Blood Bank & Transfusion Medicine

The fellowship is a one year, primarily clinical experience, centered at Yale-New Haven Hospital (YNHH) with rotations at the American Red Cross (ARC) Connecticut Region in Farmington, CT and a rotation at the VA Connecticut Healthcare System West Haven Campus (VA CT).

The arrangement of the ARC, VA CT, and YNHH portions of the fellowship is flexible and can be arranged to best suit the needs of individual fellows.

For individuals with an interest in a longer term commitment to research work and to a physician-scientist career path, there may be opportunities to have an extended research experience in the laboratories of faculty from the Department of Laboratory Medicine and/or the Department of Pathology. Opportunities for research can also be arranged in the laboratories of many other Yale University faculty as part of the fellowship. For more information on some of the mentors that participate in this program and some of the opportunities available, please see the section on Research Fellowships for more details.

Stipends are commensurate with the fellow's current year of post-graduate training and are on the same scale as that received by YNHH resident staff. Also included are family-plan-level health insurance and individual disability insurance benefits. Funds are also provided for educational materials ("book allowance"). Details of the current stipend scale and benefits package are provided upon application.

The ARC is located in Farmington, CT, about a 40 minute drive from YNHH. The goal of this rotation is to provide a complete "donor services" experience.

The fellow will learn about all aspects of blood product collection (including donor apheresis), testing, processing, and distribution.

In addition, the fellow will be exposed to other "reference lab" services the ARC performs, such as HLA testing, platelet crossmatching, HLA antibody screening, and evaluation of difficult allo-and autoantibody workup.

The VA Connecticut Healthcare System is located in West Haven, about a 20-minute drive from YNHH. The VA CT hospital provides trainees with training opportunities in a smaller-scale, community hospital setting.

The fellow spends time at the VA CT Blood Bank learning blood utilization and management in the setting of a community hospital, and participating in quality improvement programs.

Clinical and translational research projects are also available during the VA CT rotation.

The fellow will be involved in all aspects of the Blood Bank and Apheresis services. The primary task in the Blood Bank is clinical management of difficult cases, including data collection, patient interaction, and coordination and consultation with medical and technical staff. Examples include: investigation of transfusion reactions, special product requests, and unexpected blood group antibodies.

These investigations frequently culminate in the writing and issuing of formal notes for the patient’s medical record. The primary role played in the Apheresis service is the evaluation of new requests for apheresis procedures and management of care for ongoing patients, both in the inpatient and outpatient setting. In addition to a diverse population of patients undergoing therapeutic plasmapheresis, erythrocytaphereis, and leukapheresis, we have a very active peripheral blood stem cell collection program which complements our ongoing autologous and allogeneic bone marrow transplantation program.

The fellow will also be a regular participant in clinical case conference presentations, journal club, teaching of residents and medical students in hematology and transfusion lectures and laboratory courses, and other intellectual and scholarly aspects of the Department of Laboratory Medicine.

In addition, clinical or applied "bench" research projects will be available to be performed in conjunction with members of the faculty.

The fellow will be on-call evenings (about two per week) and weekends (about every third) to provide Blood Bank/Apheresis backup for the on-call Laboratory Medicine resident.

It is expected that the fellow will work closely with the attending staff in the Blood Bank to coordinate clinical decision-making, and to provide a primary means for learning by the fellow.

View the listing of our past fellows' publications.

Our past fellows have attained positions at major academic hospitals as well as blood donor centers and private pathology groups in the U.S. and even abroad. Below are examples of the types of positions and institutions where our fellows practice after their graduation from our program:

2022-23: Baylor College of Medicine (Fellowship in Informatics); Mayo Clinic (Special Coagulation Fellow); Yale University School of Medicine (Clinical Instructor; T32 Immunohematology Fellow)

2021-22: Texas Children’s Hospital/Baylor College of Medicine (Assistant Professor); Thomas Jefferson University School of Medicine (Assistant Professor); Yale University School of Medicine (Assistant Professor)

2020-21: University of Florida (Assistant Professor of Pathology, Immunology & Laboratory Medicine); NYMC (Clinical Assistant Professor of Pathology); Yale University (Fellow, Cytopathology)

2019-2020: University of Rochester (Assistant Professor of Pathology; Laboratory Medicine): Wake Forest University (Assistant Professor of Pathology); Yale University (Assistant Professor of Laboratory Medicine)

2018-2019: Mount Sinai School of Medicine (Assistant Professor of Pathology); Yale University (Assistant Professor of Laboratory Medicine); Johns Hopkins University (Fellowship).

2017-2018: University of Alabama at Birmingham (Assistant Professor of Pathology & Laboratory Medicine); Cedars-Sinai Medical Center (Assistant Professor & Principal Investigator): Yale University (Assistant Professor of Laboratory Medicine).

2016-2017: St. Jude Children's Research Hospital (Assistant Member); Yale University (Instructor); VA Greater Los Angeles Healthcare System (VAQS Quality Scholar).

2015-2016: East Carolina University Brody School of Medicine (Clinical Assistant Professor of Pathology & Laboratory Medicine); Howard University College of Medicine (Assistant Professor of Pathology); Maine Medical Center (Attending Pathologist).

2014-2015: Penn State University School of Medicine(Assistant Professor of Pathology); University of Calgary School of Medicine (Clinical Assistant Professor of Pathology & Transfusion Medicine); Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine (Assistant Professor of Pathology).

2013-2014: University of Tennessee Health Science Center (Assistant Professor of Pathology); California Northstate University College of Medicine (Assistant Professor of Pathology).

2012-2013: Laboratory Medicine Consultants (private practice); Kuwait Blood Center (donor center).

2011-2012: University of Alabama at Birmingham School of Medicine (Assistant Professor of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine).

2010-2011: Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine (Assistant Professor of Pathology); Avera Health (private practice).

Applications are accepted until December 1st. 7 months in advance of the start date, e.g., December 1, 2023 for the 2024-25 fellowship. However early application is STRONGLY ENCOURAGED as interviews start as soon as applications from qualified candidates are received and decisions are announced accordingly on a rolling basis.

We also encourage those interested in our program to notify us of that interest up to several years in advance, especially for those who may be oriented toward the physician-scientist track, since this requires coordination with research programs in individual laboratories.