Ranking Question. Pitt vs Vandy vs Northwestern vs Mt Sinai

[hardworker101]

I hate to be the person to ask others for ranking question, but with 2 days remaining, I am still changing my mind everyday.

I thought Pitt and Vandy had strong academic programs, but some of my friends argue that living in Chicago and NYC is much better than Pittsburgh and Nashville. I am single but I still think there is things to do in Nashville and Pittsburgh. We don't have that much free time either. I thought with me going into a fellowship (pain maybe), Pitt and Vandy had better potentials for fellowship placements but still think Northwestern and Sinai to be solid too.

What would you do if you were me?

Thanks a lot and sorry for the last minute questions.

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[tndoc12]

Hey man. I'm from Nashville. There's no better city in the world in my opinion! Let me know if you have any questions regarding life in music city.

 

[spezimdoc]

Lol I've been in this scenario. Try not to let your friends/family sway your decision (unless, of course, you want them to). You've obviously thought out your rankings with their respective cities and were happy with it before your friends came along. Go with your gut/heart!

On that note, Pittsburgh is an awesome city. I'm also single and I'm not concerned in the slightest if I matched at UPMC. Lots of young people given the educational pull, in addition to the plethora of health care related professionals.

 

[KaoticMessiah]

Pittsburgh is a great city. It's affordable, much more so than NY or Chicago, probably comparable to Nashville.
Food scene is really emerging, tons of new restaurants are opening up in all sorts of neighborhoods.
The younger adult age group is very well-educated due to the high amount of health care, energy, and finance jobs in Pittsburgh. There are tons of arts and high culture due to the generosity of the robber barons many generations ago.

I wouldn't hesitate to rank UPMC lower because of Pittsburgh. I love it here.

As far as the program itself, Pitt Anesthesiology is phenomenal. Our intern year is very benign and educational. The anesthesia years are incredible, with a great balance of service and education. We don't have any problems meeting numbers. I've heard of residents leaving with 1200+ blocks (many fellowships don't even get that many). The sheer number of anesthetics performed here virtually guarantees you a great education unless you are laughtastically lazy (which I'm sure you're not, or else you wouldn't have started a thread about choosing between these four wonderful programs).

 

[hardworker101]

Thanks a lot for the replies. I really appreciate it. I could not find a way to get the fellowship placements for recent UPMC grads. How are their fellowships placement looking? With that many hospitals, how many you actually spend significant amount of time there? They advertise top ranked research and 200+ faculty as part of the program. How does the research translate to your training and how much faculty interaction you have?

Thanks a lot

 

[KaoticMessiah]

How are their fellowships placement looking?

I'm only an intern, so I don't have the most informed viewpoint on fellowship placement (some of the upper levels that post on here would be more helpful), but in talking with some of the CA-3's this year, it sounds like 4-5 are going into Critical Care (Pitt, NYU, and Hopkins are the ones I remember), 5 are going into Peds (3 staying at Pitt, one to Denver, and one to Cincinnati), and a few going into CT (Duke and Pitt are the ones I remember). Fellowship placement is never an issue, and if you want to stay at UPMC for further training, it's easy to do so.

They advertise top ranked research and 200+ faculty as part of the program. How does the research translate to your training and how much faculty interaction you have?

Research plays a large role if you want it to. They were recently re-approved for a T32 teaching grant from the NIH to sponsor multiple research fellows in the program. There are all sorts of projects going on in the department right now, especially in chronic and acute pain. The Critical Care department is a very active research department, in collaboration with Surgery, Pulmonary/CCM, and Emergency Medicine. There are multiple books being written by faculty and residents right now.
That being said, research is definitely not forced on you, and you can do your one "scholarly project" and no one will think any less of you.

I can't really speak to faculty interaction, as I haven't been in the OR's yet, but I can't imagine it's any different than any other program. Some faculty will love interacting with you, some will watch you intubate and go drink their coffee, and some are in between. This is universal and any program that tells you otherwise is probably lying.

Let me know if you have any other questions. Hope that helps a little.