University of Washington

Ophthalmology Residency Program Compendium Table of Contents

University of Washington School of Medicine
Dept of Ophthalmology Box 356485
1959 NE Pacific Street
Seattle, Washington 98195

http://depts.washington.edu/ophthweb/

Posting Anonymously for SDN User

Up and coming program. Primary cataracts in the 130s, and they just added a new VA which will bump surgeries up by about 40-50 per resident. They also went from 4 to 5 residents per year, which is a definite sign of strength. Chair (Dr. Van Gelder) is excellent, charismatic, and definitely is leading this program on a strong trajectory of growth (after it remained chairless for a while a few years ago), and academicians across the country speak highly of him. Seattle Children's hospital is nice, as is Harborview (the county) -- all on EMR with good facilities. Good ancillary staff as well. Cons: paying for parking (ranges from $7-13/day), traffic within Seattle (to get between sites), at least half of the faculty are new (from great places, and are sure to do great work but they've graduated within the last 5 years). Seattle is excellent, and they took us around town in a van which really showcased the city as a great strength. Can't go wrong here.

Bump.. any updates on this program?

I recently rotated there as a visiting student.

UW is a great place. As the main hospital for 5 states (Washington, Alaska, Idaho, Montana, Wyoming), lots of trauma come in. You'll work hard as PGY2 resident on q5 call. PGY-2 curriculum also includes plastics/neuro, so you get exposure to surgery, specifically to oculoplastics, which requires early application during PGY3 year. Also you get 10 weeks of protected research time as PGY2. For PGY-3 curriculum, they're moving away from site-based learning (VA vs Chilren's hospital etc) to subspecialty based learning (Glaucoma, Cornea, peds). Their pediatric ophtho is very robust with many many interesting patients and a very bright peds chairperson, Dr Avery Weiss. There is a high percentage of foreign-language speaking patients, so the use of interpreter services is quite frequent. One day in general clinic I thought almost half of the patients required interpretation.

The chair Dr Van Gelder is highly highly respected and is a giant in ophthalmology. He's moving the department forward in big steps. Morale is high among faculty members.

Teaching seemed solid; county hospital gives plenty of exposure to diverse patient population; residents are happy. Seattle is a great location with lots of outdoors experience (ocean and mountain) if you want. The view of the ethereal Mount Rainer is absolutely breathtaking, and is the best part of being in Seattle, if you ask me.

When I interviewed there last year, a lot of the junior residents seemed pretty burnt out by all the call, which is busy and perhaps even brutal given all the ocular trauma that comes through Harborview. I think residents do see a lot of great pathology and this is definitely an up and coming program that is making strides. A lot of the new faculty are young and friendly.

Fellowship placements in prior years were just okay, and I was not too excited to hear that they will be adding another VA location that is about an hour away, so that residents can get more cataracts.

Otherwise, the chairman is very charismatic with great vision and Seattle is a great city. There is a lot to like here.

Bumping again, since I'm also curious about UW.

Has anyone gotten a sense from their advisors/mentors what the program is like, and how it's regarded? How competitive are the residents for fellowships?

I also found a couple of other threads with more info, linking here for reference:

1. http://forums.studentdoctor.net/thr...y-program-at-university-of-washington.771356/
2. http://forums.studentdoctor.net/threads/please-help-u-of-minnesota-vs-u-washington-seattle.1042077/

Is there any more recent input about this program?