Nemours will start its first pediatric residency program

Nemours Children’s Hospital, the youngest of the three children’s hospitals in Orlando, is starting its first residency program, the health system announced Wednesday.

Nemours’ three-year pediatric residency program is approved to accept up to 12 doctors a year and will begin in summer 2019.

The arrival of doctor trainees is good news for Nemours physicians, who have been looking forward to mixing their daily practice with training young doctors, said Dr. Heather Fagan, who oversees graduate medical education at Nemours. “When you have physicians and trainees, you’re doing better work,” she said. “Everyone is very excited.”

The new residency program also brings more young doctors to Central Florida who can turn into future local pediatricians. “Twothirds of residents stay where they train, so that’ll be great news for Central Florida,” said Fagan.

Florida had the fourth-highest physician retention percentage in the country in 2016, retaining nearly 60 percent of the doctors after they finished training, according to the 2017 State Physician Workforce Data Report. The national median was 45 percent.

Nemours’ new program will be an addition to the existing pediatric residencies at Orlando Health and Florida Hospital.

Orlando Health’s Arnold Palmer Hospital accepts 14 pediatric residents each year, and Florida Hospital accepts six.

Of the three, Orlando Health is the only one to train pediatricians who go into subspecialties. The health system offers fellowships in emergency medicine, gastroenterology, orthopedics, sports medicine and craniofacial surgery.

More advanced pediatric training programs are expected to come to Central Florida, as Florida Hospital and Nemours each say they’re planning on starting new fellowships in the near future.

Nemours will start interviewing fourth-year medical students this fall. It is still ironing out some details, including a partner hospital that has labor and delivery.