AAPM announces recipients of 2015 Pain Medicine Fellowship Excellence Award

The American Academy of Pain Medicine (AAPM) is pleased to announce its 2015 Pain Medicine Fellowship Excellence Award Recipients in recognition of a Pain Medicine Fellowship Program that provides an exceptional learning experience to its fellows, preparing them to deliver the highest standard of care to patients with pain. This year the Academy recognizes two programs: Mayo Clinic and Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center.

Recipient programs will be honored on Saturday, March 21, 2015 at AAPM's Annual Meeting in National Harbor, MD, where more than 1,000 scientists, physicians and key nonphysician providers convene to discuss and learn the latest in Pain Medicine.

Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, Brookline, MA
The Division of Pain Medicine at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (BIDMC) operates a comprehensive pain management center, a comprehensive headache center and jointly operates the BIDMC Spine Center. The Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center Pain Medicine Fellowship Program accepts eight fellows each year. The twelve-month fellowship includes intensive training in evaluation and treatment of pain, instruction in the technique of somatic and sympathetic blocks, intra-spinal catheters and pumps, neurolytic blocks, radiofrequency ablation, cryoanalgesia and spinal cord stimulation. Fellows spend time on both the Chronic Pain Service and Acute Pain Service, with ample time allotted for didactic sessions and multidisciplinary meetings at BIDMC and other Harvard teaching hospitals. Successful completion leads to certification eligibility by the American Board of Anesthesiology.

AAPM extends its congratulations to Christine Peeters-Asdourian, MD, Program Director, the Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center Pain Medicine Fellowship Program and its faculty and staff.

Mayo Clinic, Rochester, MN
The Mayo Clinic Pain Medicine Fellowship Program accepts four fellows each year. The Pain Medicine Fellowship focuses on teaching its fellows a multi-disciplinary team approach to managing patients' pain. As a result they receive instruction and supervision from physicians' board certified in Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, Anesthesiology, Radiology, Psychology and Neurology. All of these physicians also have completed fellowship training in pain medicine, giving our fellows unique insight into optimal management of patients with various pain conditions. Highlights of the Mayo Clinic Pain Medicine Fellowship include simulation exercises aimed at improving the pain fellow's responses to emergency situations and controlled exposure to difficult conversations with standardized patients, cadaver based surgical skills and procedure mastery lab, clinically based research exposure in multiple areas of pain medicine and a comprehensive weekly didactic. In addition, fellows receive exposure to a wide array of acute, chronic, and cancer-associated pain patients.

AAPM extends its congratulations to Bryan C. Hoelzer, MD, Program Director, the Mayo Clinic Pain Medicine Fellowship Program and its faculty and staff.