An ACGME-accredited 4-year residency training program is offered in anatomic and clinical pathology. Structured experiences in surgical and autopsy pathology, cytopathology, forensic pathology, pediatric pathology, neuropathology, dermatopathology, medical renal pathology, clinical chemistry, medical microbiology, immunology and coagulation, hematopathology, transfusion medicine and blood banking, cytogenetics, and molecular pathology are integrated into the training curriculum. Laboratory management and laboratory directorship training and a wide variety of subspecialty rotations are also offered. Residents gain considerable experience in procedures (fine needle aspiration, plasma exchange and red cell exchange) and participate in the undergraduate teaching programs of The University of Texas McGovern Medical School at Houston (UTHealth), as well as in the teaching conferences of other clinical departments within UTHealth teaching hospitals. Daily, weekly, and monthly intra- and inter-departmental conferences are given, including didactic conferences, unknown slide conferences, cases of the month, grand rounds, subspecialty tumor boards, etc.
The program is accredited for 28 resident positions, and 6-7 residents are accepted annually.
Residents rotate through Memorial Hermann Hospital – Texas Medical Center (MHH-TMC), the primary teaching hospital of UTHealth, which has over 1,082 adult and pediatric beds and numerous intensive care units. UTHealth Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine provides all pathology services for MHH-TMC, including autopsies, laboratory analyses for inpatients, surgical pathology and cytopathology interpretations, bone marrow and peripheral smear interpretations, and blood bank services. MHH-TMC is physically contiguous with the medical school main building, where departmental offices, conference rooms, and research laboratories are located. Residents also rotate through Lyndon B. Johnson General Hospital (LBJ Hospital), which is a UT Physicians staffed hospital for Harris County, the most populous county in Texas. Between these 2 hospitals and our own UT Outreach Laboratory, the department annually performs between 110-180 autopsies, 25,000 surgical pathology examinations, 27,500 cytopathology examinations, and over 3 million laboratory analyses. Other rotations, both elective and core, take place at UT-MD Anderson Cancer Center (a separate unit of the University of Texas) and Houston Methodist Hospital – Texas Medical Center; approximately 100,000 surgical pathology cases are accessioned annually at these four institutions combined. Thus, residents receive a very broad training experience through rotations at a university hospital, a county hospital, a world-renowned cancer center, and a private hospital. Residents also spend one month at the Harris County Institute of Forensic Sciences (HCIFS) to gain forensic pathology experience. The department maintains an extensive collection of reference textbooks, glass slides, and self-study sets. Resident physicians are granted full library privileges at the Jesse Jones Library of the Houston Academy of Medicine, one of the nation’s largest biomedical libraries, which is located across a courtyard from the medical school main building.
UTHealth is located in the Texas Medical Center (TMC), Houston, Texas. The TMC is the largest cluster of medical and health institutions in the world and is the largest group employer in Houston. The TMC now comprises over 740 acres of land with a comprehensive medical complex of 42 institutions, including 2 medical schools, 13 hospitals, and more than 6000 adult and pediatric beds, with over 5 million patient visits recorded annually. It is an international center for patient referral and health professions training, and one of the nation’s finest comprehensive centers for patient care, education, and research. Houston, the fourth largest city in the United States, offers tremendous civic amenities including theater, opera, symphony, museums, collegiate and professional sports, night life and a diverse variety of excellent restaurants.
