Fellowship in Endourology, Urologic Laparoscopy and Robotic-assisted surgery

Faculty

Dr Kenneth T Pace – Fellowship Director

Dr Jason Y Lee

Dr Michael Ordon

Dr Monica Farcas

Description of Training The University of Toronto Endourology, Urologic Laparoscopy, and Robotic-assisted surgery fellowship is a comprehensive 2-year program that provides clinical and research training in both endourology and minimally-invasive urologic surgery. The training program includes two training sites in downtown Toronto – St Michael’s Hospital (http://www.stmichaelshospital.com/) and Toronto General Hospital (https://www.uhn.ca/OurHospitals/TGH)

The Fellowship will consist of one year primarily focused on stone disease/endourology and the other year focused primarily on advanced laparoscopy and robotic-assisted surgery.  Clinical research occurs longitudinally throughout the fellowship. Involvement in the kidney transplant program will also occur longitudinally over the 2 year program.

Surgical training during the endourology-focused year will involve all procedures in contemporary endourology, including the ability to get your own percutaneous access. Upon completion of training, fellows will be comfortable performing stone-related surgery in standard patients as well as complex patients (eg renal transplants, urinary diversions, etc). Training during the MIS year will involve laparoscopic procedures such as simple and radical nephrectomy, donor nephrectomy, nephroureterectomy, adrenalectomy. Robotic-assisted procedures include partial nephrectomy (trans and retroperitoneal), radical prostatectomy, pyeloplasty.

In addition to surgical training, fellows will be working in the St Michael’s Hospital Kidney Stone Centre, a regionalized referral centre for shock wave lithotripsy (one of only 3 in the province of Ontario). As such, fellows will garner extensive experience in the medical management of stone disease and SWL. 

Training Requirements Fellows are required to have completed a recognized 5 or 6 year Urology Residency with appropriate certification.

Laboratory Facilities and Research Supervision Research requirements span across the 2 year training program and can be fellow-initiated projects as well as faculty-initiated studies. Clinical databases are available to allow prospective outcome studies on 2,500-2,800 shockwave patients per year, as well as all patients treated endourologically, laparoscopically and robotically. Opportunities to conduct surgical education research, surgical innovation and technology assessment research, kidney transplant studies, and clinical epidemiologic research are also available. A research coordinator is available to support all fellow projects, including REB/IRB applications. Fellows are expected to submit abstracts to annual meetings and prepare manuscripts for publication. Fellows interested in pursuing a concurrent MSc or PhD degree are encouraged to discuss options with the fellowship director.

Clinical Responsibilities The Fellow will participate in a wide range of endourologic, laparoscopic and robotic-assisted surgical procedures as outlined above. The fellow, along with the urology resident team, will be responsible for managing and rounding on the surgical patients in the peri-operative period. The fellow will also be responsible for ambulatory clinic duties within the SMH Kidney Stone Centre. Fellows will not be expected to take overnight or weekend general urology call, except for rare extenuating circumstances. Fellows will be expected to participate in both the living donor (both sites) and deceased donor renal transplant programs (at SMH site only) during the course of fellowship.

Procedures

Previous Graduates of the Fellowship Program