McGaw Medical Center of Northwestern University Program

Program Identity & Fit

Northwestern's 0+5 integrated vascular surgery program, founded in 2009 as one of the earliest integrated pathways nationally, is built around a mandatory two-year, NIH T32-funded research block between the third and fourth clinical years, positioned within a department ranked 10th in NIH funding. Clinical training centers on Northwestern Memorial Hospital, a tertiary/quaternary referral center handling complex and reoperative open and endovascular vascular disease, supplemented by Jesse Brown VA and Lake Forest Hospital for socioeconomic and case-mix breadth. The program's Physician-Scientist Training Program and three formal research pathways (basic science/translational, health services/outcomes, biomedical engineering) signal an identity oriented toward producing academic vascular surgeons and surgeon-scientists rather than community proceduralists, with graded clinical independence building toward high-acuity open and endovascular autonomy in the final two years. The structure, mentorship depth (T32 mentor roster spanning cardiology, pathology, biomedical engineering), and 40-year-old parent fellowship lineage indicate the program values applicants committed to a research-embedded academic trajectory from the outset.