Cornea Fellowship review @ Sankara Netralaya (SN), Chennai

Duration- 24 months 

Selection- by exam followed by interview 

They take 2-3 fellow every 6 months

Stipend- 55k

1st month is orientation period where you shadow an assigned fellow (of any specialty) in OP and OT.

Thereafter you are posted with a cornea consultant every month from 2nd month onwards.

No cataract surgeries given in main SN hospital.

You have once weekly posting in JCOC (their camp hospital) that you are given cataracts 

And also 1 full month JCOC posting.

SICS given initially- usually 1 case/week

Phaco given only in the last month- only 30 phacos 

No training in difficult cataracts or managing complications.

In Cornea, they give you steps initially for all corneal surgeries that are done in the dept.

They see a wide variety of cornea and ocular surface cases so exposure is very good.

Hectic work environment 

Consultants are approachable and eager to teach.

Lamellar case hands-on is limited, all fellows may not get.

Refractive procedures are done in dept and you work up patients and can train in procedures in wet lab but they do not give hands-on on patients to fellows.

Academics- regular classes+

Once a week night duty (emergency/ enucleation call) and Sunday duties once a month.

In the last 6 months of fellowship you become an SR and start seeing OP independently and posting cases and you get to fine-tune yr surgical skills in this time.

You are an independent corneal surgeon by the time you exit from fellowship. Phaco skills will require further fine-tuning after fellowship, however.