Welcome Letters

From the chairman

A lifelong commitment to fostering the health and well-being of our children and their families distinguishes pediatrics from other clinical disciplines. Learning the art of pediatric care will be one of the most exciting and rewarding experiences you encounter as you make the transition from medical school to residency. However, pediatrics is also rapidly evolving as a science, especially as we begin to assimilate the knowledge and promise of precision medicine into the more traditional aspects of clinical practice. Be assured, the integration of genomic data and molecular pathways into pediatrics will be transformative, and will undoubtedly effect how we train the next generation of pediatricians. As you begin to consider the type of pediatric training that aligns best with your career goals, you may want to consider those programs that offer rapidly changing curricula to keep pace with new technology and data that is driving a deeper understanding of how we will diagnose and treat pediatric diseases.

Dating back greater than 125 years, the Department of Pediatrics at the Washington University School of Medicine has a long-standing tradition of providing pediatric training in the backdrop of basic, translational and clinical research programs that are intimately woven into the academic fabric of the Washington University School of Medicine. Over 400 full-time and part-time physicians, 80 subspecialty fellows and the superlative allied-health staff at St. Louis Children’s Hospital support the training mission. In addition, the program directors continuously re-craft the longitudinal educational curriculum to complement the hands-on clinical training that occurs in the clinics, wards and ICUs of St. Louis Children’s Hospital. This meticulously crafted, mentored training program endows young physicians with the practical skill set and state-of-the-art knowledge to identify and treat the full spectrum of pediatric diseases.

Ultimately, our residency training program is designed to enhance your overall career development by teaching you the fundamentals of pediatric care and to raise your academic awareness by contemplating fundamentally important issues surrounding childhood diseases. Whether we help prepare trainees for a career in general pediatrics or as a physician-scientist in a pediatric subspecialty, residents leave our program feeling fully prepared to take on any career path.

Gary A. Silverman, MD, PhD
Chairman, Department of Pediatrics

From the program director

Congratulations on your excellent choice of Pediatrics! Caring for children is an amazing privilege, as is preparing you to do so. Residency training is an exciting and unique experience- learning while doing and collaborating with an interprofessional team to advance care for children! Our program offers a rich and collaborative clinical environment. You will see everything, learn from experts in pediatrics and be exceptionally prepared for the next steps of your career. I invite you to explore the many unique aspects of our program and apply to join our community!