St Louis University School of Medicine

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I got a very good impression from SLU. They are very friendly people, and they are up front about being a very clinical program. They get good surgical numbers and there are no fellows to "steal" cases from the residents. They have to spend 3 months at the VA hospital in Marion, IL, which is probably a good hour and a half away. They get free LASIK training. They go to some 3 day crash course in Memphis which is paid for. There isn't alot of research required, just some small project in your 2nd and 3rd year. They pay to send you to academy. Your first 2 weeks there are orientation, with no clinic responsibilities. Your first month of call is "buddy" call with an upper level resident. You get free lenses and books. St. Louis isn't a bad city for the midwest. Alot of residents said that it wasn't that great of a place for single folk, but I'm sure that's very dependent on who you talk to.
 
I had a positive impression of St. Louis University! The faculty members are extremely friendly and hospitable. The chairman, Dr. Cruz is charismatic and motivating. The 3 months required VA Hospital experience 1.5hrs away from St. Louis in Marion, IL will be discontinued as of this year. The program is very strong in Oculoplastics, Pediatric Ophthalmology and Neuro-ophtho. Overall a good program.
 
I interviewed last year. They left a very good impression. Friendly attendings and staff, new facility, nice midwest city. Clinically strong program, especially in peds since the chairman does peds. The only downside is the Marion VA, but if that is supposedly discontinued, it should be a very strong program.
 
The program is very underrated and I ranked it very highly, above some bigger 'brand name' programs.

Great faculty and charismatic chair who are very relaxed, love to teach and are NONE are malignant which is one of the reasons why I ranked it so highly. Low pain-to-train ratio; Residents are happy and they have, hands down, the BEST call schedule - Standard Q4 1st year, NO CALL 2nd year, backup call 3rd year. About half of the seniors usually end up doing fellowships and they end up at great places - U. of Colorado and U. of Chicago for retina, BPEI for Glaucoma are the ones that pop into mind. It's also nice that you more or less stay in one place the whole time, which is their eye center. You do go up the street 1 or 2 blocks up when you do consults at the main hospital and you do your peds rotation at the SLU Children's hospital which is also up the street. Also, one thing that really interested me was that they have a successful private practice guy come in a few times a year to teach about private practice, which is something most places don't really offer.

The only bad things I really thought of for that program was the numbers were on the lower side (But you get an amazing diversity of different pathologies because I think SLU is considered the County hospital in the region) but I hear of rumors of them going back to the Marion VA - not sure if that's true or not. It's also overshadowed by WashU. All in all, the residents come out of it as great ophthalmologists and I would have been very happy if I matched there.
 
I reiterate what the reviews above mine from years ago said. Not much has changed as far as I can tell, though there is definitely not any far away VA to travel to currently. I had a super great gut-feeling about this place during and after interview day and came away with a great impression from SLU. Very friendly/pleasant residents, faculty, and support staff. The coordinator Judee is great and one of the friendliest and most involved PC's I encountered. They really did a fantastic job of making all of the applicants feel welcome.

Pros:
- 2+ faculty in each subspecialty, no fellows.
- especially good plastics and peds exposure.
- Many ex-Wash U on faculty... those that made the switch feel that SLU is a more pleasant working environment for them.
- I also enjoyed meeting and talking with the chair, Dr. Cruz. He's a good guy.
- Residents seemed close-knit, cool, and funny. Across all PGY years. Clearly bonded.
- Good wet lab with EyeSi
- NO CALL 2nd year (except first few months). whoa.
- St. Louis is cooler than I thought it would be. Seems to be undergoing a renaissance. Don't know much about it though.
- I LOVED that they took us on a tour of the city and took photos of us at the arch. If you read my other reviews of programs that didn't impress me/felt like they put in no effort, this is a good example of the other side of the coin. I suppose all of this might have annoyed some people. That probably just means that you weren't a good fit for the program. I thought it was fantastic.
- Limited travel... all the action takes place at their little eye building at the moment. Also a con, as it seems a little isolated from the rest of the SLU medical community. They share offices with Derm iirc.
- Cataract club where residents watch surgical videos and critique them.
- Free SLU gym access
- Affordable city with lower cost of living.

Cons:
- No VA affiliation.
- No #'s given on interview day. Red flag? Cataracts I think were ~120 someone said. I could be wrong.
- No official LASIK cert. opportunity, (but LASIK cases possible)
- little research (pro for some)
- St. Louis (+/-)
 
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Curriculum:
  • PGY-1 - newly created integrated intern year with 3-4 ophtho rotations, endo, rheum, ED, neuro-radiology
  • PGY-2 - three months each of resident urgent clinic, plastics/peds, retina, and glaucoma
  • PGY-3 - three months each of peds/consults, plastics, neuro/consults, cornea
  • PGY-4 - three months each of retina, comp, cornea, glaucoma
Call: q4nights and q4 weekends PGY-2, NO CALL PGY-3 after buddy call is done. The idea is that it gives you time to focus on completing research projects

Numbers: The chair apparently doesn't like discussing numbers since they can vary between residents, but I got a quote of approximately 120 cataracts, 50-70 strabismus, and high plastics numbers.

Locations: Entirely based out of outpatient building save for peds, which is five minutes away and next to the university hospital, the last hospital covered by the residents. The department will be moving into a new SLU hospital scheduled to open late 2020.

To reiterate the sentiments above, I was impressed by how well the faculty and residents got along with each other. The pre-interview social was held at an attending's house, and attendings stayed late and even took part in some celebratory shots of "Billiken juice." There are some relatable young faculty in addition to attendings who have stayed for decades, and they plan on adding an combined glaucoma/uveitis specialist and retina attending. The last two classes have great fellowship placements: uveitis at UCSF, neuro at Penn followed by ASOPRS plastics at Tennessee, Cornea at Utah, Glaucoma at Henry Ford, research and surgical retina at Stanford, and surgical retina at NYEE. The integrated intern year and call schedule are pluses. The average phaco numbers could be a drawback.
 
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