The Hematology/Oncology Fellowship is a three-year, ACGME-accredited program that admits four fellows per year and serves Penn State Health Milton S. Hershey Medical Center and Penn State Cancer Institute.
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Program Details
The combined program will prepare the trainee for obtaining board certification in both Hematology and Oncology. The two-year Hematology Program will prepare the trainee for obtaining board certification in Hematology.
To be a candidate for this ACGME-approved training position, the qualified candidate will be completing (or already has completed) a three-year ACGME-accredited internal medicine residency. It is expected that the candidate be board-eligible for internal medicine by the start of the training program.
The three-year combined Hematology/Oncology Fellowship aims to provide a strong foundation across the wide spectrum of hematology and oncology clinical medicine. Fellows will have an opportunity to build their skills in general hematology and oncology and work with content experts while enhancing practical and professional skills. Through outpatient clinic experiences supplemented by inpatient and consult services, fellows will be prepared for independent practice and careers with a focus of their choosing.
The first 18 months of training are dedicated to foundations of practice through a combination of inpatient consult and outpatient clinical experiences. The second 18 months are individualized based on each fellow’s career goals with dedicated curriculum guided by four noncompetitive tracks:
- Generalist Track: Ideal for those interested in community based practice
- Disease Focus Track: Ideal for those interested in academic medicine with a clinical research interest
- Research Track/ABIM Pathway: Ideal for those interested in academic medicine with a lab or translational-based research
- Clinician Educator Track: Ideal for those interested in academic medicine with a clinical education interest
The two-year Hematology Track within the Hematology/Oncology Fellowship is intended to equip trainees with the knowledge and skills needed to address complex problems in blood diseases, with a focus on benign hematology. Trainees in the two-year Hematology Track will be required to develop individual research projects to be completed within six months of the two-year fellowship. A third year in either clinical or basic/translational research will be facilitated for trainees who successfully complete the two-year program and are committed to a career in academic medicine.
The Graduate Medical Education Office coordinates residents who are interested in participating in a Hematology/Oncology elective rotation at Penn State Health Milton S. Hershey Medical Center. Learn more about visiting residents here.
Program Highlights
- Varied experience
- University academic hospital – 90 to 100% of time spent at university hospital
- Affiliated VA hospital
- Community-based elective at affiliated sites
- Individualized training
- Stem cell transplant program (allogeneic, autologous and CAR-T therapy)
- Hemophilia and Thrombosis Center of Central Pennsylvania
- Sickle cell clinic
- Cancer genetics program
- Health population sciences
- Palliative care medicine
- Pediatric hematology/oncology
- Radiation oncology
- Cooperative group affiliation
- Opportunity to participate in basic science, laboratory research or clinical trial
- Dedicated Cancer Institute Clinical Trials Office: Big Ten network, ACRIN, ECOG, NSABP, RTOG, pharmaceutical industry trials
Learn More about the Fellowship
General Application Information
The Hematology/Oncology Fellowship participates in the National Residency Matching Program (NRMP), and all applications are submitted through ERAS, the Electronic Residency Application Service.
Application Requirements: Hematology/Oncology Fellowship
- Possess an MD or DO degree
- Be a U.S. citizen, non-citizen national, permanent resident or holder of a J-1 training visa per institutional policies
- Have successfully completed an ACGME-accredited internal medicine residency training program
Application Requirements: Hematology Track
- Possess an MD or DO degree, or a doctoral degree in a related discipline
- Be a U.S. citizen, non-citizen national, permanent resident or holder of a J-1 training visa per institutional policies
- Have successfully completed an ACGME-accredited internal medicine residency training program
- Have a commitment to a career focused on benign hematology, with a specific interest in hemostasis and thrombosis
What to Submit
Applicants will need to submit the following information through ERAS:
- ERAS application
- CV
- Three letters of recommendation (one from the residency program director)
- Medical school transcript
- USMLE scores
- Personal statement
The core faculty in the Hematology/Oncology Fellowship and the Hematology Track are full-time academic physicians committed to patient care, teaching and laboratory and clinical research.
Many allied faculty at Penn State Health Milton S. Hershey Medical Center and affiliated institutions participate in training the fellows.
Faculty research interests include endocrine oncology, transplant immunology, LGL leukemia, bleeding and clotting disorders, bone metastases, tumor biology and population science.
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Penn State Health
Penn State Health is an integrated academic health system serving patients and communities across 15 counties in central Pennsylvania. It employs more than 20,900 people systemwide.
The system includes Penn State Health Milton S. Hershey Medical Center, Penn State Health Children’s Hospital and Penn State Cancer Institute based in Hershey, Pa.; Penn State Health Hampden Medical Center in Enola, Pa.; Penn State Health Holy Spirit Medical Center in Camp Hill, Pa.; Penn State Health Lancaster Medical Center in Lancaster, Pa.; Penn State Health St. Joseph Medical Center in Reading, Pa.; Pennsylvania Psychiatric Institute, a specialty provider of inpatient and outpatient behavioral health services, in Harrisburg, Pa.; and 2,417 physicians and direct care providers at 225 outpatient practices. Additionally, the system jointly operates various healthcare providers, including Penn State Health Rehabilitation Hospital, Hershey Outpatient Surgery Center and Hershey Endoscopy Center.
In 2017, Penn State Health partnered with Highmark Health to facilitate creation of a value-based, community care network in the region.
Penn State Health shares an integrated strategic plan and operations with Penn State College of Medicine, the University’s medical school. With campuses in State College and Hershey, Pa., the College of Medicine boasts a portfolio of more than $150 million in funded research and more than 1,700 students and trainees in medicine, nursing, other health professions and biomedical research.
Learn more about Penn State Health
Penn State Health Children’s Hospital (left), Penn State Health Milton S. Hershey Medical Center (center) and Penn State Cancer Institute (right)
Penn State Health Milton S. Hershey Medical Center
500 University Dr., Hershey, Pa., 17033 (Derry Township, Dauphin County)
- The health system’s 611-bed flagship teaching and research hospital
- The only medical facility in Pennsylvania accredited as both an adult and a pediatric Level I (highest-level) trauma center
- Dedicated surgical, neuroscience, cardiovascular, trauma and medical intensive care units
- Accredited Life Lion critical-care transport providing more than 1,100 helicopter and approximately 750 ground ambulance transports per year
- More than 1,300 faculty members and more than 650 residents and fellows
- Approximately 29,000 admissions, 73,000 emergency department visits, 1.1 million outpatient visits and 33,000 surgical procedures annually
- Designated as a Magnet hospital since 2007
Learn more about Milton S. Hershey Medical Center
Penn State Health Children’s Hospital
600 University Dr., Hershey, Pa. 17033 (Derry Township, Dauphin County)
- An eight-story, 263,000-square-foot-facility built in 2013 and expanded in 2020
- 160 licensed pediatric beds, 26-bed pediatric intensive care unit and a 56-bed neonatal intensive care unit
- Level IV (highest-level) neonatal intensive care unit
- Level I quaternary (highest-level) pediatric intensive care unit
- Level I (highest-level) pediatric trauma center designation
- Intermediate care unit
- Dedicated pediatric operating rooms
- More than 150,000 pediatric outpatient visits, 20,000 pediatric emergency room visits, and approximately 5,000 pediatric patient discharges annually
Learn more about Penn State Health Children’s Hospital
Penn State Cancer Institute
Penn State Cancer Institute
400 University Dr., Hershey, Pa., 17033 (Derry Township, Dauphin County)
- The region’s only comprehensive cancer center
- Clinical services offered at the institute in Hershey, Pa., as well as in State College, Pa. (in partnership with Mount Nittany Health) and Reading, Pa., at Penn State Health St. Joseph
- Five floors, with ground level and first two devoted to patient care and top two housing research labs
- Infusion therapy suites, private chemotherapy rooms and a state-of-the-art radiation oncology suite
- Dedicated chemotherapy and infusion pharmacy
Welcome to Hershey
More About Hershey
Interested in learning more about living and working in Hershey, Pa.? See details here:
Wellness, including emotional, spiritual, social and physical health, is a crucial component to training and to becoming a professional, compassionate and resilient physician. Self-care is a skill which must be continually practiced and reinforced. Penn State College of Medicine and Penn State Health are committed to addressing wellness among residents and fellows, with multiple resources readily available.
Institutional resources
- Visit BeWell – a health program designed to support Penn State Health employees
- See Penn State College of Medicine wellness resources here
- Employee Health Care Concierge and Case Management Service
- Partners in Medicine
Moving to a new city with your family does not have to be stressful. Residency programs have assisted many significant others with finding employment. There is also a GME-Wide Partners in Medicine (PIM) group that offers networking opportunities as well as various social and community oriented activities. - The Doctors Kienle Center for Humanistic Medicine
- Active and easily accessed Office of Professional Mental Health
Graduate medical education resources
Institutional Resources
Penn State Health and Penn State College of Medicine celebrate, embrace and support the diversity of all patients, faculty, staff, students and trainees.
Office for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion
In keeping with this, Penn State Health has an active Office for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion with various programs, networks and resource groups, including:
- Talks and lectures on diversity, equity and inclusion through the Inclusion Academy
- Regular events on topics such as eradicating racism and creating a culture of inclusiveness
- Many Business Employee Resource Groups (BERGs), including:
- Disability Business Employee Resource Group
- Interfaith Business Employee Resource Group
- LGBTQ+ Business Employee Resource Group
- Military and Veterans Business Employee Resource Group
- Multicultural Business Employee Resource Group
- NextGen Business Employee Resource Group
- Black Physician Professional Staff Association – Resource Group
- Hispanic Professional Association
- Asian Physician and Professional Staff Association
- International Workforce Inclusion
- Inclusion Academy
Learn more about the Penn State Health Office for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion
Learn more about the College of Medicine’s Office for Diversity, Equity and Belonging
Office for Culturally Responsive Health Care Education
The vision at Penn State College of Medicine and Penn State Health is to equip learners with the knowledge, skills and attitudes they will need to provide culturally excellent health care and research for an increasingly diverse U.S. population. The Office for Culturally Responsive Health Care Education was formed to help meet that goal.
Learn more about the Office for Culturally Responsive Health Care Education
Office for a Respectful Learning Environment
In addition, the institution does not tolerate discrimination, biases, microaggression, harassment or learner mistreatment of any kind, and any concerns are immediately addressed by the Office for a Respectful Learning Environment.
Learn more about the Office for a Respectful Learning Environment
Network of Under-represented Residents and Fellows
The Network of Under-represented Residents and Fellows (NURF) is a group of diverse residents and fellows representing all specialties. NURF’s goal is to promote cultural diversity in the residency programs through community involvement, mentorship with diverse faculty, professional networking and support for the recruitment of diverse medical students into the residency programs.
NURF is sponsored by the Penn State College of Medicine Graduate Medical Education Office and the Penn State Health Office for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion.
Mailing Address
Penn State Health Milton S. Hershey Medical Center
Division of Hematology/Oncology
500 University Dr., Mailcode CH46
Hershey, PA 17033-0850
Curriculum Details
Sections involved in the Hematology/Oncology Fellowship include:
- Continuity clinic with individualized cohort of patients for different disease types
- Outpatient clinic rotations
- Hematology consultation service
- Oncology consultation service
- Inpatient hematology/oncology team
- Hematology lab/blood bank
- Gynecologic oncology and genetics
- Lebanon VA Hospital
- Community practice elective at affiliated sites
- Palliative care
- Radiation oncology therapy
- Stem cell transplant
- Research
The Quality Oncology Practice Initiative (QOPI) is a twice-a-year chart review that serves as the ACGME-required Practice-Based Learning improvement project. Learn more about QOPI here.
Didactic learning includes the following:
- ACGME Core Competency Lecture Series
- Cancer Institute Interdisciplinary Conference
- Hematology/Oncology Grand Rounds
- Medicine Grand Rounds
- Fellows’ noon conferences are held Monday-Friday on the following topics:
- High-yield disease based management topics by Heme/Onc Faculty
- Biostatistics
- Fellow Journal Club
- Ethics and communications
- Genetics
- Pharmacology
- Board reviews
- Peripheral slide series
- Fellow Tumor Board
- Hematology Case Conference
- Benign Hematology Conference series
- Fellow feedback sessions
- Tumor-specific conferences
- Brain tumor
- Breast
- Gastrointestinal foregut tumor conference
- Gastrointestinal conference
- Genitourinary
- Head and neck
- Melanoma and cutaneous malignancies
- Sarcoma
- Thoracic
- Malignant hematology
- Benign hematology
- Gynecologic
Evaluations of the fellows will be completed using the following methods:
- Monthly rotational evaluations
- Individual semi-annual reviews
- Multisource (360-degree) evaluations
- Self-assessments
- Systematic annual program review
- Each fellow must attend a conference for bone marrow biopsy training.
- Each fellow must complete five supervised marrows with either an experienced APP or senior fellow with satisfactory sampling. Each fellow will be assigned to an experienced APP team or senior fellow to complete five supervised marrows in their first month of fellowship
- After completion of five supervised marrows, each fellow must arrange to have one witnessed bone marrow biopsy by the program director or associate program director or other approved hematology attending with satisfactory sampling. Attending will “sign off” on fellow’s ability to perform marrows on their own.
Fellow Honors and Recognitions
Penn State College of Medicine and Penn State Health Milton S. Hershey Medical Center accept ongoing nominations for the Exceptional Moments in Teaching award.
The award, given monthly by the Office for a Respectful Learning Environment, accepts nominations from College of Medicine students who are invited to submit narratives about faculty members, residents, fellows, nurses or any other educators who challenge them and provide an exceptional learning experience. See more about the award here.
Previous nominees from the Hematology/Oncology Fellowship are listed here. Click the + next to a nominee name to read their nominator’s comments.
Latest News from Hematology/Oncology
Latest News from Penn State Cancer Institute
Program Leadership
Myles Nickolich, MD
Program Director
Monali Vasekar, MD
Associate Program Director
