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- Aug 20, 2003
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HealthPartners/Regions Hospital
Residents: 9 residents per year. All really happy, down to earth, friendly. Mostly from the Midwest. Like to hang out together...while I was there, they had a residency retreat, which consisted of an AM meeting, and then bowling in the afternoon. They all had a great time together, and it was clear from their interactions that they had spent a lot of time outside of the hospital together. When I asked about their favorite part of the residency program, they unanimously thought they had superior comraderie.
Faculty: I know most of the faculty well from work I did there before med school, and they are all extremely dedicated to teaching. Felix Ankel, the PD, is awesome, and very supportive of his residents. He has a very good relationship with the department chair, and the residency has a lot of support from the ED and hospital administration. Very open to change based on resident feedback. Several nationally known faculty including Bob Knopp, who is one of the editors of Annals, as well as the chair, Brent Asplin, who is on numerous ACEP commitees and does a lot of work with ED crowding. There has been some recent faculty turnover over the past couple of years, however when I asked about this, pretty much everyone had left for various personal/career development reasons such as significant others moving, etc. They have gotten some great young faculty who are superb teachers.
Hospital:
Regions is the primary site, with a 34 bed ED (although they are currently expanding, which should be done in a year or so, and will approx. double the size of the ED), Level-I trauma center, and >60K visits/year, including pediatric visits (although most sick kids go to either St. Paul Childrens or Mpls Childrens, both of which the residents rotate through). Mostly blunt trauma. They also go to North Memorial for a community ED experience. Fast track staffed about 14 hrs/day with PA's.
Ancillary Stuff: The nurses and techs are great! Did one fem stick but otherwise all blood draws, IVs, etc were done for me (unless I wanted to do them). No scut. EM2 always has the airway in trauma. EM resident on the trauma service runs the traumas (split with surgery resident). Social work pretty much makes all the dispositions on the psych patients, and if they board for a long time (psych beds are tight in MN, as they are everywhere), they are moved up to a special psych holding area upstairs and their care is taken over by a PA. They use vocera to communicate within the ED, which cuts down on the inefficiency of tracking someone down if you need to tell them something.
Admitting/Documentation: Full admitting privileges. Beautiful new electronic medical record system, tracking board, electronic order entry, online rads viewers and labs. Pretty much only paper is EKG (though old EKGs are available online). All old charts available online immediately.
Curriculum: PGY 1-3. SICU and MICU as PGY 1s and 2s, 2 dedicated peds months, however pedi is mixed in at the main hospital as well (though more infrequent, but likely would see at least a couple pedi patients on every shift), also ortho, anesthesia, OB/Gyn, cards as a 1st year Residents thought their off service rotations were excellent, and liked the ICU heavy curriculum. No gen med floor months, but there is a cards rotation, which they were trying to tweak a little to get more EKG teaching. First years work only evening and night shifts to get more procedure experience outside of the times that there are most likely to be specialty services in house. 2s and 3s work 10 hour shifts (which they had recently changed to allow more days off). Ultrasound used constantly -- several awesome ultrasound faculty, although they are working on making sure that all faculty are certified and can easily use the ultrasound. Major goal is progressive responsibility -- 3rd years manage flow through the department and supervises off service residents, the 2nd years are expected to see most of the patients.
Didactics/Research: Same didactics you'll find everywhere basically...protected conference time (5 hrs on thurs AM). Research available for those who want it, although probably a bit of a weakness at this point, since the research coordinator recently left, and they have yet to find a replacement. Dept chair used to be the research director, so he is very supportive of research in the department.
City: The Twin Cities are actually really nice, although winters can be a little long. It is a refugee resettlement community, and has the largest Somali population of anywhere in the country. There is also a decent hispanic population. Lots of good restaurants, parks, ice skating on lakes in the winter. When I worked at Regions, I lived in Uptown (near Mpls), and was about a 15 minute drive without traffic, about double that with bad traffic. Also, who can resist the Mall of America (kidding....).
Extras: First years go to SAEM as a class, otherwise decent benefits, pay, memberships, etc. Excellent sim center. International rotations possible.
Negatives: As I mentioned above, research might be a little more difficult for people needing more assistance (although the support is definitely there), although I know they are looking for a coordinator. The interns didn't seem to mind the evening and night schedule, but this may be a negative for some. The location is likely a negative for people not wanted long/cold winters.
Overall: This is an awesome program, and I would encourage people to apply here. I think it sometimes gets overshadowed by its more well known neighbor, Hennepin, however the training here is top notch, and you will undoubtedly come out of this program well prepared. Feel free to PM me with any other questions!
Residents: 9 residents per year. All really happy, down to earth, friendly. Mostly from the Midwest. Like to hang out together...while I was there, they had a residency retreat, which consisted of an AM meeting, and then bowling in the afternoon. They all had a great time together, and it was clear from their interactions that they had spent a lot of time outside of the hospital together. When I asked about their favorite part of the residency program, they unanimously thought they had superior comraderie.
Faculty: I know most of the faculty well from work I did there before med school, and they are all extremely dedicated to teaching. Felix Ankel, the PD, is awesome, and very supportive of his residents. He has a very good relationship with the department chair, and the residency has a lot of support from the ED and hospital administration. Very open to change based on resident feedback. Several nationally known faculty including Bob Knopp, who is one of the editors of Annals, as well as the chair, Brent Asplin, who is on numerous ACEP commitees and does a lot of work with ED crowding. There has been some recent faculty turnover over the past couple of years, however when I asked about this, pretty much everyone had left for various personal/career development reasons such as significant others moving, etc. They have gotten some great young faculty who are superb teachers.
Hospital:
Regions is the primary site, with a 34 bed ED (although they are currently expanding, which should be done in a year or so, and will approx. double the size of the ED), Level-I trauma center, and >60K visits/year, including pediatric visits (although most sick kids go to either St. Paul Childrens or Mpls Childrens, both of which the residents rotate through). Mostly blunt trauma. They also go to North Memorial for a community ED experience. Fast track staffed about 14 hrs/day with PA's.
Ancillary Stuff: The nurses and techs are great! Did one fem stick but otherwise all blood draws, IVs, etc were done for me (unless I wanted to do them). No scut. EM2 always has the airway in trauma. EM resident on the trauma service runs the traumas (split with surgery resident). Social work pretty much makes all the dispositions on the psych patients, and if they board for a long time (psych beds are tight in MN, as they are everywhere), they are moved up to a special psych holding area upstairs and their care is taken over by a PA. They use vocera to communicate within the ED, which cuts down on the inefficiency of tracking someone down if you need to tell them something.
Admitting/Documentation: Full admitting privileges. Beautiful new electronic medical record system, tracking board, electronic order entry, online rads viewers and labs. Pretty much only paper is EKG (though old EKGs are available online). All old charts available online immediately.
Curriculum: PGY 1-3. SICU and MICU as PGY 1s and 2s, 2 dedicated peds months, however pedi is mixed in at the main hospital as well (though more infrequent, but likely would see at least a couple pedi patients on every shift), also ortho, anesthesia, OB/Gyn, cards as a 1st year Residents thought their off service rotations were excellent, and liked the ICU heavy curriculum. No gen med floor months, but there is a cards rotation, which they were trying to tweak a little to get more EKG teaching. First years work only evening and night shifts to get more procedure experience outside of the times that there are most likely to be specialty services in house. 2s and 3s work 10 hour shifts (which they had recently changed to allow more days off). Ultrasound used constantly -- several awesome ultrasound faculty, although they are working on making sure that all faculty are certified and can easily use the ultrasound. Major goal is progressive responsibility -- 3rd years manage flow through the department and supervises off service residents, the 2nd years are expected to see most of the patients.
Didactics/Research: Same didactics you'll find everywhere basically...protected conference time (5 hrs on thurs AM). Research available for those who want it, although probably a bit of a weakness at this point, since the research coordinator recently left, and they have yet to find a replacement. Dept chair used to be the research director, so he is very supportive of research in the department.
City: The Twin Cities are actually really nice, although winters can be a little long. It is a refugee resettlement community, and has the largest Somali population of anywhere in the country. There is also a decent hispanic population. Lots of good restaurants, parks, ice skating on lakes in the winter. When I worked at Regions, I lived in Uptown (near Mpls), and was about a 15 minute drive without traffic, about double that with bad traffic. Also, who can resist the Mall of America (kidding....).
Extras: First years go to SAEM as a class, otherwise decent benefits, pay, memberships, etc. Excellent sim center. International rotations possible.
Negatives: As I mentioned above, research might be a little more difficult for people needing more assistance (although the support is definitely there), although I know they are looking for a coordinator. The interns didn't seem to mind the evening and night schedule, but this may be a negative for some. The location is likely a negative for people not wanted long/cold winters.
Overall: This is an awesome program, and I would encourage people to apply here. I think it sometimes gets overshadowed by its more well known neighbor, Hennepin, however the training here is top notch, and you will undoubtedly come out of this program well prepared. Feel free to PM me with any other questions!
