2015-2016 Interview Reviews

[Merovinge]

since you asked...


First I should just make some notes on your geography. Very few if any residents live "in the loop" of Chicago or what's considered downtown, though the "West Loop" and "South Loop" are distinct neighborhoods and the latter is popular with residents. You can use google maps to see the boundaries. The Med District is relatively well-connected to transit, so Rush and UIC residents are known to be scattered all over the city. Loyola residents are clustered farther west for obvious reasons. In the city, South Loop and Ukrainian Village are popular with Loyola residents I know since both are a straight shot west. Oak Park has kind of a suburban/city hybrid feel and is popular too, then of course the farther western suburbs are an option for the more traditional suburban lifestyle.

As for the actual residencies, UIC as you said has a rep for a solid all-around program, really strong psychosis program, and A LOT of pathology. It's certainly doesn't have a rep as a cushy program but as a result, you'll see a lot. Lots of poverty and other socioeconomic problems in the patient population they see there, so it's something you'll have to learn to manage, but at the same time they probably draw from the most diverse patient base of any program in the city. The UIC grads I work with speak very highly of the PD. If there's a main con of the place, it's that it's a state university program in a state that's not known for its fiscal health.

Loyola is a very VA-heavy residency, which can be both a pro or a con depending on your interests. The good side is that for a VA, Hines is pretty diverse and has one of the better and more comprehensive VA mental health programs out there, so if you're interested in veteran mental health care, it's hard to find a better place. Their inpatient sites are solid but I'm not sure if they're as rigorous in terms of what you end up doing as a resident and what you see in terms of training compared to UIC. I know they also rotate at Elgin which is something that UIC doesn't get to see.

UIC has probably the more solid all around training, but you'll work harder for it.

Great summary. UIC does rotate through Madden, which is basically the same as Elgin from what I understand, and a great experience with state mental health. The location in Chicago is fantastic, mostly because the west loop, south loop, wicker park/ukranian village, and river north (depending on family/interests/personality) are probably the 4 best neighborhoods for a young professional and all are imminently accessible by car/bus/train/bike. Despite Northwestern's downtown location, it's often much more difficult to get there than UIC/Rush unless you live right in the gold coast/river north.

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[vanfanal]

Anyone been to Central Michigan yet? Would like to get some input before interview.

 

[MustHaveCoffee16]

You're not wrong! GWU Psychiatry is a terrible program. The residents are miserable, the faculty contact/ mentorship is non-existent, the administration is a wreck. The subspecialty clinics and CL are plusses, but they may not even be there year to year. Every year, GWU has to re-negotiate contracts with different clinics, and some either don't want to deal with the administrative headache or have their own power-trips that interfere with negotiations (like Inova Fairfax did in 2011/12, which caused residents to miss out on an ACGME training requirement of addiction medicine).

GWU is a relic that relies on its location and its history (which includes being the center for lobotomy for crying out loud!), and doesn't back that up with any kind of adequate training. The Global Mental Health experiences listed were all things that the residents had either funded before residency or on their own. And remember, not all residents get to do GMH, so if you're not one of those residents who spends a month in another country, you get to take up the on-call slack.

Sure, there are nice residents and faculty there, but many of those residents feel they've lost their souls in order to graduate and the turn-over for good faculty is very high because they don't feel supported by the administration either.

Do yourself a favor and run away from GWU, unless you want them to ruin your chances at a career or having any semblance of self-confidence when you leave.

Thank you for the very honest input. I appreciate it!

 

[lockian]

WashU in St. Louis
(+) Faculty engaged in research that is pushing the limits of the field. Even lab researchers are involved in teaching. One of my interviewers was a bench researcher who does regular seminars with the 3rd years where he either brings in papers to discuss, or residents pick things they want to talk about.
(+) Academic program that draws heavily on the urban underserved population, though the ultimate mission is education

(-) On the more hands-off end of the supervision spectrum. On inpatient psychiatry, there is no "buffer zone" of senior resident when you are an intern, and you are expected to be proactive in calling the attending if you have any question. May be difficult for those with traces of avoidant personality disorder such as myself. Third year, you only staff new intakes, and are essentially on your own in clinic unless you want to be proactive about seeking help.

(+/-) Has a reputation for being a "biologically heavy" program. This stems from the fact that they played a key role in the development of the DSM as we know it, and to this day emphasize precise clinical diagnosis, evidence-based thinking, and an understanding of underlying pathophysiology. They also have a history of strong interphase with the neuroscience department. I didn't get the sense that this is at a significant expense of psychotherapy, though, as they train in all modalities except psychoanalysis. This is the place where one of my interviewers spent 5 minutes explaining that psychoanalysis has been shown to be ineffective in clinical trials.
(+/-) St. Louis is neither great not awful, imho. Climate is relatively mild -- it rarely snows.

University of Iowa
(+) The program interfaces quite a bit with medicine. Iowa also has an Med-Psych and FM-Psych program, and you interface quite a bit with those residents. There is also a med-psych unit.
(+) Although Iowa City-Coralville and the surrounding communities are the size of your typical college town, the catchment area spans Iowa, western Illinois, Missouri, and even some Minnesota, so you get quite a bit of variety. I believe rural opportunities exist as well. In fact, the hospital is as well-resourced and as varied in the types of psychiatry services it offers as any academic center you'd find in a larger city.
(+) University of Iowa Hospital and Clinics has been voted best medical setting to work in, for what that's worth
(+) Pretty nice facilities
(+) PD and some of the senior faculty write textbooks, popular science literature about psychiatry, as well as the usual review articles and their own study reports.

(-) They make no bones about the fact that they do the bare minimum to meet ACGME requirements when it comes to psychotherapy. They believe that a smaller emphasis on psychotherapy is what is appropriate given today's practice climate.

(+/-) Iowa City is, in spite of everything, a college town. There's an arts and a literary scene, a lot of out of towners due to the university, and one of the highest concentrations per capita of people with advanced degrees. Generally, it's a safe, family-friendly, and liveable area, but personally I'm kind of over college towns...

 

[lockian]

Has anyone here interviewed at University of Michigan? If so, what do you think?

My interview is coming up next week, but I might end up canceling. The program is highly regarded, and that's the only reason I am still having second thoughts, but I personally am kind of over college towns.

One of my classmates interviewed there and it's her top choice, tied with one other one, but she's a very academic psychiatry type of person. Another classmate is really excited about it due to the fact that it has a psychoanalytic institute, but she is also a person who names her pets after famous psychologists...

 

[MustHaveCoffee16]

NYU

Amygdara, this was one of my earlier ones so the details are a little fuzzy, but I didn't realize no one had reviewed it, so here ya go:

1. Ease Of Communication: No issues- interview invitation came via ERAS. Was given a choice of several Fridays and was asked to call the office to schedule a date. All information received in a timely fashion.

2. Accommodation & Food: Pre-interview gathering was wine, cheese, and crackers at a resident's really beautiful apartment. Great resident turnout and a fun, normal group! I stayed with a friend and I don't believe accommodations were provided. Breakfast was provided the morning of the interview and lunch was at a nice restaurant near Bellevue.

3. Interview Day (Schedule, Type Of Interview, Unusual Questions, Experiences): 8:30am-4:30 pm, includes three 30-minute interviews. First was introduction and an overview of the programs, then a tour of Bellevue and Tisch with a LOT of walking (wear comfortable shoes!), followed by a nice lunch and then interviews. Mine were all conversational, though I think I got a "tell me about a difficult patient" question. Everyone meets with either the PD or APD at the end of the day before leaving. The PD is great and connected me with faculty members who shared some of my interests.

4. Program Overview: 14 PGY1 spots. Sorry, don’t have the time right now to outline the rotations but they’re listed nicely on the website: https://www.med.nyu.edu/psych/education/residency-program/pgy-i

5. Faculty Achievements & Involvement: Residents spoke highly of them, and the ones I met were great. Smart, approachable with diverse interests.

6. Location & Lifestyle: NYC and all the benefits that come with it, but also higher cost of living. Residents said it is hard to live comfortably on a resident salary here but you can compensate for that by moonlighting.

7. Salary & Benefits: PGY1- $59, 488. PGY2- $61,821, PGY3- $66,487, PGY4- $68,658.Great moonlighting opportunities, as above.

8. Program Strengths:
-Dr. Bernstein was probably the nicest PD I met on the interview trail
-Down-to-earth, fun, and bright residents
-Bellevue and its incredibly diverse patient population - 220 psych beds and interesting units such as a Mandarin-speaking unit, Spanish-speaking unit, 2 forensic units, plus the usual child & adolescent, geriatric, dual diagnosis, general unit, etc.
-Emphasis on experiential learning. Residents all said that they felt prepared to handle anything after residency, largely because of the experience dealing with very difficult/complicated patients at Bellevue.
-Varied clinical sites in addition to Bellevue- namely, Tisch (private) and the VA
-Great forensics, community exposure. Mental health court in the hospital
-Global health electives, including one in Ghana focused on teaching psychiatry to students, as there are only 16 psychiatrists in the entire country

9. Potential Weaknesses:
-Cost of living in NYC- one resident said it is possible to get by if you don't go out to dinner, for drinks, etc. but that most people moonlight to afford any kind of lifestyle
-Seemed call-heavy, residents cited long hours as one of the down sides of the program... But they also said call was a valuable learning experience that made them feel competent, prepared. It really seems like a "learn by doing" program, although it didn't seem to be lacking in didactics.

 

[DrMeowMeow]

My interview is coming up next week, but I might end up canceling. The program is highly regarded, and that's the only reason I am still having second thoughts, but I personally am kind of over college towns.

One of my classmates interviewed there and it's her top choice, tied with one other one, but she's a very academic psychiatry type of person. Another classmate is really excited about it due to the fact that it has a psychoanalytic institute, but she is also a person who names her pets after famous psychologists...

Oh dear, that is some stiff competition!

 

[HarryMTieboutMD]

WashU in St. Louis
(+) Faculty engaged in research that is pushing the limits of the field. Even lab researchers are involved in teaching. One of my interviewers was a bench researcher who does regular seminars with the 3rd years where he either brings in papers to discuss, or residents pick things they want to talk about.
(+) Academic program that draws heavily on the urban underserved population, though the ultimate mission is education

(-) On the more hands-off end of the supervision spectrum. On inpatient psychiatry, there is no "buffer zone" of senior resident when you are an intern, and you are expected to be proactive in calling the attending if you have any question. May be difficult for those with traces of avoidant personality disorder such as myself. Third year, you only staff new intakes, and are essentially on your own in clinic unless you want to be proactive about seeking help.

(+/-) Has a reputation for being a "biologically heavy" program. This stems from the fact that they played a key role in the development of the DSM as we know it, and to this day emphasize precise clinical diagnosis, evidence-based thinking, and an understanding of underlying pathophysiology. They also have a history of strong interphase with the neuroscience department. I didn't get the sense that this is at a significant expense of psychotherapy, though, as they train in all modalities except psychoanalysis. This is the place where one of my interviewers spent 5 minutes explaining that psychoanalysis has been shown to be ineffective in clinical trials.
(+/-) St. Louis is neither great not awful, imho. Climate is relatively mild -- it rarely snows.

University of Iowa
(+) The program interfaces quite a bit with medicine. Iowa also has an Med-Psych and FM-Psych program, and you interface quite a bit with those residents. There is also a med-psych unit.
(+) Although Iowa City-Coralville and the surrounding communities are the size of your typical college town, the catchment area spans Iowa, western Illinois, Missouri, and even some Minnesota, so you get quite a bit of variety. I believe rural opportunities exist as well. In fact, the hospital is as well-resourced and as varied in the types of psychiatry services it offers as any academic center you'd find in a larger city.
(+) University of Iowa Hospital and Clinics has been voted best medical setting to work in, for what that's worth
(+) Pretty nice facilities
(+) PD and some of the senior faculty write textbooks, popular science literature about psychiatry, as well as the usual review articles and their own study reports.

(-) They make no bones about the fact that they do the bare minimum to meet ACGME requirements when it comes to psychotherapy. They believe that a smaller emphasis on psychotherapy is what is appropriate given today's practice climate.

(+/-) Iowa City is, in spite of everything, a college town. There's an arts and a literary scene, a lot of out of towners due to the university, and one of the highest concentrations per capita of people with advanced degrees. Generally, it's a safe, family-friendly, and liveable area, but personally I'm kind of over college towns...

A few things about Wash U
1) Yes, we have more autonomy than a lot of other places- but this is how you grow as a doctor. Being a resident is not like being a 3rd (or 4th) year med student on a clinical rotation, where you are largely useless. Most decent residents, however avoidant they may be, will rise to the occasion, realizing they are in charge and have decision making power. Also, the nurses and other staff generally know what to do in acute situations (this is true for other specialties as well), so it's not as bad as you think. And by the end of intern year, most residents grow tired of constant oversight and want to do things independently anyway.
2) Regarding psychoanalysis, most of what you said is true, though we do get exposure to psychodynamic psychotherapy and learn the fundamentals of traditional psychoanalysis. And, if it interests you, you can do more training at the Saint Louis analytic institute (we have had several residents do this, and our PD who is a well published basic scientist and purely evidenced based clinician/neo Kraepelinian is very supportive). The broader point is that virtually any career path will be open to you.
3) STL is actually a gem- I was unimpressed with the city itself on my interview day (I ranked here #1 for the program) but have really grown to love it. The city has great arts, culture (the STL symphony is one of the world's great orchestras), museums, sports (even with the Rams defecting to LA), FOOD (seriously), and history. Also, Forest Park, which is across the street from Barnes, is twice as big as Central Park and has the Zoo, art museum, free concerts and festivals in the summer, and great trails for running. It is very affordable, traffic is not really an issue, and there is a sizable young professional population here. It's not NYC or Chicago, but then again, it's not NYC or Chicago.

 

[Amygdarya]

@scudiera and @MustHaveCoffee16, thanks a lot! May you match at the program that's best fit for you 🙂

 

[zipzapzop89]

Deciding to review a program I don't often see discussed here.

MAYO

1. Ease Of Communication:
Prompt. Scheduling done via Doodle scheduler, where you can see all available dates and select which one works for you.

2. Accommodation & Food:
Mayo pays for two free nights of accommodation at a nearby hotel. Dinner with residents is after the interview day, and I found the residents in attendance to be very charismatic, friendly, and excited to be at Mayo.

3. Interview Day (Schedule, Type Of Interview, Unusual Questions, Experiences):
Interview day was perhaps the longest that I've had along the trail, beginning at 7:30am and going until about 5pm I believe. After an introduction to the program by the PD, you are able to attend inpatient ward rounds for either the acute adult, mood, or child inpatient units. Facilities for this were by far the nicest that I have seen along the trail, not surprisingly. You get a tour of the Mayo facilities, which are absolutely beautiful. There is also an amazing 7-story standalone fitness facility, which is impressive to say the least. You have 4 interviews afterwards, which were fairly conversational for the most part.

4. Program Overview:
Curriculum is in the link. http://www.mayo.edu/msgme/residenci...ry/psychiatry-residency-minnesota/curriculumI

• 9 intern positions
• Fellowships in Child/adolescent, addiction, and geriatrics
• I believe the elective time has been increased to 9 months during PGY4 but someone please correct me if I'm wrong

5. Faculty Achievements & Involvement:
Program has a more biological lean compared to most. Research is mostly in that aspect, with recent studies like one on biomarkers for bipolar disorder. Many faculty come from Mayo, but also from other prestigious institutions like MGH and Cambridge.

6. Location & Lifestyle:
Rochester certainly is not the most exciting place compared to most small cities. Most of the residents were in serious relationships or were married with children. It seems like many residents, not limited to just Psychiatry, end up couples matching here or come with a significant other. Many residents noted being able to buy homes within Rochester at very affordable costs.

7. Salary & Benefits:
http://www.mayo.edu/msgme/admissions/compensation-and-benefits

8. Program Strengths:

• Strong training in medical aspects of psychiatry, C/L psych
• Biologically oriented psych research is strongly encouraged
• IM and Neuro months, as described by residents, are enjoyable and not too rigorous as described by residents
• Mayo name will open doors (although it seems Mayo is not exactly a powerhouse in the psychiatry world in relation to its other departments)
• Strong emphasis on patient care as core aspect of training
• AMAZING facilities

9. Potential Weaknesses:

• Great for those couples matching or coming with a partner, but not so much for those looking for a strong singles scene
• Mayo seems to dominate the entire city of Rochester, can be seen as good or bad
• Very formal environment, which may not fit for everyone. Residents wear suits daily
• Perhaps not the most socioeconomically diverse patient population
• If you don't like the cold.........

 

[Bluejay87]

Anyone been to Central Michigan yet? Would like to get some input before interview.

I got a really weird vibe from Central Michigan. The residents seem nice, but almost all of the faculty that I interacted with were very off-putting. They also made it fairly clear that they aren't really interested in people who plan to pursue a fellowship - they want to train general psychiatrists who will practice in central Michigan. Because the program is very new, a lot of the details are still being worked out (there are only two classes of residents so far.) For what it's worth, they initially had six spots per class, but they were not able to fill either of the last two years so now they have reduced to four spots per class.

 

[Bluejay87]

University of South Dakota
Pros:
- Amazing facilities. Easily the nicest inpatient psych units I've seen
- Faculty seem very approachable and personable
- Workload is quite light: no in-house call, no night float, off-service months are all outpatient
- Residents seem genuinely happy and work well together
- Not a research-heavy program, but they have access to a huge genetics lab for those interested in doing research
- Child and adolescent psych is a particular strength here

Cons:
- Sioux Falls is a smaller city and very cold in the winter. There aren't any larger cities that are very close
- Because this is a smaller program and almost all rotations are done at a freestanding psych hospital, there isn't as much opportunity to interact with other specialties

 

[WingedOx]

Great summary. UIC does rotate through Madden, which is basically the same as Elgin from what I understand, and a great experience with state mental health. The location in Chicago is fantastic, mostly because the west loop, south loop, wicker park/ukranian village, and river north (depending on family/interests/personality) are probably the 4 best neighborhoods for a young professional and all are imminently accessible by car/bus/train/bike. Despite Northwestern's downtown location, it's often much more difficult to get there than UIC/Rush unless you live right in the gold coast/river north.

From what I can tell the Elgin rotation for Loyola is a forensic unit rotation.

 

[splik]

WashU in St. Louis
(-) On the more hands-off end of the supervision spectrum. On inpatient psychiatry, there is no "buffer zone" of senior resident when you are an intern, and you are expected to be proactive in calling the attending if you have any question. May be difficult for those with traces of avoidant personality disorder such as myself. Third year, you only staff new intakes, and are essentially on your own in clinic unless you want to be proactive about seeking help.

whatever their flaws, this is not one. there is nothing worse than having a junior or senior resident and intern team on inpatient psychiatry as it doesn't tend to work very well. what that means in practice is that the intern would be doing all the work, the senior nothing, you don't get to build up your confidence and autonomy early on and you end up clashing with the junior or senior resident. This works less well with a junior resident because the gap in training is less and tends to lead to resentment and conflict, but if you have a senior resident that essentially would mean you'd be forced to do additional inpatient psychiatry later on in residency cutting into your outpatient experience. There is a difference between hands-off supervision and no supervision. the latter is what you want to avoid. Also most sensible programs will no throw you lose from the very beginning - most likely you will be supported a lot more by your attendings as a neophyte intern and given more autonomy as time goes on.

 

[Merovinge]

From what I can tell the Elgin rotation for Loyola is a forensic unit rotation.

Ahh okay. UIC is definitely limited in forensic exposure. I frequently tell applicants that if that is a strong leaning interest they have there are probably better options for them, although the number of involuntary patients we have gets one well acquainted to mental health court.

 

[SoulinNeed]

Anyone know when Rush and U of Illinois sends out their interviews? Trying to plan out an away rotation, and I think I may have to do it in very late October to Thanksgiving.

 

[lilek22]

Does anyone remember washu's call schedule? I think it would be higher up on my list if I didn't think the call schedule was brutal

 

[kevinc2]

Dartmouth

1. Ease Of Communication: invitation through ERAS. Coordinator is responsive to emails and sends a reminder couple days regarding dinner, transportation, hotels

2. Accommodation & Food: No hotel provided, but a list of discounts provided http://gme.dartmouth-hitchcock.org/adult_psych/planning_your_visit.html
Highly recommend elements hotel- only 2-3 minutes away from the hospital and they provide drop off/pick up shuttle from the hotel to the hospital. We met for dinner at a restaurant in hanover right in front of dartmouth college (5-8 minute drive away from hotels/hospital). A good turn out (almost 1 to 1 ratio with applicants and residents) You can come either from boston logan airport or manchester airport (southwest)- i recommend manchester because it's smaller and rental car counter is right in front of baggage claim so faster to get in and out + 1.5 hour drive vs 2.5 hour drive from logan.

3. Interview Day (Schedule, Type Of Interview, Unusual Questions, Experiences): Starts around 8 in the hospital. Ends by 4. A lot of interviews- 6x 30 minutes interviews with APD and PD (Dr. Finn), faculty members, and residents in the morning/afternoon. Depending on your interest, you will also have a meeting with child fellowship director or more interviews with researchers for research track folks. Lunch provided (decent) with a good resident turn out. No breakfast, but coffee and some snacks. Day starts out with the program overview by PD and then you sit for a consult team round for an hour (it was nice as we got to know the style of rounds and hospital/system/social work issues quickly instead of hearing about it). Also people conveniently pick you up for interviews at the conference room instead you having to go around to find places. Tour in the afternoon and then you go home! Most interviews are really informal- only common theme is everyone will ask you why dartmouth and why psychiatry- but other than that it's more like do you have any questions for me. Interview with Dr. Finn is little more formal- more pointed questions from your application, but once again nothing too difficult and she's very honest (in a good way) regarding your questions about the program

4. Program Overview: Listed on the website- but I will go over some of the details http://gme.dartmouth-hitchcock.org/adult_psych/rotations.html
For PGY-1 rotation- you can substitute one month of medicine with peds and one month of neuro with peds neuro for those interested in child (also they have a separate child track with a separate match number, but that doesn't necessarily limit you to child and/or for those in the general track from substitution- you will also get early child exposure in pgy2 and 3 for track and non tracks if you desire)
PGY-2 rotation: Fairly consult heavy (residents mentioned this as a strength and dr. finn is a consult psychiatrist as well- no fellowship yet but hopefully they are planning to start on in near future). For 1.5 month of elective- this is technically a jeopardy month (back up for residents who are out sick/pregnant, etc) but multiple residents mentioned they never were called so they could actually be used for the elective.
PGY-3 rotation: a variety of specialized outpatient clinics, mostly located within dartmouth hitchcock hospital- but you have 1 day of community psych rotations where you can get placed in multiple sites throughout new hampshire, vermont, some massachusetts rotation.
PGY-4 rotation: A pretty much 12 month of electives- only exception is continuing 1/2 day of continuity clinic you started in pgy-2. A lot of elective in sleep medicine (housed within psych), research, addiction, hiv/aids, college counseling, and psychotherapy elective with boston psychoanalytic institute (apparently popular- you drive as a group one weekday evening to boston, you get out elective/clinic early to give time to drive down to boston).

Sites:

Dartmouth (most of your rotations are here including medicine months and outpatient clinics)- 3 psych units (30-40 beds total)- a really nice hospital with bright lights and feels like a shopping mall- a lot of referral from all over the region (nh, vt, mass, ny, etc). Units are not locked and voluntary admissions only (NH state law). Only involuntary are done in new hampshire hospital (state hospital), so if you admit patient from ED at dartmouth who needs involuntary, you will admit them directly to NH hospital from dartmouth. Units are superbusy with lots of turnovers (average LOS: 5 days but a lot of patients stay shorter) with lots of work in terms of admission/discharge

White Junction VA (consult and inpatient rotation + some substance abuse): about 10 minutes away from dartmouth in vermont across the river. only a small psych unit there. Things are slower. They are transitioning to involuntary units soon. Lighter load, attending quality varies.

New Hampshire Hospital (some of 2nd year inpatient rotations): state hospital in concord that's about 45 minutes away from dartmouth- dept will provide car and gas and you will take call there while you are rotation at NH. Involuntary units, more seriously ill patients, uses clozapine, things are slower with more opportunities for teaching and better social work support. you have option to do 1 month of inpatient adolescent unit here if you are interested in child. residents and students consistently rate this as their best site in evals.

Calls: Their system is kind of complicated so i didn't quite wrap by head around it despite multiple explanations so i could be off little bit, but definitely on a heavy side with busy calls and more service oriented- from PD down to junior residents level all said the same thing about heavy load.

Intern year: average of 3 weekday short call/month (should be out by 10 pm with everything wrapped around, some days they may leave earlier like 7-8 pm) + 3 weekend days (8 am to 9-10 pm)/month. Medicine: q4 for inpatient medicine. for outpatient med/neuro, you take psych call.

PGY2: Mix of dartmouth calls and VA calls- VA calls are very light (mostly floor issues + home call- but you will need to come in for a new admissions or consult), you get to sleep through the night, but you don't get a post call day off. Dartmouth calls (overnight starting from PGY2) are lot busier since you cover ED, consult, and floor calls. At dartmouth, you will call attending directly- but you do get postcall day off unlike VA calls. On average, they had 3 weeknight overnight calls + 1 weekend day+overnight call- so most of your weekends are free.

PGY3: same, more VA calls, but it could be both (3 weekday overnight calls/month, but may be less if people are not out for vacation,etc)
PGY4: 8 saturday day calls, but higher or lower depending on how many people fast track to child.

Also research track: 50% time off third and fourth year and few months protected during PGY1/2

5. Faculty Achievements & Involvement:
Psychiatry is the largest funded department at the med school and psych chair, dr. green, also heads the medical school's clinical and translational institute with a new building. Faculty members mentioned that research has been increasing significantly while retaining the intimacy of a smaller department where everyone knows one another. Top 20 in terms of NIH funding- lots of research related to health services, substance abuse technology, schixophrenia, neuroimaging, etc. Also opportunities to take research classes at the dartmouth institute for health policy research and get a certificate. Dr Finn (PD) is from Mass general and several faculties are from big name academic places including stanford. Residents said they don't have problem getting jobs anywhere in the country and match at fellowships at top programs (child- yale, new york city programs, etc, forensic- yale)- PD and faculty members will call and push for applicants. Faculty members were very informal- even during rounds, residents presented and discussed cases in a very informal way with enough autonomy.

6. Location & Lifestyle: Hanover/lebanon feels like an upscale small ski resort town with a large college campus. Really pretty (surrounded by river and mountains), but fairly rural. Residents come here a) new englander/likes nature/family) b) comes from all over (south, northeast, midwest, west coast) to try something new. Decent cost of living, great school districts. Intern year starts out with 50/50 single and couples but as you go in, people get married and have kids so more heavy on couple side. Residents do hang out together a lot though and you know everyone (you will run into attendings or people you know in hanover). Dating pool is small, but many residents date other residents and get married. Also a decent grad student/staff population due to dartmouth.

7. Salary & Benefits: Standard 50K/year with year to year increases-$20/month premium for healthcare but no co pays. Lower cost of living. But due to NH laws, you cannot moonlight until you are a third year (unless you moonlight in vermont).

8. Program Strengths:
+ Great research program with access to mentors
+ community psychiatry
+ a good variety of sites
+ nature/lower cost of living
+ a small, close knit program and dept
9. Potential Weaknesses:
- Rural
- Difficult for singles
- Cold
- Very call heavy/service oriented program

 

[psychmd1441]

Thank you for the very honest input. I appreciate it!

Bugsnotdrugs is not that far off. GWU is really not all it's cracked up to be. It has the perk of being in DC and great therapy exposure, nice autonomy of patient care beginning in 3rd year. However, the leadership in the program (and department) is severely lacking to the point of it affecting resident education immensely.
Admin is very out of touch with your day-to-day resident life. They are not very pro resident, but instead, are typically out for themselves. GWU tries to be a "big" program but it is just not possible since their actual facilities/ funding are limited. It's a very de-centralized program, so if you thought the leadership was a problem already, then it mounts an even larger problem when you're doing rotations are multiple different sites with no clear go-to person to help you out, assist you, or support you in times of need.
If it comes down to location, then GWU has better work-life balance/ hours than other programs in this area. However, if you have the option to do residency elsewhere, I would highly look into all of your options.

 

[DuskPhilosophy]

Stanford

Morning started with a very informative powerpoint presentation, and breakfast with the chair (they even offered vitamins). This took place in the building where a majority of the outpatient rotations are done. We then took tours of the VA (very beautiful) and the Stanford hospital. At noon we were taken to a grand rounds lecture and then we were returned back to the original outpatient building for lunch with the residents. After lunch began a round of 5 interviews with a small break when halfway done. All of my interviews were pleasant and light hearted. They really read your application here and like to bring up points that they have highlighted in it.

After all of the interviews we were invited to a post interview happy hour event, which all the applicants were present for and a few more residents than the ones who were only there for the tours.


Program Overview:

PGY-1: 4 months medicine (with option of doing peds electives) 2 months of neurology inpt& outpt, 4 mo of inpt psych at the VA and Stanford Hospital, 1 mo of Psych ER at SCVM and 1 month of night float at the VA which is broken up into 2-2 week blocks and your vacation time is usually attached to these 2-2 week rotations. Call ~q6 with short cal being from 4:30 – 9 and weekend call from 8am – 9p or 9p- 8 am. Expect to be on call at least 5x a month.


PGY-2: 3 mo inpt psych at Stanford hospital, 2 mo geri psych, 2 mo C&L, 2 months of scholarly concentration, 1 month assessment methods rotation, 1 mo addiction psych, 1 mo inpt VA and 1 m night float @ SH. You also take on a patient for long term psychodynamic psychotherapy a ½ day/ week. This seemed to be the year a lot of the residents performed their funded global health trips. Call decreased to ~4 call shifts a month.


PGY-3: All outpatient, opportunities to C&A clinic, College mental health clinic, psychopharm/mood clinic, SMI/ psychotic d/o clinic, community psych, CBT clinic, Clozaril clinic, Telemental health clinic, couples and family therapy clinic, all while working on your scholarly concentration with some of your left over protected time. Moonlighting is often allowed during this year and many residents do supplement their income doing this in their spare time. Call is ~ 2x a month


PGY-4: 6 months spent doring selective rotations at the VA, SH or as chief, 3 mo spent doing other selectives, and 3 mo spent on your scholarly concentration. No call this year.


Scholarly concentration: This is your chance to do almost anything you want in terms of your future in psychiatry. Ideally it would be something that can be submitted for publishing. Different paths this requirement could take are clinical focused, community outreach, research, global health, and education. There was also talk of some residents designing ICU spaces to reduce delirium potential in ICU patients. This flexibility to pursue whatever tickles your fancy is an opportunity not offered by many residency programs.


Psychotherapy and other opportunities: Starts with ½ day/week of psychodynamic psychotherapy training, which continues all the way through 4th year. There is a psychoanalytic psychotherapy training program. Also Dr. David Burns provides a Team based therapy seminar, otherwise known as the “Feeling Good Institute”. You can get involved with policy making at Stanford’s center for health policy, there are seminars and workshops provided to improve medical teaching and even receive a honors certificate in medical education.


Fellowships: One of the best child and adolescent fellowships in the nation (IMHO) ran by Dr. Joshi who was very passionate and excited about where he saw his fellowship improving over the next few years. Strong C&L, Addiction, Geri and neuropsychiatry fellowships. The program has also received funding for anyone interested in a college mental health fellowship.


Benefits:

Interns start with 60k/ year and it steadily increases over the next 4 years.

Moving Stipend ($3,000 one-time, taxed and paid in August)

$500/month housing stipend

Annual Educational Benefit ($2,000 per year, taxed and paid in January)

Annual Miscellaneous Stipend covers gas, mileage, and cell phone charges ($1,000 per year, taxed and paid in July)

USMLE Part III Fee ($730, subject to change annually)

California Medical License Fees ($909)

DEA License Fees ($551)

Health, vision, dental, disability, savings plan.

Oh and free use of the caltrain


Pros: Flexibility to make your time in residency everything you want it to be with world renown faculty and alumni only a phone call away to help you achieve your goals. One of the best child programs, strong psychotherapy training strong didactics, and a lot of guidance if academia is in your future.


Cons: COL of course, but pretty good benefits to counteract that. Part of me feels like working in Palo Alto would expose you to a higher functioning patient population who are just worried well, and have substantial family support. I worry that I won’t get super sick SMI patients to train with and that it will hurt me in the long run. When I ask the residents about this they counter saying SH has a more diverse patient population in terms of pathology and socioeconomic standing especially with the passing of the ACA.


Overall I loved this program and it is currently tied with one other program for the #1 spot. I have some soul searching to do.

 

[notdeadyet]

Great review, DP.

I agree with splik's comments about Stanford being a program on the rise. Which will likely confuse a lot of people. Folks hear the name "Stanford" and tend to get giddy by confusing the quality of the university with the quality of its residency programs, which doesn't hold. But for the last 5 years the program has really turned itself around and has gotten better and better while still maintaining a very (ahem) livable schedule.

They are also allegedly starting a forensics program, in case that's an interest. I say "allegedly" because I hear a lot of programs talk about this and they try to slap something together only to have it crumble when trying to get the necessary contracts with the courts and various agencies to make this work. UCSD tried to kick one off and that fizzled. Stanford is much more likely to happen (they have a couple of good forensic psychiatrists on board and god knows they have funding).

Part of me feels like working in Palo Alto would expose you to a higher functioning patient population who are just worried well, and have substantial family support. I worry that I won’t get super sick SMI patients to train with and that it will hurt me in the long run. When I ask the residents about this they counter saying SH has a more diverse patient population in terms of pathology and socioeconomic standing especially with the passing of the ACA.

You are right to give this some thought.

Stanford has many strengths but they are hampered by the lack of owning a good county hospital (or even having a close training relationship with one). There are a lot of reasons for that, but the main effect it has on the residency is that you do not have a heavy exposure to the underserved populations, particularly in an acute context. They are aware of this shortcoming, and make steps to address it (they have a free clinic that residents rotate at), but ultimately, if you have a strong interest in working with poorer underserved population, this will not be a program that will delight. Not that you can't get that experience post-training.

If you are also inpatient-focused, I'd speak to residents about that. Most programs with county hospitals do their inpatient work there, as you get the most acute and best mix of psychopathology. Stanford doesn't have this. It has Stanford for part of their inpatient experience, but even that I believe is a mix of a locked and unlocked unit (unlocked units by definition are lesser acuity, though certainly interesting in their own right). They also use the Palo Alto VA as a training site for inpatient psych. While PAVA is beautiful and one of the best VAs in the country for psychiatry, any VA inpatient unit is less than ideal for clinical exposure to inpatient psychiatry (for reasons of politics and philosophy, the VA puts folks inpatient for a lot of reasons other than acute psychopathology, so acuity is much less than you'd get on a county unit).

Again, years ago, I was less than impressed with Stanford but they really beefed up their psychotherapy training and increased education focus. Their inpatient experience and lack of county training will be a turn-off for some. But they are an excellent choice for many folks and they always attract a very bright group of residents that likely could have matched at UCLA, Columbia, or UCSF, but chose Stanford due to hours/lifestyle (which they have in part by not covering as many facilities as those programs do, which bumps up the workload).

 

[geesinger]

University of South Dakota
Pros:
- Amazing facilities. Easily the nicest inpatient psych units I've seen
- Faculty seem very approachable and personable
- Workload is quite light: no in-house call, no night float, off-service months are all outpatient
- Residents seem genuinely happy and work well together
- Not a research-heavy program, but they have access to a huge genetics lab for those interested in doing research
- Child and adolescent psych is a particular strength here

Cons:
- Sioux Falls is a smaller city and very cold in the winter. There aren't any larger cities that are very close
- Because this is a smaller program and almost all rotations are done at a freestanding psych hospital, there isn't as much opportunity to interact with other specialties

Good review. I actually bounce back and forth between ranking USD or HSS first. If this program were somewhere else, I think it would have a much larger draw, to me as well. I'll second that the faculty were incredibly friendly and supportive, and many of the residents couldn't stop ranting and raving about the support they've received during personal issues.

My concern is that the didactics and teaching were mentioned as a short-coming by several faculty members, one who completed residency there just recently. However, there is plenty of time for reading and teaching oneself I suppose. On that same note, I really don't love that it is a stand-alone psych hospital with no inpatient medicine. From speaking with several friends who are psych interns, they find inpatient medicine to be helpful as it saves them lots of time to be able to manage minor medical issues without having to follow-up constantly with medicine to come consult. But that said, the residents LOVED their outpatient experiences and do say they learn a lot and feel very respected by the faculty on those rotations.

Just wanted to add my two cents.

 

[lockian]

Oh dear, that is some stiff competition!

Well, it just got a little less stiff, as I've cancelled my interview with them.

It felt like pulling the plug on a loved one.

 

[kevinc2]

MUSC

i will add few comments

-my interview day was a lot smaller than mentioned by neolandover so we had more time to interact with a bunch of residents and more residents (including interns) showed up for lunch, nice facilities and dept seems to have lots of $$$. I think all of my interviewers asked me why MUSC? And asked few questions regarding my application/med school record- some of them were little stressful, but for the most part, they try to keep it conversational. Overall I enjoyed interaction with residents- they seemed to be hard workers (this is not a light program), but also had time to relax (and seemed very relaxed). They were also very honest with me regarding things that they didn't like about the program without me asking about it so I felt like they were very transparent regarding their program. A very diverse resident group- I thought most ppl would come from south carolina or the south, but there were a lot of residents from other regions- new york, midwest, california, etc including diversity in terms of LGBT and racial diversity.

-interns told me inpatient medicine months are hard, not necessarily malignant, but they did warn me about it and didn't seem too happy about it, but it's only for two months with an option to substitute it with 1 month of peds.

-Some residents didn't like nightfloat system (most residents do 1 month of nf separated by other blocks and then 1 month again, but some may have 2 months in a row) + also it's very intense- a very busy ER (lots of patients) and you have to cover consults, floors, etc although they said they have enough support and supervision. Also weekend rounding may average around 3 weekend days/month of inpatient psych (depending on number of residents in the unit and they will split the rounds) and you do have to be fairly efficient. So if you combine those two systems- not necessarily a light call schedule. Also you still continue to take overnight calls as a third year (20-23 times a year).

-You also have options to do outpatient college counseling psychiatry during PGY3 (both at college of charleston- a large public university right next to musc AND musc student health for non med students). Department is also very education oriented, you will have med student to teach in almost all of your rotation including nightfloat, except for outpatient. MUSC has the highest ranked clerkship and a bunch of students go into psych and stay with MUSC.

-My sense is that this is a more biologically oriented program, but there were few residents who were very interested in therapy and had opportunities to explore more, but program won't force intense therapy training upon you- 3 supervisors for therapy, outpatient, strength in CBT with its psychology department and sometimes you can get additional didactics/supervision from the psychology dept- you can also do recorded supervision. Residents just had nice things to say regarding attendings across the board.

-Residency has the DART program funded by NIDA- which is a research track focused on addiction (but you can also participate in it if your research is only tangentially related to addictions), you apply as a PGY2, 50% protected time as a PGY 3 and 50% during PGY4. A lot of grads stay at MUSC for fellowships. In terms of jobs, people from the south stay in the region and people from elsewhere move back to northeast, west coast, etc, but no problem getting jobs in outside regions.

-Patient population is pretty much 50/50 white and black. A wider variety of socioeconomic/functional status- from urban, african american poor, rural white poor, to wealthier charleston residents who own boats, etc. No asians/hispanics.

-Charleston has a great food scene, but its lacking in ethnic cuisine. As I was walking around, i felt like this town felt like a college town or a young professional town with a large number of MUSC staff/students and college of charleston students walking around, with a mix of older residents/tourists. Charleston also has a decent sized downtown area with outdoor shopping malls, panera bread, starbucks, etc.

Pros:
+ A large, well funded department
+ Strength in addictions/research
+ Nice weather + beach
+ residents seemed to be very hard working, but also has a good work life balance
+ A stand alone psych hospital

Cons:
- more biological (or a plus for some)
- somewhat intense call schedule + weekend rounds + pgy3 call
- busy busy ER, psych service
- lack of racial diversity, ethnic food
- not sure what it would feel like to live in charleston as a non white single
- not sure about name recognition outside of the south/east coast.

Program Name: Medical University of South Carolina (MUSC)

Program Communication: No problems with scheduling or communication. Both PC and assistant PC were very welcoming during interview day.

Accommodations: Discounted hotel offered across the bridge from downtown ($89). I chose the Holiday Inn Express (slightly more expensive) right by the medical campus due to ease of getting downtown and ability to walk to interview.

Dinner: Very nice Italian place downtown. Many things on the menu were very pricey ($30 entrees) and they had carafes of wine. Gotta love these dinners. There were 5 or 6 residents at dinner, from all years. There were also nine applicants plus some SOs, which by far was the largest dinner I had been to as of yet. It rather limited who you could directly interact with. Residents were good about it though, they moved around so they got a chance to talk to everyone. They seemed very happy and well-rested. Easy to talk to and very willing to answer questions.

Interview Day (Schedule, Type Of Interview, Unusual Questions, Experiences):
Start time 8:00, arrive a few minutes beforehand. They had bagel sandwiches with cream cheese and stuff. The residency program has its own building where people take call, relax, do notes etc. Little lounge area with N64 (obviously very important).

8:00-9:15 Overview from PD and chief.
3 interviews spread throughout day (1 PD or aPD, 1 faculty in area of interest, 1 resident/fellow) - They are really good about pairing you up with people in your field of interest. I had stated child and ECT as my interests and was able to interview with people in those departments. PD's personality is very calm, perhaps a little on the drier side. He is clearly very invested in his program and cares deeply about his residents. I believe his background is in C/L, and he is very active in the community with regards to crisis management. PD also has a service dog so don't let this catch you off guard. He is very calm and friendly and I had to resist wanting to pet him during the interview.

Interview questions were very standard, nothing deeply psychoanalytical or difficult. Just trying to get to know you.

11:45 - 1:00 Lunch at this cool old fashioned southern home converted into a restaurant. Had a lot of salads and sandwiches. Order whatever you want off the menu. Again, it is evident that the psychiatry department has a lot of money. $11 for a salad. Another chance to speak to a different group of residents. ~5 residents for lunch.

1:00-1:30 Tour - Got to see some of the psych floors in the Institute of Psychiatry. They are shaped in a semi-circle and are very large and modern. Each floor is a different unit and is decorated accordingly. Went to nice gym on campus which residents get free access to. Large pool, weight rooms, racket ball courts etc. They explained that it would be otherwise difficult to afford such nice facilities on a resident's salary. Apparently Bill Murray works out there too. VA is on campus although we didn't go inside.

Day ends around 2 or 2:30 based on how your interviews were set up. Very manageable and not fatiguing at all.

Program and Curriculum Overview
~16 residents per year, 1 of which is Neuro/Psych, 2 are Med/Psych
PGY-1: 4 blocks medicine (1 inpatient VA, 1 inpatient MUSC, 1 outpatient, 1 ER), 1 block inpatient neuro, 7 blocks psychiatry (3 inpatient MUSC, 2 inpatient VA, 2 night float)
Night float consists of 15 hour shifts from 5pm - 8am. One of these months is lighter (15-17 shifts per month), one is heavier (17-20 shifts). Responsibilities are crisis and admits. The benefit of this is there is no call during psych months. Standard 8-5 days. Some days they finish earlier than 5. You do round on the weekends, but if you round past 1pm, you get a free day off for later use that doesn't count in your standard vacation days. These days off you can save up and use like rollover minutes.

PGY-2: 1 block C/L neurology, 5 blocks inpatient psychiatry (general/ect, acute, va, geriatric, addiction), 1 block addiction outpatient, 2 blocks C/L, 2 blocks night float, + VA outpatient 1/2 day a week

No call. Weekend rounding when on inpatient rotations. Opportunities to moonlight in mid-late PGY-2.

PGY-3: Outpatient year. Call ~2 days/month supervising junior residents. Post day call off.
PGY-4: Outpatient + electives

Program Feel and Culture
MUSC is one of the higher ranking programs in the south, top 10 for NIH funding for psych, and #1 funded PI in psychiatry (2014). There is certainly the option to do research, but many of the residents just want clinical experience. Either way, you probably get the best of both worlds in terms of research resources and clinical training. If you are at MUSC, psychiatry seems like the THE program to be in. You are respected as one of the larger departments at the hospital - none of the "oh, psych's here (eyes roll)". One resident had said that psych applicants tended to have higher credentials (step scores) than applicants in other programs. Residents seem very laid-back, casual, and personable. They said that when you are doing off-service rotations, people understand that you are here to do psychiatry, and treat you as such without being malignant about it. Many had said that the attendings are very friendly. While we had break time between interviews, residents walking in the door would always say hi and welcome as they were going to didactics. Random people outside would say hi and welcome us when we were on the tour. Psychiatry is consistently voted the best medical school clerkship, and residents are expected to be teachers to students.

My advisor had said MUSC was heavily biological, and while they certainly are on the forefront of a lot of biological research, I felt the training program itself was pretty balanced in terms of pharm/therapy.

Working hours are not USC or San Mateo, but not Duke either. Most residents had said that they thought medicine and night float was going to be worse than it really was. My feeling was you'll work hard, learn well, and still have time to enjoy life.

Location & Lifestyle
Charleston has been voted #1 city for 5 years in a row and friendliest city in the US. There's tons of stuff to do downtown and a lot of historical ambience. There are building ordinances that prohibit how high you can build so there's a lot of cool stuff to look at. You could live here for residency and never go to the same restaurant twice. There's beaches, water activities, historical sites etc. Also a lot of touristy stuff like horse carriages.

Residents live in many places including downtown, West Ashley, Mt. Pleasant. Traffic is an issue if you don't live on the peninsula and are commuting in/out during business hours. Housing is probably more expensive than average (although cost of living index is ~100, compare to D.C. ~140 and Manhattan ~220). I think if you want to live in a slightly nicer area and home befitting a young professional, you will be paying more than in smaller cities. Overall still seems pretty affordable.

Weather is hot/humid for June-September - fairly nice for the rest of the year. I'm from the north so I would be happy not dealing with snow for the next 4 years. Flooding can be an issue due to rain and tides.

Salary & Benefits
PGY-1: 49,223
PGY-2: 50,914
PGY-3: 52, 570
PGY-4: 54,059

Paid membership to gym, paid parking in best parking garage (not standard for residents in other departments), monthly meal allowance, free ipads (although since most people have their own, department is considering something else), step 3 cost covered, 2 days of resident retreat

Program Strengths
+Friendly people all around
+4 fellowship programs (child, forensic, addiction, geriatric) + 1 non accredited brain stimulation (ECT/TMS/DBS) fellowship
+Nice resident benefits
+Top research facility
+Facilities on one campus
+Nice weather, fun location for young professional
+VA

(Based on personal preference)
+/- 4 months night float in exchange for no psych call
+/- Large class sizes
+/- Charleston is not a metropolis

Potential Weaknesses
-Population not as racially diverse as other cities
-Traffic if you don't live downtown
-Charleston psychiatry job market seems saturated
-No in house moonlighting

 

[MissWilder]

Greetings All...I realize these reviews come a little late, but as I appreciate what I get from you all...so I am attempting to give back.
(also to keep this under 100000000000 words, I am not using the suggested format and going to write brief summaries) Oh and I am kind of an eternal optimist so these reviews may be a little too sunshine and roses for some... Oh and I am eventually going into Child so I my reviews are a tad focused there!
Kaiser Fontana: Pre-interview happy-hour apps and non-alcoholic beverages with the residents. Wonderful, fun group of people. They all couldn't express how much they LOVE working and learning at Kaiser. Upon meeting everyone the next day it was easy to see why. PD was very kind and seemed genuinely excited to meet us all. The Asst. PDs were equally inviting. The facility is lovely. Kaiser is like a Cadillac. They do what they do VERY well. (Yes, I was a former patient for a long time, and I am probably biased.) There seems to be a genuine open channel of communication between the PDs and the residents. As this is a new program they are all working together to make it great. They are in the process of getting a C&A Fellowship. Lots of $ and data to do clinical research if you are so inclined. Kaiser is also about community service, and there are lots of opportunities there too. I suppose the major downside is the location. Being an LA native, I admit that I am a little bit of a snob. There are close areas that are rather affordable by So Cal standards, however, the nightlife leaves something to be desired.
UCLA-Kern: No pre-interview party. The current chief is incredible. He was our mother goose for the day. We had lunch with several residents, and there were equally great. They all seemed to have encouraging things to say about Bakersfield which again being an LA snob could leave somethings to be desired. They seemed like a group that really enjoyed working together and had each others backs. Bright and hardworking. As the program is under probation, it was kind of eire being there. But during my interview I spoke openly with the Asst. PD, and he was very upfront about the situation. I appreciated that. However, I am not going to lie...still makes me nervous though they are working to fix the problems. The C&A director is incredible. A very kind man from whom we could learn much. There seems to be a great need in the area so the residents for sure get some intense training. There are also some rotations in Los Angeles at other UCLA affiliates so some opportunities to connect with other peeps Other than the probation, I suppose the old and a tad crusty facility is a negative.
UC Riverside: Pre-interview dinner with Attendings and Residents. I am not going to lie that dining with 5 Attendings who are psychiatrists and possibly analyzing you is a touch intimidating, but that's when it's time to pull out every last ounce of charm and just smile and at the very least be pretty. The residents were a diverse bright group. They did seem like a big family with the PD as the poppa bear. As the program is new there seems to be a close communication between the faculty and residents to make the program great. Riverside county is in dire need of mental health professionals so the faculty are busy, but I never got the impression that they are too busy to teach. There appears to be years and years of experience from which residents can learn much and become amazing clinicians. Downside is the location. For those not from Southern California Riverside is like Fontana ...decent prices is house and probably more to do but it's not the Westside of LA! Oh, they are also in process of getting and C&A Fellowship.
Temple: No pre-interview dinner. There was a reception last week, but, alas, I am on the opposite coast so could not make it. The main thing I got from Temple was that they are all about educating the residents. Not that the other places are not, but I felt that here, in particular, they give lots of time to supervision and education. It's a busy hospital in a urban area that has great need. The residents were again a lovely happy group that seemed to enjoy the work! They expressed how comfortable they feel even after intern year handling complex situations. They have developed these interest tracks: research, child..etc to help those who know what they want to do a more specific focus. Downside is that there is no C&A fellowship and snow.
Case Western Metro Health: Pre-interview social at one of the chief's places. 99% of the residents were there. A dynamic and inviting group. It was like a commercial for the United Colors of Benetton. Again, another group of kind, intelligent residents. The PD is awesome. He is fairly new to the program and is as articulate, and he is interesting. If I wanted to do Geriatric Psych I would go there just to work with him. The other Attendings with who I met where equally compelling and talented. The program is challenging in that it is a busy urban hospital that deals with very mentally ill. But by the looks of it the residents are on their way to becoming great clinicians. We sat in on a Grand Rounds by one senior resident..impressive. Downside is that there is no C&A fellowship and snow..oh and LeBron! (yes, LA Lakers for life! We will be back!)
Univ of Hawaii: I was lucky or un-lucky enough to get to interview in LA. We had dinner with the chiefs. Incredible people. The faculty seem great too. It seems that Hawaii offers a unique opportunity to work with social and cultural issues that only exists there! So exciting. But then there's the $ issue. There is a beautiful eloquent review on the previous pages that says everything that I felt so could you please defer to her review.
Univ of Kentucky: Yes, I am cheating again, there are some other great reviews about Kentucky which go into great detail and are representative of my experience too. As mentioned, the hotel bathtub was something that could be featured in Showtime After Dark! I will say that I felt like I was in a movie when I drove out of the airport. Lexington is beautiful, and the people very sweet. I loved the residents and the faculty. The new PD or soon to be seems amazing and has some big plans.
Mount Sinai: Beth Israel: Again there is an earlier review that also mirrored my experience. And that review is beautifully detailed and specific. Except the Department Chair came to meet with us. He seems to being a unique experience to the program with his past as a county mental officer ( I am not getting the title correct). The PD was very welcoming during my exit interview..I just got the irony of the remark! Anyway, the residents seemed very happy and set-up for success. I got a good psychotherapy and family therapy training vibe from the program. The electives are endless and research opportunities abundant. Downside, of course, is green! But like someone else mentioned about the NYU review... you make it work!
SUNY Stony Brook: Pre-interview dinner with residents was great. They all seemed happy with the program and enjoy living on Long Island. Interview day was also great. I just had a flashback to the desserts at lunch..yummy. The program has a lot to offer. The hospital is busy with a host of pathologies. There's research and psychotherapy and intellect. The PD is bright and eager and seems to love being an educator. There's a strong C&A fellowship. The downside is the location. Long Island is not the cheapest and there's traffic and snow. The work life balance seems good and the residents seemed genuinely happy.
UC Irvine: again another previous interview was rather thorough and similar to my experience. Preinterview dinner with the residents was very informative. A welcoming, bright, and kind bunch. I enjoyed the "behavioral style" interviews...mostly because it was a nice break from telling my story, not that I could ever grow weary of talking about my trials and tribulations that brought me down this road. I had some fascinating conversations with some of the interviewers about their work. Very exciting things happening down there in the OC. I like the fact that there is a broad array of patients from the very wealthy to the jailhouse peeps.
Maricopa Medical Center: Pre-interview dinner with the residents was delicious as it was informative. There was very little about this program to not love. I suppose a downside is that if you are SUPER into research then this may not be the place for you. But that being said there seems to be ample opportunity as this place is busy and there are very ill patients aka good subjects. There is rumor to be a forensic fellowship happening. The C&A is really good..so I've heard.

I realize that I have said some no too specific things. I just wanted to try and give something since I have just been a parasite around here. If anyone has any questions...feel free to PM

 

[blueskies519]

.

 

[Gavanshir]

Interview reviews for the alternative applicant.

Creedmoor Psychiatric Center
1. Ease Of Communication: Only communication was for the interview invite and directions to the building.

2. Accommodation & Food: No accommodation, sandwiches ordered from local Italian restaurant. They were good.

3. Interview Day: Two interviews. One with the PD and the other with an attending. Time in between interviews was spent in the library/lounge answering two short essay questions (I don't recall the prompts). The interviews were pretty standard, about 15-20 minutes each. Nothing out of the ordinary, the PD was overly nice with everyone and didn't really have any interesting/hard questions. The attending that I interviewed with on the other hand asked me questions that let me know he had thoroughly reviewed my personal statement. He was analytic and measured with his questions. Spent a lot of time with 3 of their residents who hung out during lunch and one gave us a nice tour.

4. Program Overview: This seems like a relatively laid back residency program with the great benefit of rotations at Columbia Presbyterian. In fact almost an entire year is spent at Columbia. Medicine months are spent at Queens Hospital Center and outpatient C&A at Jewish Board of Family & Children's Services (Judea Clinic). Great program if you you get bored easily because there are a lot of different rotations sites.

5. Faculty Achievements & Involvement: Mostly Columbia faculty.

6. Location & Lifestyle: There is a lot of history at Creedmoor. It's one of the oldest psych facilities in the country and once housed thousands of residents with its own self-efficient farm. It's all the way inside Queens in Queens village. The building is very ominous looking, specially on my interview day when it was covered in fog. The facilities are huge. There is a full-sized basketball court and gym for the use of the patients. You can always bring a patient down to shoot a few hoops while you do your psych interview. Nice big auditorium too. Huge music and recreational space with tons of instruments. There is a freaking nice bowling alley inside. Creedmoor is also unique in having the "Living museum" which is a collection of art by the patients. Some of the art works have been exhibited and sold for big money down in SoHo.

7. Salary & Benefits: PGY-1 is 57K. Some annual CME coverage. I think that was it.

8. Program Strengths: No call (can be a weakness too) and short-call is apparently mostly spent watching movies on your laptop. Columbia affiliation and rotations at Columbia. According to the residents, when rotation there, you are treated just as the Columbia residents with great teaching and faculty support. Residents seemed happy. One of them told me "if you want a "lifestyle" residency, this is the place to be."

9. Potential Weaknesses: Must do 4 years, no option to fast-track into C&A. It's a long-term psychiatric facility so there is little turn-over and exposure to more acute psych illnesses may be limited. No CPEP at Creedmoor, I believe you go to a different site to get CPEP experience. Moving around a lot (could be a positive to some). Seemed like kind of a crappy part of Queens far away from Manhattan/BK but some may prefer that.

 

[MinionBob]

I’ve lurked on this forum for over a year and learned a lot from it. To give back to future classes, here are my unfiltered 2 cents about the places I interviewed at and ROL formulation.

I have a few ideas but honestly I’m not sure what I want to be when I grow up yet. At this point I’m looking for broad general psychiatry training. I like:
- Diversity of patients - economics, pathology, severity, culture.
- Psychodynamic tradition. Opportunity to “get more experience for those interested” is nice but comes off as an excuse to me. Ideally I want the “average” attending I work with or the “average” didactic given to consider therapy’s role on a daily or at least weekly basis. Admittedly I didn’t figure out this was important to me until well into the season - and if I did everything over again I probably would have made a few changes in the list of places I applied to and interviewed at.
- Didactics. I really enjoy good ones in medical school.
- High post-tax salary and low cost of living. This is a job after all. My spouse is unlikely to become wealthy in his/her career. More savings at the end of residency means more flexibility in choosing my first few jobs.
- Moonlighting. In addition to more money, I bet working with higher autonomy and efficiency is good preparation for life as an attending.
- Benefits. Which really equals more money. Some places (Yale, UPMC, Hopkins, UCLA) offer health insurance for spouse and children at no cost - that is equal to an extra several thousand dollars a year.
- Convenience. My medical school had some considerable commutes 3rd year, and while I survived it would be nice to not endure them as a resident. Cheap parking goes a long way for me too.
- A program director with plenty of experience and love for residents.
- It would be nice to live in a single family house.
- It would be nice to have my own office with my name on the door.

I declined interviews at OHSU, WashU, Northwestern, Michigan, Penn (late invite), & Emory. I was rejected by UCSF. I was waitlisted by Stanford and withdrew.

1. Yale:
Yale has excellent diversity of clinical sites and patients, and a respectable psychodynamic tradition. MGH McLean is just as good if not better in these regards, but what makes (in my opinion) Yale the #1 psychiatry residency by far is its livability: high pay, generous benefits, shorter commute times since all major clinical sites are close to one another, more abundant moonlighting opportunities, rental prices less than half of Boston’s, and the ability to live in a single family house. The devotion to improving didactics and its positive reception amongst residents stood out to me. This is an area I could tolerate living in after residency for my first job. There was some stuffiness at my interview day with the whole “we want the most diverse class and they should all be leaders” speech (but I sure wouldn’t mind joining that club). Bottom line: I estimate a difference of $140k in savings at the end of residency at Yale versus MGH McLean. For a slightly better program that is much more of a headache, MGH is just not worth it.

2. MGH McLean:
This is the best clinical residency of the places I interviewed at - the widest diversity of patients in terms of economics and ethnicities, therapy tradition more robust than anywhere except perhaps Longwood, and the most prestigious name in academic psychiatry. It is also a commuting and financial nightmare to train here. The distance between sites is formidable - especially for the interns who rotate at NWH - so much so that a two day interview was needed. Although Boston is usually thought of as a walkable city, a car is necessary for all but the hardiest of bikers for all 4 years. I really liked what I saw of Cambridge (located in between MGH & McLean). Moonlighting is available but appears difficult to do much of until PGY4 because of a busy schedule including consults in PGY3. Given the high cost of living and low pay in the area there is no way I would want to stay here for my first attending job. Elitism is palpable. According to one of my interviewers, the new PD regime has made an effort to recruit “less autistic” residents (his/her words, not mine) and that the most recent two classes have been noticeably different. Bottom line: This is a residency for the dreaming, starving artist who settles for nothing but the sexiest name and absolute best training - money and conveniences be damned.

3. Western Psychiatric Institute & Clinics at the University of Pittsburgh:
WPIC has just about everything within its 300 psych beds, 12k/yr psych ER visits, 400k/yr outpatient visits, and well-funded research faculty. This is a nurturing environment with regards to academics - the administration appears to go well out of their way to provide excellent mentorship and success with attaining career grants. Residents like me who are not determined to be future PIs will fit in just fine here though. WPIC has patients with diverse pathology but not so much in terms of ethnicity and economics. Psychodynamic therapy is questionable - plusses include the Pittsburgh Psychoanalytic Center being close by and having an “office without walls” affiliation with the residency program, however despite the chairman’s pitch (“don’t come to WPIC if you don’t want to do therapy”) I don’t get the same sense of psychodynamics being subtly entrenched in everyday training and amongst the majority of faculty the way it feels at MGH McLean or even Yale. Program director has held his position for 10 years. The area is extremely affordable but dingy. Since WPIC is the only primary site, commute times can be low if you live close (parking $6/day, even if pretax, is high though). Excellent moonlighting opportunities add to the financial practicality of working here. Residents get their own offices as upper-levels. Renting or buying a house is easy here. Bottom line: Clinically this program is not quite as complete as Yale and MGH McLean, particularly with regards to psychodynamics. But… at ~$110k more savings at the end of residency compared to MGH McLean and the ability to live in a house, I came very close to compromising.

4. Longwood (BWH-BID):
Excellent diversity and therapy therapy tradition. To me this program is deserving of its high ranking but I find it suspicious how HMS students, through match results, overwhelmingly identify MGH McLean as superior (if Longwood is just as good, why are students from its affiliated medical school avoiding it?). In theory the early protected research time should give Longwood a leg up on MGH for those interested in research (but isn’t a big deal to me). The word on the street is that residents here are lot more down-to-earth than those at that MGH but I don’t have a strong feeling this is the case from my interviews. Personally I’m not a fan of requiring a scholarly project. Commuting is probably less of a hassle here than at MGH since the main sites are right next to each other. Bottom line: Even though it’s a fantastic clinical program that I would love to match to, if I’m going to tolerate the financial hit of living in Boston for 4 years I would prefer to be at the biggest psychiatry name in town, not here.

5. UCLA (Semel Institute):
One of the biggest names I interviewed at, up there with MGH McLean and Yale. On the surface it doesn’t have the same outwardly serious, haughty vibe though - just read the handout bios given at the interview day here compared to those from Yale. Psychodynamic therapy requirements are low and don’t begin until the 3rd year. There are opportunities to receive more training but this attitude doesn’t sit well with me. Community psych is often cited as a weakness of the program but this can be supplemented with moonlighting. Program director has held his position for 20 years. The salary is pathetic but benefits are excellent. Moonlighting is huge here, perhaps even bigger than at UPMC and Yale, which makes this a smarter financial choice than the Boston programs. Commuting to some of the sites is a trek but the main hubs of the program - WLAVA, Raegan, and Semel - are close to one another. The weather is enchanting, the area is expensive, jobs pay much better here than in the northeast and the area appears less saturated. I could possibly see myself staying here for my first attending job. Bottom line: Awesome set-up for psychiatry training however I’m not as high on this place as others are because of the lack of therapy tradition; and I ranked it lower than UPMC because it’s not obviously better and not as financially practical.

6. University of Wisconsin at Madison:
I applied here mainly for the location and as what I perceived to be a decent backup… and it exceeded my expectations. I like the focus on outpatient psychiatry and wish other programs would follow the same mold of ~2.5-3yrs devoted to outpatient instead of the usual 1.5-2yrs since psychiatry is primarily an outpatient specialty. Therapy appears to be an important part of the philosophy here. The program director is one of my favorites. VA, UW, and children’s hospital are all connected and only 4 miles from the psychiatry clinic building. Moonlighting is allowed but most residents are not super interested in it and thus I didn’t hear about any lucrative opportunities (the state hospital system was the only site mentioned and it is capped at $12.5k/yr compensation for residents). It is possible to rent or buy a house here, but the most convenient locations are on the high end of what I could afford. Bottom line: Not a huge academic name and not the best moonlighting but a balanced, diverse, and underrated psychiatry residency.

7. Johns Hopkins:
17 months of inpatient psychiatry (not including 4 months of C/L) is too much. Prohibition of moonlighting is enough of a reason to avoid this place at all costs. The residents spoke well of the teaching here, and I believe them. My home program has a recent graduate of this residency and one of my mentors raves about how he/she is the best fellow we’ve had in years. At first I found the perspectives to be inspiring - as a sort of vendetta against the DSM machine over-taking psychiatry - and uniting as a teaching model in the department. However I don’t understand why psychodynamic therapy should not be a focus of treatment if the patient’s multiple perspectives is to be taken into account when understanding his/her problems. This lack of balance - shortchanging therapy and outpatient treatment - is why I ranked it low. Disappointing indeed because it’s an affordable, practical place to work in a cool city: one site for PGY1, one site for PGY2-4, both close to Canton, a neighborhood with cute row-houses. My fantasy of living in one is what prevented me from ranking it dead last. Bottom line: Hopkins has so much potential but needs a makeover to include more outpatient training and allow moonlighting before it can be taken seriously as a top program.

8. University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC):
I got a weird vibe from 3/4 of my faculty interviewers. PD seemed like he was just going through the motions, which I understand is part of the process but I have not gotten this same feeling from other PDs. Most of the time on interview days I am impressed with faculty and have a desire to be like them someday - that feeling was completely lacking here. This interview day was an enormous disappointment and I would be a tad worried if I matched here. On paper though this is a balanced program with at least average moonlight opportunities. Bottom line: Maybe I just had a bad day… but my gut is telling me to stay away.

9. University of Washington at Seattle:
Excellent diversity of sites… alas they are all a significant commute away from each other. My favorite city… but it’s expensive and moonlighting is not abundant (perhaps that even means the area is saturated with psychiatrists?). Overall this place feels like it would be a headache to train at (similar to MGH McLean). Bottom line: This is projected as the biggest financial loser of all the places I interviewed at, hence my justification for ranking it at the bottom.

10. University of Washington, Boise Track:
This is a young program (7-8 yrs old) and there is added uncertainty since they were looking for a new program director at the time of my interview. It’s a kindasorta lifestyle choice since there is no call and all weekends are off while in Boise - however the first two years in Seattle are definitely not easy. Bottom line: I love the location and fantasize about living here one day… but think it’s a better place to move to as an attending than to train as a resident - too big of a risk in my opinion given the other options I have.

 

[kirkirkir]

Does anyone have info on Nassau hospital in NY?

 

[PsyYaYaYaYai]

This is what I remember about these programs after the season was over. Thus, it is my "gut" and most memorable things, which I think make the biggest difference. Tried to give some one-liners. Grouped by region, not by preference. Hope it helps someone!

VCU: a potential diamond in the rough that seems so misunderstood. great city, great PD, lots of diverse pathology and facilities. A mix of DO, IMG, FMG, which may be why more AMGs aren't flocking to this hipster haven?
GWU: ACGME accredited psychiatry program in DC that has strong women's health and CAP. coordinator and PD are very friendly and approachable. work in both DC and Virginia. UNIQUE: health policy advocacy work and you can get an MPH 90% off.
Georgetown: ACGME accredited psychiatry program in DC that is not super accessible by public transit. openly admitted they use templated interview questions. faculty made it seem like I was fortunate to be heard by such a prestigious institution, but the residents' noses were not as high.
UMD: a large program with diverse exposure but requires hard work. Sheppard Pratt will have you salivating, but the call schedule make have you quivering in fear. Baltimore is not for everyone, and Hopkins may cannibalize a bit. UNIQUE: Sheppard Pratt and everything within
Jefferson: ACGME accredited psychiatry program in Philadelphia. Many say the PD is awesome, but I got a bad vibe and our interview group felt like he was pushing our buttons on purpose (perhaps it was a bad day). this is the only place where I had an interview where someone clearly didn't read my application and appeared like they could care less about me. YMMV.
BU: ACGME accredited psychiatry program in Boston that is strong in addictions. lacks academic inpatient unit. currently undergoing some program leadership changes. location is not exactly in the city, which is +/- for some. shares facilities with Tufts. interview is a marathon of interviews/interviewees, but this may change. both aPDs are super nice.
Tufts: ACGME accredited psychiatry program in Boston that emphasizes psychoanalysis. in the heart of downtown Boston, may make rent higher or commute longer, your pick. shares facilities with BU. had a "warm and fuzzy" feel, maybe because of the psychoanalytic bend?
UCLA-SFV: diverse exposure/sites but outpatient work is largely VA-based. get all the benefits of being part of UCLA, like housing and such. the driving does not seem that bad and residents seem happy. moonlighting is pretty amazing. PD and aPD felt distant during interviews. UNIQUE: PGY2 and PGY3 days are split 0.5 inpatient/0.5 outpatient
Harbor UCLA: excellent pathology exposure within facilities that are very drab. location is pretty south of LA. great exposure to pathology. residents didn't seem overly tired. UNIQUE: who you see as inpatient you follow as outpatient
UTSW: lots of electives, exposure, and flexibility in a city that is not for everyone. excellent private, VA, and county exposure. PD is very approachable. UNIQUE: brand new county hospital
UT Austin: academic program on the rise that currently resembles a community program. free-standing psych hospital. major moonlighting opportunities. may not teach M3 or M4s for a while because of the new medical school. UNIQUE: PGY2 is all outpatient, PGY3 is all inpatient.

 

[lockian]

I've been asked to write some reviews of programs that are not often spoken about here, and that I think deserve to have more applicants coming their way.
So, without further ado the first one is:

Hennepin-Regions in Minneapolis/St Paul, Minnesota
I think this is a very underrated program, and in the words of... someone (?) I talked to on interview day, all it really needs is a "University of" at the beginning of its name to get more attention.

Pros:
--Nearly 200 beds between a county setting (Hennepin) and a well-regarded private hospital (Regions) with some of the highest acuity and diverse patients you can expect in a large urban area. The consensus among residents was that the supervision and workload is just right, and faculty tend to steer you toward the best learning opportunities.
--Facilities are very important to me, and both sites are top-notch. Not quite the U of MN with their uber-cool sensory stimulation rooms, but the psych wards are well-furnished and pleasant to be in, with plenty of windows to ward off the SAD.
--The twin cities are one of the most livable urban areas in the country. Great food, excellent schools, highly educated and NICE populace, affordable, beautiful lakes and architecture, bike paths galore, a preponderance of arts, shopping, and other things to do.
--Plenty of moonlighting opportunities, including in-house
--One of my favorite PD's: a man who is all about positive feedback and making you feel like a person who has a great deal to give the world. Particularly well-liked by his residents, too.

Cons:
--Lack of a formal academic affiliation, though faculty do still engage in research, and you can find it if you want it. Like at most community programs, you have to be proactive. You can't really go next door to U of MN, though, because their research funding has been frozen due to the recent scandals and Mayo is two hours away and is... Mayo.
--The pre-interview dinner was in a Thai place with nice ambiance, but the food was nearly inedible. Given the preponderance of restaurants in the twin cities, there have got to be better options!
--It's Minnesota and it's COLD.

Neutral / fyi:
--An "inverted" 2 and 3rd year training scheme, where 2nd year is spent in the outpatient world and 3rd year is back in inpatient. One of my interviewers told me that he's seen a clear difference in senior resident quality since this system was instituted. In his words, someone who returns to work inpatient after spending a year in outpatient gets valuable insight into effective discharge planning. As such a 3rd-year is "more like a sub-attending, as opposed to an advanced resident." I can see how the inpatient-outpatient transition can be hard to make early on, but none of the residents endorsed floundering at the beginning of their outpatient year. It seems they don't go "here are your patients, knock yourself out"; you slowly integrate yourself into the clinic workflow. Also, you go to several different clinics during your outpatient year -- you may have clinic A on Monday, clinic B on Tues-Thursday, and clinic C on Friday. There's a large number of clinics to choose from scattered all over town, and you're assigned based on a rank list you make.
--The two core clinical sites are about 15 minutes' drive apart sans traffic. I believe -- correct me if I'm wrong -- didactics are only at one of them.
--I've heard through the grapevine that Mayo tends to pick the most complex patients and send the rest (including the ones with particularly severe psychosocial problems) to Hennepin. This may be a good or a bad thing. Personally, I am of the school of thought that you should take the patients who come to you, and you should learn from the most high-acuity population in all ways.

In the pipe:
Maricopa
Advocate Lutheran General
JPS

 

[lockian]

JPS in Dallas-Fort Worth, Texas

Communication: Took me forever to schedule an interview -- I almost gave up! For some reason, the program coordinator would not reply to my emails, and the phone number listed in her signature must have been wrong, as I left multiple messages with no reply and it was different from the one on the website. She also got confused about what date we settled on when she sent me my confirmation -- I got a confirmation for the hotel on one day and the interview for another.

Accommodations: The program pays for a really nice hotel downtown, including parking. No complaints there. Did not make it in time for the dinner.

Program: Big, high-acuity county hospital with a psych ER. You'll get no shortage of diversity and high-acuity patients here. The workload seemed high. The residents cited carrying up to 20 patients at times, and there are no formal caps. They still said it was "manageable," though, in part because the support staff does a very good job not calling for silly reasons and doing a lot to sort out the social side of things. I got to attend grand rounds, and it was an excellent, very clinically practical talk by a visiting lecturer from Baylor about new research on mixed states in mood disorders.

Facilities: The facilities were mostly what you'd think of when you think of an old county hospital. Few windows, monotonous beige walls, fluorescent lighting, linoleum floors, the occasional cinderblocks. It was clean and not as bad as it could have been, but I've definitely seen better. The outpatient center which was our home base for the interviews was a little way's away and was this drab little office building in the middle of some parking lots. Even the faculty acknowledged that the place "could use a face lift," even though it was ok on the outside. The good news is, the CEO of the hospital really cares about psychiatry; he spent two whole days observing how things work in the psych ER, and there's a new psych-only building in the works, but it probably won't happen in our lifetime as residents.

Location: Fort Worth is actually pretty nice. I stayed one night at a nice hotel downtown paid for by the program, and one night with a couple of young physicians (one a first-year attending and the other doing a fellowship) who lived near the hospital. They were renting a whole house, a beautiful one with a lot of character and well kept up, built in 1920. They paid just over $1000/mos for it. The downtown is really pretty, with cobblestone streets and art nouveau architecture which I did not expect to see. Fort Worth is not as "happening" as nearby Dallas, but there's theatre, arts, and museums, and it's been described as "family friendly" with quiet, cosy neighborhoods where everybody knows each other. In fact, the program quite aside, the people are very, VERY nice, and I think this is true of Texas in general.

There wasn't traffic that I saw or that anyone's mentioned. The roads are plentiful and well-designed. The only potential problem is that they don't get snow, they get ice on the roads, and when that happens things get very slow and there are accidents galore because no one knows how to drive on ice.

(Other fun facts about Texas: everybody seems to drive a truck, and everything is bigger. When my hosts took me out to eat, I was served a plate of nachos the size of a bowling ball.)

People: Unfortunately, I was not impressed with anyone I met. The faculty seemed like they were going through the motions, and one guy was literally reading my application *as* he was interviewing me. The chief resident asked me what I considered inappropriate and unnecessary questions, such as where else I applied and interviewed, and how many interviews I had gone on so far. Most of my interviewers also didn't do as good a job with the "why here" question, making me feel like I had to defend my position as opposed to simply using it as a conversation starter.

[Keep in mind that although this is a relatively negative reviews and I almost didn't rank the place, everyone is different. For some people, this program may be an excellent fit, it just wasn't for me.]

 

[725805]

JPS in Dallas-Fort Worth, Texas

Communication: Took me forever to schedule an interview -- I almost gave up! For some reason, the program coordinator would not reply to my emails, and the phone number listed in her signature must have been wrong, as I left multiple messages with no reply and it was different from the one on the website. She also got confused about what date we settled on when she sent me my confirmation -- I got a confirmation for the hotel on one day and the interview for another.

Accommodations: The program pays for a really nice hotel downtown, including parking. No complaints there. Did not make it in time for the dinner.

Program: Big, high-acuity county hospital with a psych ER. You'll get no shortage of diversity and high-acuity patients here. The workload seemed high. The residents cited carrying up to 20 patients at times, and there are no formal caps. They still said it was "manageable," though, in part because the support staff does a very good job not calling for silly reasons and doing a lot to sort out the social side of things. I got to attend grand rounds, and it was an excellent, very clinically practical talk by a visiting lecturer from Baylor about new research on mixed states in mood disorders.

Facilities: The facilities were mostly what you'd think of when you think of an old county hospital. Few windows, monotonous beige walls, fluorescent lighting, linoleum floors, the occasional cinderblocks. It was clean and not as bad as it could have been, but I've definitely seen better. The outpatient center which was our home base for the interviews was a little way's away and was this drab little office building in the middle of some parking lots. Even the faculty acknowledged that the place "could use a face lift," even though it was ok on the outside. The good news is, the CEO of the hospital really cares about psychiatry; he spent two whole days observing how things work in the psych ER, and there's a new psych-only building in the works, but it probably won't happen in our lifetime as residents.

Location: Fort Worth is actually pretty nice. I stayed one night at a nice hotel downtown paid for by the program, and one night with a couple of young physicians (one a first-year attending and the other doing a fellowship) who lived near the hospital. They were renting a whole house, a beautiful one with a lot of character and well kept up, built in 1920. They paid just over $1000/mos for it. The downtown is really pretty, with cobblestone streets and art nouveau architecture which I did not expect to see. Fort Worth is not as "happening" as nearby Dallas, but there's theatre, arts, and museums, and it's been described as "family friendly" with quiet, cosy neighborhoods where everybody knows each other. In fact, the program quite aside, the people are very, VERY nice, and I think this is true of Texas in general.

There wasn't traffic that I saw or that anyone's mentioned. The roads are plentiful and well-designed. The only potential problem is that they don't get snow, they get ice on the roads, and when that happens things get very slow and there are accidents galore because no one knows how to drive on ice.

(Other fun facts about Texas: everybody seems to drive a truck, and everything is bigger. When my hosts took me out to eat, I was served a plate of nachos the size of a bowling ball.)

People: Unfortunately, I was not impressed with anyone I met. The faculty seemed like they were going through the motions, and one guy was literally reading my application *as* he was interviewing me. The chief resident asked me what I considered inappropriate and unnecessary questions, such as where else I applied and interviewed, and how many interviews I had gone on so far. Most of my interviewers also didn't do as good a job with the "why here" question, making me feel like I had to defend my position as opposed to simply using it as a conversation starter.

[Keep in mind that although this is a relatively negative reviews and I almost didn't rank the place, everyone is different. For some people, this program may be an excellent fit, it just wasn't for me.]

I am very familiar with this program and wanted to add a couple points.

This program is one of FEW psych programs I saw that had no VA experience at all, which was a huge negative for me in the end.

Also practically no child exposure, with the exception of the adolescent inpatient unit and maybe some outpatient child clinic (I forget exactly). But very weak in Child/Adolescent. PD has stated he is not interested in accepting residents who want to go into Child & Adolescent.

The faculty is absolutely fantastic and the residents are being truthful when they say they can call/text any faculty at any time and feel well supported. Attendings work just as hard as residents, there is just a ton of volume but the Psych ER is state of the art and if anyone is interested in Emergency Psych this is actually a great program for you (as long as you don't want to deal with child emergencies I guess).

The program coordinators email that was sent attached on the interview invites actually didn't work and she had trouble with ERAS, I called her number and it worked out for me.

Didactics are bad.

Fort Worth is an amazing city to live in. If there's something you want to do that isn't there, you just drive to Dallas. Cost of living is low, there are great places to live with low crime. Very much so a small town feel in a big city.
The residents are fantastic, friendly, and supportive.
Good program if you want to work with adults, learn emergency psych, and have little to no interest in working at the VA or with children.

 

[24blue8]

I wanted to contribute with some reviews about places that don’t get a lot of traffic on here. If you have one for a more off the beaten track as well, I will post them for you.

If anyone has a longer review for Loma Linda it would be nice to have that as well since they seem pretty mysterious and a lot of my classmates were interested but didn’t know too much about the place.

I don’t have a personal stake in these programs so if there are mistakes I apologize. These reviews are based on notes I scribbled at the time, conversations and my memory.

UC RIVERSIDE

Can’t really say that much since it seems like the place is still in development but it does seem like a program that will be on the rise due to faculty, location and no call.
Residents were friendly, well rounded and appeared to be excited about helping create the curriculum. One did complain that there was too much hand-holding in the program and they also made several disparaging remarks (in bad taste) about the quality of the faculty.
There are opportunities available for clinical research.
Psychotherapy curriculum still needs to be hammered out but faculty was enthusiastic about the possibilities. Several psychiatrists familiar with the faculty all mentioned, unsolicited, that while the chair is incredibly charismatic, not all that glitters is gold.

 

[24blue8]

UCLA SFV/ VA
Very strong ER psych exposure, addiction management and psychotherapy (due to PD’s interest). C&L and emergency psych attendings were very enthusiastic. Good, overall general training (curriculum includes geriatrics, child inpatient, C&L). I felt like the curriculum seemed well thought out compared to some other places. Opportunities exist to perform electives at UCLA and residents can have their therapy cases supervised by UCLA docs however I was told most do not do this due to traffic and are pleased with supervision at SFV. Residents stated that the docs at UCLA were different and they gelled better with their VA/SFV faculty. Residents were slightly disappointed by the lack of exposure to women at the VA (85% of patient load is men for the residents I spoke with).

Program appears to be “resident run” and as stated by everyone else, PD and aPD seemed borderline disinterested during the interview day. I was blatantly told by residents (later confirmed by graduates of the program) that the PD is at times difficult to find due to his private practice and there is little interaction with some faculty. However, they didn’t find this to be a hindrance and said there was plenty of support in other areas. PC was never seen during the day, difficult to get ahold of prior and post interview day but that is understandable as she is kept very busy managing the department. Several residents switched in during their PGY-2 so they did not do their intern year at the program and after coming in from surgery or IM programs thought the intern year was very relaxed. Actual interns felt differently about the schedule. They all start off together for one month at the VA which seemed really nice to help interns bond and figure things out together. Hospital in SFV has seen better days (as most county facilities) and you have to pass through a metal detector prior to entering. You have to pay for parking down at the VA near Westwood and I think they said their food cards don’t work down there either.

Though they all were very friendly and warm, I was really surprised by some of the comments some of the residents made during the interview day (would not stop talking about how much money they make, their VA discounts, how little they rest because they can make so much money moonlighting). They were uncomfortably relaxed around applicants in their comments, demeanor and apparel.

 

[24blue8]

UCSF FRESNO

This program would be very popular if it was located 100 miles West. I was more impressed by this place than several I went to in Southern California. I read some SDN program reviews from a few years back and this seems to be the general sentiment so I don’t think I just caught them on a good day.

All interns start together on off service months then January through December constitutes their psych years. 1st year is all inpatient, then two years of outpatient, the remaining January through July comprises their fourth year electives (yes, you can do electives at UCSF if you want). The outpatient years are anchored at a UCSF “center of excellence” private practice clinic with handpicked patients for residents based on their interests. Residents were pleasantly surprised by the diversity found at the VA and thought they received good variety and exposure there. They also mentioned the psychotherapy training/exposure was heavily emphasized and "strong". Their C&L service is currently in transition due to a retirement and they currently do not work all services. Residents say quantity of patients seen is now lower but quality is better. There’s an integrated mental health clinic that allows for C&L in an outpatient setting. Many residents seemed interested in C&A, several fast tracked into programs in California. Not a lot of hard research going on. Residents seemed relieved by this.

Faculty were impressive and seemed very committed to the program (I believe the program director is originally from Fresno and came back home). Residents reiterated how easy the faculty was to engage, how supported they felt and how many changes are in place due to feedback from the residents. Program coordinator was easily the friendliest one I met on the trail.

From what I can remember, the call was doable (1 weekend per month in the first year always with an attending in house, 1 weekend every 2 months second and third year, none fourth year). No night float. Don’t quote me on those numbers. The program is education focused and doesn’t need residents to run the place.

I also was surprised by how nice and shiny their hospital was. Residents seemed excited about all the free food in their physician cafeteria and there were little food stations with people making to order some kind of burrito bowl. Parking is free.

 

[24blue8]

UCLA/KERN MEDICAL CENTER

Don’t believe the hype. There are no hillbilly meth demons or FMG ghouls that live in Bakersfield waiting to eat your overly educated soul.

But it’s Bakersfield. Love it or… It is nowhere near as bad as what you’ve heard but if you’re not prepared for it then you might be in for a surprise. The city looks sort of dusty but the residents seemed to believe the place was on an upswing and I really appreciated their enthusiasm. They’ve bought houses, their kids go to public school and they see themselves living in the Central Valley after they graduate.

General stuff in the first year (neurology months are done at UCLA and they give you an apartment in LA for the blocks) and second year is more inpatient, C&L, ER, geriatrics and night float. Third year is all outpatient at county facilities and the VA. Options exist to do forensics, community psych and adolescent/juvenile hall. Fourth year is all electives and yes, you can do them at UCLA. Call schedule (once again, don’t quote me on this) was something like two weekends per month during PGY-1 and then it gradually lessens. Residents (PGY-1 and 2) said that they’re never alone in house during call (there’s a buddy system?) and attendings are very responsive and encourages them to call or will drive in to help them even if they’re moonlighting.

Patient population is skewed towards underserved, lower socioeconomic patients and substance abuse which is understandable given the demographics of the city.

Faculty addressed the current turmoil that was publicized last year. The program is on probation. They said that going forward the affiliation with UCLA will remain and they are hoping to strengthen the program by adding in more elements of research and growing the program with the remaining faculty. The program director seemed committed and qualified and it appears that he will be the reassuring cornerstone of the program going forward. Seeing him and talking with him was the highlight of the day and everyone commented on what an asset he is to the program.

 

[24blue8]

UC IRVINE

I think there’s a review from this year already posted and I think it covers the details. 1st and 2nd year seemed pretty standard but they do have an inpatient med/psych unit that residents rotate through.
3rd year is outpatient at the Long Beach VA and UCI medical center clinics. They mentioned they have 7hrs/week of psychotherapy including group and couples therapy. 4th year electives were pretty diverse including Kaiser, student health, forensics, integrated pain management and research.

Despite what people make think when they hear Orange County, Residents stated the patient population is diverse as UCI medical center is the only university hospital in the OC and the only level 1 trauma center so they see everything. You will get your fill of meth induced psychosis and the med/psych unit seemed pretty intense. Residents talked positively on their experiences and exposure. Emphasized that program is supportive, not a lot of hierarchy, faculty is accessible. Residents also believe structure allows for time outside of the program. There are “committee chairs” that plan social events and also promote resident wellness (even receiving a small grant/stipend to brighten up the residents room). This was a really nice hospital and even the inpatient was really nice, clean and bright. The cafeteria was also really nice and I think they get a monthly food stipend that they felt was sufficient.

Call schedule is currently being reworked (or maybe that’s just regarding night float). PGY1s have 2-3 wks of night float, 25 short calls per yr (5-9p), 12 weeknd calls (Saturday 12hrs and Sunday 13hrs) and a holiday 12hr call.

Residents had ample opportunity to get involved in research but did not seem research heavy inclined. New PD’s vision (as stated at lunch) includes changing the academic atmosphere at UCI towards more research leaning. He repeated this several times during the day and it seemed like he was looking for more research (lite) excited residents to take the program in a different direction.

After the interview block, we were taken to a resident lunch that was attended by the PD, the interim chair and most of the residents. Questions were asked by the applicants and even those directed at the residents were answered by the PD and faculty. At times it seemed the residents did not want to give a “wrong” answer in front of the faculty. One of my interviewers raved about the program but mentioned that if you already know what you want to do and if UCI doesn’t have it as a fellowship it may be better to go somewhere else. I was also told that you don’t have to work “that hard” and some wish they’d taken more advantage of the opportunities they had during their training.

I really liked the interview format here and found it a fun day. These were some of the nicest residents I met on the trail.

 

[Lhiver]

Program Name: Hopkins

Program Communication: No problems with scheduling or communication.

Accommodations: No accomodations provided.

Dinner:
Dinner was at a restaurant at the waterfront. We could order anything on the menu. It was a 3 course meal with “American” style food (mostly fried foods as appetizers), but fish, steak, and seafood options for the main course. The interview dinner was on a Thursday night for both Thursday and Friday interviewees. Resident turnout was good.

Interview Day (Schedule, Type Of Interview, Unusual Questions, Experiences):
Start at 8:00 am with light breakfast (fruit, pastries, coffee) and an Introduction from the outgoing Chairman (Dr. DePaulo) and PD (Dr. Redgrave). Then went on a tour of several units (chronic pain, geriatric, mood disorder, schizophrenia, and eating disorders) with the Program Director. We had a series of 3 resident interviews (1/2 hour each) and 3 faculty interviews (1/2 hour each) interspersed throughout the day. Everyone had faculty interviews with PD and APD. In addition, we attended Teaching Rounds on one of the units where we saw a patient interviewed by a faculty member, went to a research discussion, had pizza for lunch with the residents, went to coffee with residents, and attended a discussion about intern year at Bayview Hospital. The day ended at 5:00 pm with an “exit interview” with the PD or APD where they emphasized that they will not respond to Thank you letters or communicate with us after the interview because they are concerned about coercion in the match process. All of the interviews were very conversational. It was clear that everyone read my application. They asked some questions about my application, but mostly they asked: “Do you have any questions?”. Prepare lots of questions!

Program and Curriculum Overview
~10 PGY1 categorical spots, 2-3 PGY2 categorical positions . (Excellent layout of schedule on their website in “Residency Program: Prospectus”).

Didactics: refer to the “Residency Program: Prospectus”- extensive protected didactics time, 1-2 hours per day instead of a protected half day system. This program is incredibly transparent about the didactics curriculum and it appears to be very robust. A unique feature of Hopkins didactics is Chairman’s Service Rounds where a resident presents a case to a senior faculty member in front of all of the residents in the program (40+ residents in white coats). The patient is then brought in and each resident asks the patient a question, and afterwards the case is discussed as a group. This can either be considered a great asset to the program, or a very antiquated, and perhaps coercive use of patients for teaching.

Program Feel and Culture
The PDs faculty repeatedly expressed that the program and Department has essentially remained the same for the last 30-40 years. They do not plan to change the program because “what we’re doing works.” This message was contentious given that the Department was led by a very controversial figure- Paul McHugh- for much of that time. Dr. McHugh, who remains a prominent figure in the department, believes that transgender individuals suffer from a mental illness, and PTSD is not a true diagnosis. Not all of McHugh’s opinions are supported by other faculty members in the Department. However the Department’s emphasis and pride in the lack of innovation and progress was jarring given this history. I know some people who already feel hesitant about applying to the program due to McHugh's stance on LGBT issues, and the faculty did not try to dispel this message or state that they welcomed diversity. One faculty member mentioned wanting to replace the DSM with the “Perspective Approach" conceived by Dr. McHugh and Dr. Slavney, but said that they have “given up” on other psychiatrists adopting their view and therefore focused on teaching it to medical students. The program seemed to want to isolate or distant itself from the rest of the psychiatric community. I also felt deeply unsettled by the fact that there are so few women faculty members in the Department. According to one resident, only ~2 fulltime female faculty. This became glaringly apparent while watching the centennial video that the program sent out which featured mostly white males. This was also the face of the department we were introduced to on our interview day. One faculty member admitted that that “neuroscience” was a weakness of the program but they did not foresee changes in that part of their curriculum anytime soon since “changes are slow” at Hopkins. Compared to other top programs that emphasize constant innovation and change in their departments and curricula, this program seemed far behind. Psychotherapy training does not seem as robust as in many programs and the program is somewhat disparaging of psychoanalytic training. However, they do have at least some didactics focusing on psychoanalysis. I expected to love this program but was deeply shocked by some of these attitudes.

Location & Lifestyle
Residents seem social and go out to a bar once per week. They said that at least one class is the social class each year and organizes events for the rest of the residents. Singles v. married/families mix varies year to year. Residents seemed to tolerate, but not love Baltimore for the most part. They felt that there is a lot to do and many restaurants, but some of the PGY4s did not want to stay there after graduation. Residents live all around the city and some outside.

Salary & Benefits
PGY1: $51,519
PGY2: $54,000
PGY3: $56,261
PGY4: $58,735

Vacation:
4 weeks per year

Lunch is provided at didactics 4-5 times per week

Program Strengths
-Amazing inpatient units with distinguished faculty trained in each area
-See multiple cases of each disorder (even rarer disorders, such as eating disorders, chronic pain) via the inpatient units
-Psychiatry is a very established department at Hopkins
-See mix of socioeconomic classes

Potential Weaknesses
-Outdated and stubborn about change
-Lack of female faculty in leadership positions
-Arrogant about Hopkins philosophy/pedagogy being better than other programs, does not seem that they are looking outside of their program for innovations that are happening at other programs
-Program is not flexible
-Little time for research until 4th year for those who are interested, unable to establish longitudinal projects
-Psychotherapy training may not be as strong as other progarms.

 

[liquidshadow22]

can anyone comment on the call schedule at GW?