I'm not even sure podiatry 'leadership' knows the details of some programs... some haven't been site-visited in years, others weren't re-evaluated after past probation or recommendations. Hospital politics and key DPM attendings change often.
When you think about it, most 3 year podiatry programs existing now were not created as such... and many didn't even want to be a surgical program. A lot of them were just sort of 'upgraded' from 1yr or 2yr or non-surgical residency when the APMA decided every grad should do 3 year residency. They wipped up VA programs, changed existing ones that weren't 3yrs into 3yrs (whether or not they really had the cases, facility, overall support to truly meet the reqs).
The residency situation (that they're drastically different and some are quite inadequate for training/boards/competence) is - and always has been - the worst part of podiatry. The ABFAS pass rates and the fact that some grads who graduated "same residency type" do ortho group recon/trauma while other ones do HealthDrive clearly speaks to this. The huge number of our programs that are
not in teaching hospitals, aren't in trauma centers, don't have research supports, don't have structure academics, don't have very good depth chart of attending skills/training is sad. Taking some of the best attendings/cases largely out of residency for frivilous fellowships is even more curious.
The directory is more like a 3rd and 4th year podiatry student residencies "guidebook" than an encyclopedia...
...We see it every year where
people say that there are a lot of programs listed on directory that don't exist or aren't taking residents. Others close down.
With the way things are now with more pod schools and grads + not putting any programs on probation / closure, don't count on any improvements.
