300,000 people that houses the State Capital and a large public university. Its size makes it an easy place to live, with minimal traffic, crime, or cost-of-living, but its proximity to Chicago and Milwaukee, as well as its highly educated and professional population creates a more cosmopolitan atmosphere than in other cities of comparable size. Madison and its suburbs have received recognition as among the best places to live and work in the U.S. It is a city full of lakes and parks, some great restaurants, good music, and friendly people. Sure, the weather is not exactly like San Diego’s, but the four seasons can be spectacular here (and with the money you save on housing, you can afford a trip to the beach in February).

Anatomic Pathology at UW consists of training in Autopsy, Neuropathlogy, Cytopathology, and Surgical Pathology.

Autopsy: Over 650 autopsies are performed at UW annually, of which over 400 are forensic cases. We have 2 dedicated faculty members with expertise in forensic autopsy, Drs. Corliss and Stier. Residents have excellent opportunity for exposure to forensics during their 4.5 months of required autopsy rotations, but can also do elective months focusing on forensics, pediatrics or other autopsy areas. Neuropathology is covered both on the autopsy rotation but also in an additional 1.5 month rotation where more focus is on malignant neuropathology and frozen sections.

Cytology: There are 4 total months of required cytopathology training at UW, the first being in the State Lab of Hygiene, which sees a greater proportion of gynecologic pathology and the other 3 at UWHC, where more solid organ (FNA) and other specimens are handled. The final two months of cytology are adapted to the residents’ career interests, with time for research projects for those wishing to apply for cytology fellowships. The cytopathology department is the most advanced at UW in terms of using telepathology technologies in their day-to-day operations in different UW clinics, the radiology suite, and remote sites.

Surgical Pathology: Surgical pathology at UW (combined with the VA, Watertown, and American Family Children's hospital) sees over 35,000 specimens per year with an excellent mix of "bread-and-butter" biopsies and more esoteric specimens originating from the large number of organ transplant patients at UW and the NCI-funded Carbone Cancer Center. We currently use a mix of general and subspecialized signouts with most residents seeing a general mixture of specimens. A team of 4 residents rotates between grossing, signing out large specimens, signing out biopsies, and a "float" day. Residents are given time to preview their cases and sign out 1 on 1 with faculty at the scope. Numerous elective opportunities in subspecialty areas of surgical pathology such as renal, derm, gyn, and soft tissue are available. In addition, residents spend about 10 weeks at Meriter, a private hospital in Madison, where they are exposed to a private practice surgical pathology system and gain further experience in placental pathology and cytology.

How UW’s program is unique.
Starting in July, 2010, we changed our clinical pathology rotation structure and began offering what we think is a dramatically different way of teaching residents clinical pathology. A team of 4 to 5 residents, from PGY1-4 rotate together for 3 months each year in the UW clinical laboratory, encompassing the areas of molecular diagnostics, cytogenetics, chemistry, coagulation, immunology, microbiology, transfusion medicine, and some "wet" hematology. While there is still teacing of technique and procedure at the bench, the focus is on cased-based learning with faculty, through didactic sessions, participation in sign-out and interpretation of laboratory tests, and involvement in real-world laboratory management issues. In addition to these 12 months, residents spend 3 months in hematopathology at UW and 3 months at St. Mary’s hospital, a private hospital in Madison, where they have a great deal of independence dealing with hematology and other laboratory issues.

Why the change?
We find that dividing up the clinical laboratory into narrowly focused 1 month rotations (e.g. Chemistry, Blood Bank, etc.) results in only limited and widely separated exposure to high-impact learning opportunities such as signing out molecular diagnostics results or difficult coagulation tests, with too much emphasis on learning the technologists’ jobs rather than that of the attending laboratory director. Further, the lack of repeated exposure throughout residency to these high impact moments results in even senior residents feeling like beginners when they return to a rotation area that they haven’t experienced for 1-3 years. Lastly, one of the deficiencies noted across the country in newly graduated pathology residents is their lack of exposure and understanding of laboratory management issues that they are expected to take on early in their first jobs. These include personnel management, QA/QC/QI, understanding the elements involved in bringing a new test online in the laboratory, or purchasing a major piece of equipment, to name a few. The 3 month time frame of the rotation allows PGY3-4 residents the opportunity to see these processes from start to finish and actively participate in them.