According to a Jan. 24 press release from the Infectious Diseases Society of America (IDSA), the Leaders in Epidemiology, Antimicrobial Stewardship and Public Health (LEAP) Fellowship program is an effective model for partnerships between early-career infectious diseases physicians and public health departments. New research entitled, “The Leaders in Epidemiology, Antimicrobial Stewardship, and Public Health (LEAP) Fellowship, a Novel Training Program in Public Health for Infectious Diseases Physicians” is now published in Clinical Infectious Diseases.
The LEAP Fellowship is a joint program offered by the Infectious Diseases Society of America, the Society for Healthcare Epidemiology of America and the Pediatric Infectious Diseases Society and is funded by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Established career development pathways are lacking for infectious diseases (ID) physicians interested in working with public health departments but the success of the LEAP program has potential to serve as a training model that can be then adapted into the traditional ID fellowship curriculum.
The press release says that “Recent years have seen an increasing number of ID-related public health challenges extending into the healthcare domain — demonstrating the need for more longitudinal partnerships between clinical ID physicians and public health. The one-year LEAP program facilitates collaboration between ID clinicians and public health departments, specifically in the fields of antimicrobial stewardship, infection prevention and health care epidemiology. Nearly all LEAP graduates continue to collaborate with public health departments while remaining clinically active, many with medical leadership positions.”
IDSA has the press release.
