University of Utah Residency Reviews

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vacoug

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Utah


(My home institution)


Residents: Honestly this group is very impressive especially for a program that is only three years old. Many of these people came from top notch school and chose to come to a new program over older more established programs. They are very tight, seem to get along well and have a lot of fun together. Lots of outdoors interests but who wouldn’t have those when the mountains are a two minute walk out the emergency dept exit.

Faculty: I believe that this is the strength and the weakness of the program. Many of the faculty and most of the younger members are amazing teachers. Most trained at top programs including Carolinas, Highland, Denver, Pitt, Fresno, Arizona, and New Mexico just to name a few. These young well-trained faculty are amazing teachers and great clinicians. The weakness lies in the older physicians at the private hospital where you rotate. Most of the older docs were not emergency trained and a few are just plain unhappy about working with students and residents. These people are definitely in the minority and close to retiring and may have with the hospital move this past fall. Dr Hartsell is the PD and he is very interested in the resident’s happiness and training. He is somewhat of a renaissance-man and very fun to talk to. Dr Stroud the assistant PD is a hoot she has different color hair all the time and her personality is just as fun. She also is very hands on with the residents and they all seem to love her. This group seems very close to their residents and they do things with the residents all the time including usually something physical after didactics each week for those who don’t have to work..

Ancillary Staff: Top notch across the board, never did any scut.

Curriculum: One of the nice things about a new program is a very stream lined curriculum, no off service rotations that are just traditional. I think the curriculum is very strong. You have plenty of ICU months, peds dedicated month during the first year and interspersed shifts during the last two years and the new IMC where you rotate has 25% peds pts to see as well. You get to work at three different hospitals. The University hospital which is busy but does usually slow down by morning time, I think the census is close to 40K, the VA where you get to act like an attending, and IMC a large private hospital with a census over 70K. Both the University and IMC are level 1 trauma centers. I worked at LDS before IMC opened and it boasted one of the most efficient EDs in the country with average door to doc times of 15 minutes, I heard that IMC was working out some glitches but I’m sure by next year it will be very smooth.

Facilities: The university department is very nice it isn’t that old but I think they plan on expanding soon. They recently switched over to all electronic record keeping so that is nice. I haven’t been to the IMC campus but I imagine it is very nice and they dictate all of their notes there. I haven’t been to the ED in the VA, but I imagine it is just as beautiful as our government believes our heroes of war deserve.

Location: I will try and keep this under 5 pages. What can I say, I love SLC. I have 7 ski resorts 20 minutes from my door, I rarely encounter traffic unless there is an accident, and there are lots of safe places to live. Now if you are a big city person you may be unhappy in SLC, but we still have the symphony, the ballet, decent theater, lots of good music shows, pro basketball, pro soccer and semi-pro baseball. But lets face it, most people who are attracted to Utah are those who want to go Mt biking by walking out of the ED and hitting the trail literally 2 minutes later, or want to check out the most national parks in any state in the contiguous 48, or want to ski great powder after finishing a night shift, or want to climb cliffs that people from all over the world come here to climb. If you like those kinds of things you will like Utah, and I didn’t even mention the huge paragliding community, kite skiing or many reservoirs that people ski on all summer long. In short I think SLC is the outdoors lovers paradise. But don’t tell Denver that, they think their ski resorts that are two hours away are super convenient (I have relatives in Denver with some major Colorado pride).

Negative: Some turf battles still being fought because it’s a new program, but the chair Dr Barton is winning most of them. Some of the old faculty at IMC, but like I said they may have already retired.

Overall: I love the Utah program, but of course I may be very biased since it started while I was here in school. But, honestly I think that for a new program it is very strong and that in a few years it will carry a big name with it. The faculty is strong, the curriculum is good and for the outdoors lover you can’t get a better location.

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Thought I should chip in since I know I read these threads incessantly last year. I added in a bit about my overall thoughts on each program, in case anyone finds that helpful. Feel free to PM me if you have questions and I'll try to at least give my personal insight (which was mostly gleaned from a 1 day interview so it for what it is!).I didn't go to all the interviews I was offered, but I ranked all the places I interviewed and honestly feel I'd be happy at any of them. Yay for EM. :)

1. Vanderbilt:
Loved this program. Had everything I was looking for in terms of having great people, tremendous leadership, great academic/research opportunities, nice city with good COL. Overall the hospital is super supportive of resident education, good benefits, etc. SO liked it too, so it was a fairly easy choice.

2. U of AZ: This was a strong #1 for me until I went to Vandy (which was my last interview). Totally loved the residents, wanted to go out for drinks with the rockin' PD, and Tucson in December was awesome. Great research and terrific curriculum, too. In the end, though, it's far from family and didn't outshine anything Vandy could offer so being a direct flight from family won out.

3. Maine: Totally loved this program, too. Fantastic residents, great hospital, fabulous location. I've spent a lot of time in Maine so this place felt great to me. Thing is, they have no NIH funded research, and since it's important to me to have mentors with NIH grants, etc, I decided I had to pass this one up. I do hope to get back there later in my career, though, and if Match Day brings me there now I'll still be really happy.

4. Carolinas: Great, well established program that has been turning out fantastic EPs for a long time. I liked the new PD a lot on a personal level, although it felt like she's still working out her vision for the direction of the program from here. I don't think that really takes away how great the program is, necessarily, but the leadership at other programs pushed them above this one for me. Again, I think I could be very happy here.

5. UMass: Again, another very well established, very strong program where I could be very happy. I absolutely loved the PD here and it's clear that he puts the education/health/happiness of his residents at the top of his to-do list every day. Worcester is really a drab, post-industrial city with horrendous winter weather, though, and SO was pretty dead set against moving there. So down it went.

6. Utah: I rotated here and really enjoyed my month. Really fun people, good focus on education, could not really be in a nicer location. In the end it was also far from family, and it's a young program that still seemed to be finding its place in the overall hospital scene. I know some residents in other departments at the U and it seems from their experiences that there's an overtone of 'residents are here to work' instead of 'residents are here to learn.' I figured out on the interview trail that this distinction was important to me. I don't think that was true in EM there at all, but you do have to do your off-service rotations. This could be off, it just seemed that some of the other programs I saw had a bit more to offer me in the end. Despite that, I would be more than happy to train there, and I'm sure I'd get a great education, if that's how things go.

7. Georgetown: Dr. Love (the PD here) was actually the one who drew my attention to the point mentioned above, that you want to go somewhere that you're not just a cog in the wheel of the hospital but that your education is primary. He has such a well-defined, clear vision for his program. It was really inspiring. I'd be really happy to train here, in theory, but the logistics were just not going to work for me. COL was way too high, you have to drive to locations that aren't near one another in crazy DC traffic, etc. I was kind of bummed I couldn't easily make this one work for us. We'll figure it out if match brings us there, but it'll be a challenge.

8. UVA: I definitely loved Charlottesville and the residents I met. I went here after I was at G'town and I wanted to take that program and move it to Charlottesville. The PD here is new and just wasn't a great salesman. I don't doubt they have a great program, but he did a lot of handwaving and literally saying 'blah blah blah' during his PPT and I felt like I didn't get a sense at all of what he was offering. That said, I'm sure I would be happy here and I certainly loved the scribes program.

9. Rochester: Definitely a strong program, nice people, good COL, strong research, but SO wouldn't budge on location.

That's all she wrote. ;) Bring on 3/17!!
 
Is it possible to get around the SLC area and to the hospital without a car? I might have a bike.
 
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Is it possible to get around the SLC area and to the hospital without a car? I might have a bike.

Yes. You can also bike to the ski resorts, but maybe not with skis on your back, unless you're really hard core.

Keep in mind you'll be in very good shape if you bike up that hill every day. You're probably going to want a car in the winter too, but I managed med school without driving a car to school. Residency hours are a little different than med school hours though. It is pretty easy to live on a bus line or Trax less than 10 minutes from the hospital; but you'll need a different plan for shifts ending after midnight. Trax only runs 10 am to 8 pm on Sundays, and 5:30-11:30 on weekdays. If you live within a couple of miles, you can ride bus/trax most of the time and a bike the rest, but I'd bet 99% of the residents there own a car.
 
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