more questions - UNC?

[iwantneurosurg]

this is from the UNC neurosurgery residency site:

"PG Year 5: Senior clinical neurological surgery
PG Year 6: Research/fellowship/elective
PG Year 7: Chief Resident clinical neurological surgery "

Does this mean during your sixth year at UNC you can do a fellowship in, say, cerebrovascular surgery, or micro-spine surgery instead of just research??

And if this is surely the case, I've been noticing that most neurosurgical residencies are 5 or 6 yrs after the general surgery internship year...the five year ones dont mandate a year of research whereas the six year ones have a year of research built into it

In which residencies can we replace research with a fellowship? Can you give me particular programs that allow this if any (UNC?)

And when a residency says "research", is it actual research, or do you still get to do surgeries during that year/block?


Lastly, I'm quite keen on spine surgery, and thus the age-old debate which i've seen on several other threads occurs: neurosurgery vs. orthopaedics

I've asked around, and they both say they do the same thing pretty much. But when i Google jobs for spine surgery, almost all are associated with orthopaedic-spine surgeons, not neurosurgeons.

Does this mean that as a neurosurgeon, you would not be able to fill those job opportunities? and if you are an orthopaedic spine surgeon, would you just do spine cases, or other general orthopaedic cases?

thanks

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[mpp]

Replacing research with an infolded fellowship occurs at some programs..you'll have to ask. There are likely some orthopedic surgeons that just do spine surgery but most do some of both but it is generally agreed that an orthopedic surgeon needs to do a fellowship for spine to get a job as a spine surgeon while a neurosurgeon would not necessarily need the fellowship. Neurosurgeons and orthopedic surgeons both do spine surgery and right now there are plenty of jobs for both.

 

[amojan99]

I've worked with a few neurosurgeons last year, and from what I hear, they do largely the same stuff as orthopods - at some hospitals they alternate on the spine service: ortho one day, neuro the next. But usually orthopods dont handle tumors or nerves; thats left to neuro. Ortho does more bone/cartilage work.