University of Missouri at Kansas City Residency Reviews

I thought I was really going to like UMKC. Kansas City is supposedly a relly nice city, with a low cost of living, a busy ER/trauma center and 8 hour shifts. I had read on this forum a couple of posts dating back to 2003 that said that people generally had bad interviews at UMKC and ranked them very low.
When I arrived at my pre-interview dinner, I found the residents to be a nice, cool group and felt like I could hang out with them. The following morning, I met the chairman and program director who also seemed very nice. Just when I started to think that those posts from 2003 stating that the interviewers were arrogant and rude couldn't possibly be true, I had the worst interview of my life with their new assistant PD.
This guy was arrogant, rude and basically grilled me and belittled me for a full 30 minutes. I asked him one question at the end about research and he gave me some lame answer about he didn't really know or care. That was my last interview of the day and I basically was mad on my entire flight home.
A few weeks later at a different interview, I asked someone from Kansas City about this and she said that all of her friends had had the same experience and were all planning to rank them very low.
Can anyone shed any light on this? Anyone a resident at UMKC and think the staff is great to work with? I am just really trying to figure out how to rank them because I really liked a lot of other things about the program but am not sure if this signals a problematic sub-culture at this institution.

Posted anonymously on behalf of a student who interviewed there:

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Overview
3 year program and one of the oldest EM residencies in the country. Hospital is located near downtown KC so it receives a ton of the urban indigent patients that gives residents a nice mix of pathology. They are a part of a pilot program that picked a select few programs to receive 8 year credentialing from the ACGME.


Residents
10 residents per class. It seems like all of the residents have various interests and hobbies outside of medicine which gave off the impression that the program does like to pursue well rounded individuals. There was a good showing of residents at the pre-interview dinner at Jack Stack’s (amazing BBQ!) who readily answered all of the applicant’s questions and all genuinely seemed happy with the program.

Faculty
It seems like most of the faculty is younger and enjoys teaching and interacting with students and residents. There are a variety interests among the faculty which include US, tox, EMS, medical educations, etc., so if you wanted the opportunity to learn about any subspecialty of EM you wouldn’t have a problem getting firsthand information and direct teaching/mentoring. It seems like the faculty is well respected throughout the hospital and two EM faculty serve administrations purposes for the hospital being Chief Medical Officer and Chief Medical Information Officer.

I interviewed with the PD and one of the assistant PDs. The PD was incredibly sharp but also approachable. I came away with the impression that she cares deeply for the program and enjoys being the PD as she is continually striving to find ways to stay a step ahead. The assistant PD interview was incredibly relaxed. He’s a younger guy and judging from the comments from other applicants on my interview day that attended UMKC, he’s a lot of fun to be around.


Curriculum
Comprised of 12 month long blocks per year. They reiterate the point that their curriculum is dynamic and resident feedback is taken VERY serious concerning the curriculum.

PGY1-EM Orientation, EM 3 months, then one month each of Peds EM, IM, Critical Care, Trauma Surgery, Anesthesia, OB/NICU (2 weeks each), Cardiology, Pulmonology

PGY2-EM 8.5 months at TMC and 1 EM/EMS at St. Luke’s (community), Peds EM, Trauma ICU (2 weeks), Ortho Surgery

PGY3-EM 10 months, 1 month of Peds EM, Elective

Starting in PGY-2, all months spent in the ED will include 2 shifts of Peds EM per month.

They do 8 hour shifts with 20, 21-23, and 19 for PGYs-1-3, respectively.

They have protected conference time on Thursday mornings and Wednesday morning of the 3rd week of the month.


Facilities
Truman Medical Center has over 300 hospital beds in addition to 52 beds in the ED along with 3 triage rooms, 3 trauma rooms, 7 bed special-needs area, and an outpatient pharmacy. The ED was recently renovated in 2005 and all the rooms are private. The ED sees 62,000 people per year with an admission rate of 20.8%. They also have a 128 slice CT scanner dedicated to the ED as well as a couple of dedicated US machines. There is access to social work 16 hours a day in the ED along with a behavioral health specialist 7 days a week. They also have a full time Pharm.D.

Children’s Mercy Hospital has 26 ED beds and see 66,000 children per year with an 11% admission rate. It is connected to TMC.

St. Luke’s is a community hospital about 3 miles away from TMC. They have 19 ED beds and see 32,000 people per year with a 26% admission rate.


Location
Kansas City has over 2.1 million people in their metro area and pretty much any kind of activity can be found depending on your interests. The Power & Light district is popular among the younger crowd as it has loads of bars, restaurants, and events. The Plaza is another popular place with amazing shopping, restaurants, and bars. The Plaza doesn’t cater as much to the party crowd that the Power & Light district does as it is a more upscale area with generally more expensive restaurants.

KC also boasts professional football, baseball, and soccer for the sports fan. Their Sprint Center looks like it attracts pretty much all of the popular nationwide tours for those interested in concerts. Forbes magazine ranked downtown KC as the #7 best downtown in the US and commented positively on their new Kaufmann Center for the Performing Arts. They have tons of parks and fountains scattered through the city. I believe that several of KC’s suburbs are usually highly ranked when it comes to various Best Places to Live rankings.

As far as traffic, I can’t comment from a firsthand perspective but a lot of the residents live in the suburbs and say that traffic is usually never a problem and it takes them 10-15 minutes to get to TMC. Many of the residents own their own home as KC’s cost of living is incredibly cheap.

Other
PGY-1 salary is just under $48,000 (as of 2012) and EM residents serve as ACLS instructors for the rest of the hospital and medical students so they can make some extra cash if they choose to do so. Moonlighting is also allowed. You get 3 weeks vacation per year. Parking is free in a covered garage and health insurance is subsidized. They also provide a smart phone stipend and reimburse you for professional expenses including licensure fees, Step 3, DEA fees, etc. Provide up to $1,000 in each of PGY-2 and PGY-3 for conferences. They have plenty of ongoing research projects covering all kinds of topics so participating in research would be relatively easy.

Any more recent reviews for UMKC? Thanks in advance.

I am a resident there now. It's a great program and I have not had any post-purchase remorse. What would you like to know?

killdevil said:

I am a resident there now. It's a great program and I have not had any post-purchase remorse. What would you like to know?

Click to expand...

The post from 2012 seems pretty thorough so I guess these are minor things....

1: Is there anything to update in general from the previous post? (i.e. shifts/faculty/new facilities/etc.),

2: Does the hospital provides meals/other benefits not mentioned?

3: Any post-purchase remorse among co-residents?

[Edit] 4: How are the off-service rotations?

Backpack234 said:

The post from 2012 seems pretty thorough so I guess these are minor things....

1: Is there anything to update in general from the previous post? (i.e. shifts/faculty/new facilities/etc.),

2: Does the hospital provides meals/other benefits not mentioned?

3: Any post-purchase remorse among co-residents?

[Edit] 4: How are the off-service rotations?

Click to expand...

Update from a current resident: This program is a hidden gem. It is the perfect mix of an academic tertiary care center balanced with a county type of hospital. Truman is a trauma center and KC sees its fair share of trauma. We have most consultants available, but EM residents run the hospital. Our population is low-income and we see incredibly sick patients on a daily basis. Procedures are in surplus.

We work 8hr shifts. Generally, interns work ~16 shifts per month; PGY2 work ~21; PGY3 work ~20. Interns float around and pick up interesting patients. PGY2/3 run 13 bed pods. Our ED is 40 beds or so. In traumas we run airway and do most of the procedures.

3 wks of vacation. Mealcards for off-service rotations. Off-service rotations are pretty standard but change every year with resident feedback. We do peds shifts monthly (and 1 full month per year) at Children's Mercy which is next door to Truman. It is one of the best children's hospitals, at least the only big one in the area.

We have great program leadership and a fun group of residents who are down to earth and enjoy being social, but I may be biased.