Course: DrNB (Doctorate of National Board) Endovascular and Interventional Radiology at Kovai Medical Center and Hospital, Coimbatore

Duration: 3 years

No of seats: 2 per year

Eligibility: MD / DNB Radiology.

Fellowship Application & Selection process: Selection process is through NEET SS examination followed by centralised All India Counselling. Good knowledge in diagnostic radiology with basics of Interventional radiology will be enough to clear the NEET SS examinations.

Thesis: Thesis is mandatory for completion of the course. Thesis topic and protocol submission needs to be completed by 3 months of joining. Thesis submission has to be done by the end of second year.

Exit exam:  Exit theory and practical examination is conducted as per the National Board Guidelines. Logbook is mandatory to maintain.

Fees: Approximately 1.25 lakhs INR as per the NBE guideline

Stipend:  50000 INR, 52000 INR, and 55000 INR for first, second and third year respectively.

Accommodation: Hostel accommodation is provided if required.

Academic activities: Weekly academic activities like seminars, journal clubs and case discussion are presented by fellows and faculties. Depending on the schedule of Cath lab cases, the academic activities will be subject to variation. Every day before starting of Cath lab cases, the planning of cases will be discussed with inputs from everyone. The discussion will continue during the cases, enhancing our thinking process.

Conferences: Candidates are encouraged to attend IR conferences on rotational basis provided there is enough manpower in the department. The consultants encourage and motivate everyone to present papers in conferences and publish them in journals.

Workplace: KMCH is a tertiary level 1000 bed hospital. Radiology and IR department has state-of-the-art imaging equipment’s with a Biplane Cath lab. The working environment is healthy with excellent mentors making it as great place to work and learn. The consultants are extremely friendly, easily approachable and are very open to take part in the discussions and address all the problems. In the event of any mistake or complication, the consultant will take the lead and face it. They will never let down their residents which is the biggest quality which I admired. All the consultants in diagnostic division are easily approachable at any time for clarification of any difficult cases. The department is very encouraging in innovative thinking and positive ideas. The consultants are great mentors not only during the residency but also after it and are available at any time for help and expert opinion in difficult situations.

Work schedule: There is an OPD team and a Cath lab team which alternates everyday comprising of junior PG, senior PG and consultant. Daily work starts at 8am with PG rounds for ICU and ward patients who are admitted under IR division and other patients to whom interventions have been done. Grand rounds are taken along with consultants later in the day.

OPD team: The OPD team is responsible for assessment of new and follow up OPD cases and presenting them to the consultant. It does relevant USG/Doppler/Cross sectional imaging pertaining to the patient. The team also works up and posts the patients for intervention. Along with this, the OPD team attends to emergency cases like assessment of acute strokes for decision making of intervention, acute bleeding and other emergency calls. Candidates need to learn Tamil as fast as possible for communicating with the patients.

Cath lab team: Cath lab team is responsible for the cases posted in that particular day. They have to be involved in verification of preprocedural workups, and in the procedure and post procedural care of the patients. Reports of the interventions have to be drafted and counter signed by a consultant.

Duties: Duties are split as per the convenience of the fellows. Duty fellow is responsible for attending emergency calls, stroke calls and resolving the issues of inpatients admitted under IR and patients in whom interventions have been done. All the fellows are expected to be available whenever emergency cases are happening in Cathlab.

Spectrum of IR: Head to toe interventions is performed in the IR division (Neuro interventions, body interventions, Aortic interventions, peripheral vascular interventions, venous, portal and biliary interventions, non-vascular interventions)

My experience in KMCH: We cannot be good in IR unless we are good clinicians. This statement goes well with the training provided by KMCH. The training focuses not only on the interventions, but also on preprocedural selection, counselling of patients, post procedural care and follow ups which is the most important part of training and is available only in few training institutes. During the three years training, head to toe interventional exposure makes us confident to thrive in the current competitive environment after we finish. I have received sufficient hands-on training to feel confident in handling independent cases after I have finished. The extent of hands-on training also will be subjected to individual confidence and skill levels and complexity of the procedure involved since the patient safety will be considered the most important priority. Also, the hands on training is completely supervised under consultant which is one of the most important aspect for proper training. Every trainee who has completed IR training in KMCH is doing extremely well after entering clinical practice.

Pros: Head to toe intervention covering all IR spectrum under one roof – No other centre has this kind of spectrum in IR division.

Clinical training in IR – Makes you a good clinician and helps to gain confidence in decision making

Patient focussed department rather than procedure focussed – We should know what to do and what not to do

Cons: Hepatobiliary and portal interventions are relatively low in number although enough to get sufficient experience after spending three years

Number and spectrum of ablative therapies is relatively low – Externship programme is being considered for further upcoming candidates at Tata Memorial Centre and other high-volume centres for the same

Very busy department and works without timing – if you do not want a busy and exhaustive training program, do not opt for it.

– Dr M A Karthikeyan MD, DrNB (EVIR), EBIR

Consultant Neuro and Vascular Interventional Radiology

Dharan Hospital, Salem

Please feel free to contact for any other information

Ph 8447255025

Email : drkarthi001@gmail.com