LSU-shreveport

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chicagochildpsych said:
It's a hostile environment, with game of thrones like changes in leadership, the PD actively bad mouthed the chair, the chancellor and dean lectured us weekly about our faculty and their poor behavior. Our PD left to go to the VA and be their chief, our chair installed the PD from the nineties who scuttled the program back then. They then stopped us from rotating at the VA (losing our gero and addiction electives) to spite the old PD and also lost the 4 program spots the VA funded. The leadership thinks this us normal, and constantly threatens people with termination. I say this not as a resident who was poorly regarded, but one who played the game well and got a fellowship and chief position. If you are politically savvy, hard working, and unable to find a university spot elsewhere....roll the dice and see what happens.
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chicagochildpsych said:
It's a hostile environment, with game of thrones like changes in leadership, the PD actively bad mouthed the chair, the chancellor and dean lectured us weekly about our faculty and their poor behavior. Our PD left to go to the VA and be their chief, our chair installed the PD from the nineties who scuttled the program back then. They then stopped us from rotating at the VA (losing our gero and addiction electives) to spite the old PD and also lost the 4 program spots the VA funded. The leadership thinks this us normal, and constantly threatens people with termination. I say this not as a resident who was poorly regarded, but one who played the game well and got a fellowship and chief position. If you are politically savvy, hard working, and unable to find a university spot elsewhere....roll the dice and see what happens.
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Why is the program still surviving then, where is the ACGME's involvement in this? The PD seemed like a nice and sweet person during interview day, but this is very alarming to me. I don't need a university spot, just a spot anywhere, but after seeing some of these posts, I think I would be better off elsewhere even if that means a rundown community program.
 
The acgme had a site visit, and we were threatened with our residency spots not being renewed for telling the truth. While meeting with the reviewer the university chancellor and the PD both "accidentally" walked in on the meeting and glared at us. Shreveport is a dysfunctional dump, and for all I care it can burn.
 
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That's really disappointing to me. Imagine if this is the way residencies are run across the country, what is the point of having the ACGME or having a GME office if the program won't be answerable for its flaws thanks to residents who are too afraid to speak up. I am glad that SDN exists at least its a place where people can give this type of input freely. I never would have guessed this type of information if I hadn't asked here.
 
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You don't bite the hand that feeds you. The ACGME almost never rescinds a programs accreditation and especially in psychiatry Im not sure they ever have. These organizations are entirely self serving and create new hoops to jump through to justify their continuing existence such as the recent ACGME milestones project even though most programs didn't really even meet the standards of the previous standards. For example many (most?) programs are deficient in providing training in one of the three psychotherapy competencies and many programs do not have geriatric community or forensic rotations. Even several top programs don't actually fulfill the ACGME requirements! Programs have been placed on probation but then browbeat their residents into lying saying they won't ever be able to practice if they don't and then mske changes on paper and all is good.
 
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Historically, this program did close in the 90s. And then reopened. The change in leadership caused the program to disintegrate into what it is today. A shadow of its former self.

Anyone who doesn't say there are malignant residencies, I say untrue.
 
It's a program that will prepare you for whatever you decide to do later on.
 
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I really appreciate the feedback everyone has given me on the program both here and in private message. It won't be my first choice, but I don't see anything glaringly bad to prevent me from raking it. Everyone on interview day seemed supportive.

Is the negativity prior to the new PD coming on? or is it with the new PD?
 
javjo said:
I really appreciate the feedback everyone has given me on the program both here and in private message. It won't be my first choice, but I don't see anything glaringly bad to prevent me from raking it. Everyone on interview day seemed supportive.

Is the negativity prior to the new PD coming on? or is it with the new PD?
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It's better to match then go unmatched.
 
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Shreveport is not a bad place to live by any means. Bossier City is an even more upscale place that's not too far away from the hospital. I have a lot of family who lives in the area so I am familiar with it. The food is not as good as New Orleans or Baton Rouge, but it's still an up and coming city in my opinion.

With regards to the program, who cares about the administration if at the end of 4 years, you'll get training? I am reading all these SDN reviews with a grain of salt, you never know which poster may bad mouth a program to make sure it gets less people ranking it to make sure that they match there? This is a competitive season for whatever its worth.
 
sunshine1160 said:
Shreveport is not a bad place to live by any means. Bossier City is an even more upscale place that's not too far away from the hospital. I have a lot of family who lives in the area so I am familiar with it. The food is not as good as New Orleans or Baton Rouge, but it's still an up and coming city in my opinion.

With regards to the program, who cares about the administration if at the end of 4 years, you'll get training? I am reading all these SDN reviews with a grain of salt, you never know which poster may bad mouth a program to make sure it gets less people ranking it to make sure that they match there? This is a competitive season for whatever its worth.
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No. The people talking about/warning about the program are ones who've been through the program.
 
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Now that I'm out and working, I can say that this place trained me to push myself and I appreciate the experience.
 
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Shikima said:
In short, there are better programs which are more healthy and will help you develop into a much better psychiatrist.
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Healthy is the right word. You'll transition into a Nurse here as well since most of them can be found smoking outside the hospital when they should be involved in patient care.
 
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marsh20 said:
Healthy is the right word. You'll transition into a Nurse here as well since most of them can be found smoking outside the hospital when they should be involved in patient care.
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And a SW, and the aide, and the clerk... wait, where's the medicine part again?
 
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Shikima said:
And a SW, and the aide, and the clerk... wait, where's the medicine part again?
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haha talk about Social Worker's lol, it's better to just do a lot of their work yourself to get it done
 
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Avoid this program like the plague! It's damn malignant and someone is always getting harassed or badgered thanks to the stubborn and malignant faculty. I didn't graduate too long ago and I know things are only getting worse at this hell hole. Faculty members are leaving this dump and the place is short staffed. Plus, you won't get good therapy training at this place since there are not many psychologists and the patient population is not educated or motivated. Most of the patients who come here come for substance abuse and there are not enough resources to help them in Louisiana because the state is struggling to keep afloat.

Plus, what makes it worse, is that someone is always out to harm you and get you in this program. If you have any flaw, they will torture you about it and humiliate you to no end. They thrive on this. It is an unhealthy environment to train in. Fitz and Horton have their monthly meetings with chiefs and all to discuss how they will deal with the residents and tend to decide to pick on the weakest link to terminate. They will tell you to your face that you are doing a good job, then when it comes time to giving you evaluations and promoting you, they will tell you that you will need to repeat rotations. Someone is always watching you and you need to tread very carefully because NO ONE is here to help you, only to harm you.

This is a disorganized and crappy program not because of the lack of pathology but the shear lack of ethics and regards residents. LSU is very resident dependent and this program is so dependent you can't even call a sick day even if your deathly ill.

Fitz (the PD) enjoys looking for and pointing out flaws in med students and residents: http://www.admsep.org/2001.html

My advice is to stay clear of this place and do your best to match somewhere else. The social workers, nurses, staff etc. are so friggin lazy, you will be doing there job in addition to yours. It's no wonder this hospital is going bankrupt. Laziness and being solely dependent on residents without much supervision, has led to the demise of this hospital.
 
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Not personally familiar with LSU-shreveport, but the bottom line is residency is just a small part of your career and most of the patients don't care and most real world jobs aren't going to care either. Real world jobs care about your ability to see patients efficiently in a safe manner. That is, *BY FAR*, the most important thing they want. Thats also true in the vast majority of cases where you are in business for yourself....after all, if you are covering inpatient and billing yourself you are going to be in a world of hurt if you can't move through patients and get out of there. Thats one of the things I've seen other recent grads struggle with- they graduate residency and get a job where they eat what they kill to some extent, but they are still in that residency mindset in terms of daily work flow. Meaning you can spend 40 minutes shooting the **** with case managers and whatnot. Yes, you could do that when you were a residency and you saw your attending do it as well, but you were both on salary then. The case manager may be able to, but she's also on salary.

Being seeing patients efficiently and safely together, the next most important thing for community hospital/pp jobs is just getting along with others well. And then after that how good you are.

So unless you want to have an academic career, I wouldn't pick a residency based on the quality of the program so much. I'd pick based on location way above that. Now maybe someone hates Shreveport or maybe someone loves it because it's close to family....who knows. But I'd pick based on that and not how good a certain rotation is.
 
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vistaril said:
Not personally familiar with LSU-shreveport, but the bottom line is residency is just a small part of your career and most of the patients don't care and most real world jobs aren't going to care either. Real world jobs care about your ability to see patients efficiently in a safe manner. That is, *BY FAR*, the most important thing they want. Thats also true in the vast majority of cases where you are in business for yourself....after all, if you are covering inpatient and billing yourself you are going to be in a world of hurt if you can't move through patients and get out of there. Thats one of the things I've seen other recent grads struggle with- they graduate residency and get a job where they eat what they kill to some extent, but they are still in that residency mindset in terms of daily work flow. Meaning you can spend 40 minutes shooting the **** with case managers and whatnot. Yes, you could do that when you were a residency and you saw your attending do it as well, but you were both on salary then. The case manager may be able to, but she's also on salary.

Being seeing patients efficiently and safely together, the next most important thing for community hospital/pp jobs is just getting along with others well. And then after that how good you are.

So unless you want to have an academic career, I wouldn't pick a residency based on the quality of the program so much. I'd pick based on location way above that. Now maybe someone hates Shreveport or maybe someone loves it because it's close to family....who knows. But I'd pick based on that and not how good a certain rotation is.
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I agree with you about doing your job, but Residency is an important foundation for the rest of your career. The training environment and fast pace, did not allow for good safe patient care. It doesnt help to have very little attending supervision and have the weight of evrything on your shoulders.
 
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psychotropical said:
I agree with you about doing your job, but Residency is an important foundation for the rest of your career. The training environment and fast pace, did not allow for good safe patient care. It doesnt help to have very little attending supervision and have the weight of evrything on your shoulders.
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A lot of bad habits are learned, unsure if it really is the correct way for patient management, and the high levels of cortisol require about 18 months before they normalize once again.
 
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Shikima said:
A lot of bad habits are learned, unsure if it really is the correct way for patient management, and the high levels of cortisol require about 18 months before they normalize once again.
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This program is too resident dependent and too disorganized to absorb any resident absence, I think I was only a slave here to write notes and see patient so attendings could bill. The true education took place after I left this miserable dump.
 
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Shreveport is very conservative and a good place to earn a living... but the job market for psychiatrists is good across the globe.
 
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Most of what you will see is substance abuse (cocaine, amphetamine, opiates) and when you have residents who are not properly trained for this kind of stuff handling them, there can be a variety of potentially dangerous complications. There is some pretty serious addiction here to the point where you have pregnant women snorting cocaine while they are in labor. The sad thing is that the cycle continues because the CPS resources in the area are not fully equipped to handle the volatile population either.

I think I should have gotten an honorary social worker degree after I finished here too.
 
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No clinic in first 2 years here, it starts 3rd year. Program does get easier after first 2 years.
 
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This is reason enough to stay away from this program. It's very unstable and a very hostile training environment especially when you throw in Fitz and Horton into the mix as well, this place has definitely lost a lot of faculty over the years.

Slowly the institution is turning into a depressing place as well since they are cutting back on all programs. This is not good for patient care and certainly not good from an educational perspective.
 
Medical Student here, just how busy is this place? Are they expected to expand faculty or recruit more mid-level's to help?
 
pinkyj731 said:
Medical Student here, just how busy is this place? Are they expected to expand faculty or recruit more mid-level's to help?
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Unlikely they'll recruit anyone. And it's very busy. But the problem is that you see a one sided pathology both from faculty and patients.
 
Shikima said:
Unlikely they'll recruit anyone. And it's very busy. But the problem is that you see a one sided pathology both from faculty and patients.
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Can you elaborate a little. How busy is it? I went here for medical school and it was still not as bad as surgery or medicine.
 
Shikima said:
You were sheltered.
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Medical students were deliberately shielded and treated well so that they would fall for Psych. Fitz puts on her "Southern Mama" act to lure Med Students into this miserable political residency. Never forget that the same incompetent and malignant PD who is running this program today is the same one who caused it to shut down in the 90's. Proceed with caution. They recently put two residents on probation without even a mention of what the reasoning was.

They have also cut back on the educational fund which was a measeley few hundred dollars but it says a lot about the department's priorities because other departments have maintained funding.

Oh and you have to read about your patients and do things on your own when you are at LSU. That's the case everywhere, but it's especially true when you have a didactics that consist of Fitz throwing her conservative, racist, southern BS at you for an hour and talking about nonsense from powerpoints she forced the residents to put together with threats of imminent termination because she's too lazy to do anything on her own.

That's the story with all the very few attendings here, most of them are over the age of 55 and don't have the stamina to do any of the insane amounts of work themselves. LOL at the comment above about 2-4 calls a month. Make it 4-5 calls a month and even during your intern year when you're off service you have to come in on the weekend to cover this ridiculously busy service. You cannot take vacation unless a classmate from an outside facility (Willis Knighton or Brentwood) is willing to cover for you as the program does not have any back up.

Horton doesn't give a damn about your educational experience and deliberately rounds during didactic hours. I seriously hope this dump gets shut down by the ACGME. Programs like these need media coverage to show how malignant, racist and abusive they truly are.

You'll be prepared after you finish residency here, the question is, will the malignant regime let you finish?
 
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chicagochildpsych said:
It's a hostile environment, with game of thrones like changes in leadership, the PD actively bad mouthed the chair, the chancellor and dean lectured us weekly about our faculty and their poor behavior. Our PD left to go to the VA and be their chief, our chair installed the PD from the nineties who scuttled the program back then. They then stopped us from rotating at the VA (losing our gero and addiction electives) to spite the old PD and also lost the 4 program spots the VA funded. The leadership thinks this us normal, and constantly threatens people with termination. I say this not as a resident who was poorly regarded, but one who played the game well and got a fellowship and chief position. If you are politically savvy, hard working, and unable to find a university spot elsewhere....roll the dice and see what happens.
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Which PD are you talking about that has been hostile? The current PD or the one who left to go to the VA. I have heard horror stories about Patterson. Was he the one who made the environment hostile? I see a lot of negativity and concerning comments about the program here I'm just trying to figure out if they stem from pre or post PD change?
 
Current PD scuttled the program, past PD actually taught us, despite being a hard a$$


Sent from my iPhone using SDN mobile app
 
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chicagochildpsych said:
Current PD scuttled the program, past PD actually taught us, despite being a hard a$$


Sent from my iPhone using SDN mobile app
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Can you be more specific by how the current PD scuttled the program? How long has she been there?
 
pinkyj731 said:
Can you be more specific by how the current PD scuttled the program? How long has she been there?
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marsh20 said:
The current administration is the same one with the same PD that contributed to the program closing its doors in the 90's. Residents are overworked, teaching is limited, and the hospital is in bad shape as well. I think the current administration has gotten wiser with trying to keep residents silent with threats of termination so that the ACGME does not find out about how harsh this place is. That's the only reason I can think of that the place hasn't closed its doors sooner.
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Answer enough?
 
marsh20 said:
I've made numerous posts about this program as you can see from searching through my profile. I've done this as I want to warn others to stay away from this place and to spare them the misery.

In short, Fitz-Gerald was once the program director in the 90's and she did a terrible job as a PD then, it eventually led to the program shutting down (this is not a very easy thing to happen and ACGME usually has ways to help the program so whatever was happening must have been pretty grave). The program reopened and there was another PD who came in who was doing fine, was hard but at least taught something, he was removed by the chair and Fitz-Gerald was re-instated as of late 2013. She has done a horrible job as Program Director since and is a controlling woman who likes to impose her conservative backwards ways of thinking on everyone in the program. Everyone is afraid to raise their voice in front of her because she is very unstable and snaps in an instant. She has severe anger issues and has no business being a program director. She is super lazy to top it all off, she is suppose to be providing lectures and teaching, but she is too lazy to do that. The lady is too backwards, disorganized and lazy to do anything on her own. The faculty is dropping by the numbers (it's very limited) and rotation structure is very unstable. This has a lot to do with the general economics of the hospital and state. Honestly, Shreveport feels like an uneducated, backwards and highly undesirable part of the country. I am so grateful to be out of there and practicing on my own.

This is one of the busiest programs in the country with a very hostile environment given the malignant nature of the faculty. They love putting residents on probation and extending their training when it is not warranted.
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But there are casinos.
 
NickNaylor said:
But there are casinos.
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Don't worry, you won't have any time to go to any casino's since you'll be too overwhelmed with call and the ridiculous amounts of work you have to do. I can assure you that you will be seeing all the Alcoholics and Drug Abuser's from the Casino's in the PCU where they'll come to detox.
 
How come they dont remove the administration if it's so bad.
 
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psychotropical said:
Don't worry, you won't have any time to go to any casino's since you'll be too overwhelmed with call and the ridiculous amounts of work you have to do. I can assure you that you will be seeing all the Alcoholics and Drug Abuser's from the Casino's in the PCU where they'll come to detox.
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oh gosh it's a few years chill out.......once you are out a 99233 at whatever hospital you see patients at is going to be worth exactly the same thing whether you spent your time during residency hanging out in Shreveport or at harvard or whatever.
 
vistaril said:
oh gosh it's a few years chill out.......once you are out a 99233 at whatever hospital you see patients at is going to be worth exactly the same thing whether you spent your time during residency hanging out in Shreveport or at harvard or whatever.
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How many faculty is not a lot of faculty? 10?
your program sounds fun! Is there pizza there?
 
Wow reading these posts from past residents resonates exactly what i went through rotating as a medical student here earlier this year. Malignant environment at best! horribly unorganized med student rotation. Attending's work students to the bone and you learn didley squat about psych. It's all about moving the meat here, getting patients in and out, dictating the patient notes and doing scut work the whole time. Hated this place. A wise person once told me, if you want to know what a residency program is like, see how they treat their medical students. Yeah, def swipe left!
 
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EazyE1907 said:
Wow reading these posts from past residents resonates exactly what i went through rotating as a medical student here earlier this year. Malignant environment at best! horribly unorganized med student rotation. Attending's work students to the bone and you learn didley squat about psych. It's all about moving the meat here, getting patients in and out, dictating the patient notes and doing scut work the whole time. Hated this place. A wise person once told me, if you want to know what a residency program is like, see how they treat their medical students. Yeah, def swipe left!
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Not only that, a big marker of how a program is how many local medical students does it attract to it's residency. Many medical students rotating at the program will know exactly of what is entailed in residency and make their choices based on that..
 
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