Carolinas

[Bombesin]

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What are everyone's opinions on the Carolinas Rehabilitation residency in Charlotte? I dislike asking these types of questions for fear of inadvertently sowing discord if anything negative is said, but I'm having the hardest time creating my rank list. I know I'm supposed to rank based ultimately on how comfortable I feel at a particular program, how good the "fit" is, but therein lies the problem: I could honestly be happy at any of my top 5. I've already made clear my love affair with UPitt in a previous thread, but I feel darn near equally about RIC and Carolinas, as strange as that might possibly seem, haha. I can't put them in any kind of order. I guess I felt that Carolinas was really strong for not having a large university behind them and I'm looking for either confirmation or disagreement about this opinion. On the one-hand they don't have the fellowship placement/opportunities that RIC/UPitt have, but I do feel like they have some powerhouse faculty and that the training will be strong nonetheless. Am I crazy? What is the general feeling in regards to Carolinas in the rehab world? I keep thinking past residency as well. When hunting for jobs, I feel like I would be doing myself a disservice by not having RIC or UPitt behind my name. Is this feeling unwarranted, or is it the hard reality? Haha, am I making any sense? Any input regarding Carolinas would be greatly appreciated!

 

[ReadyFreddy]

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[rehab_sports_dr]

One way of thinking of things ....

Think about your choice of residency as a choice of marriage. One great piece of marriage advice I've heard is that if the thing you loved most about your future spouse was halved, and the thing that you disliked most about them was doubled, would you still want to marry them?

I think a similar question could be asked about a residency program- if the thing you liked most was reduced, and the thing you disliked the most was increased, would you still like that program

Statistically, they refer to this as robustness- how much can the system be perturbed and still have the general conclusions hold true

My personal bias is that there are certain factors that increase the robustness of the program:
1. Size- a very big factor. If a program has only 5-10 core faculty, then things can change very quickly if 1 or 2 key people leave

2. Stability of the greater health care system. This is an especially big factor in the current economic climate. In the interest of self-promotion, this is one of the best things about Pitt- they are one of the few hospital systems that has reliably turned a profit in the economic downturn

3. Stability of core faculty- any reason to think any are about to leave

4. Trajectory of core faculty. Again, I am biased, but it is helpful when the core faculty is a mix of stable veterans who are well entrenched in the greater health care system (look for faculty who have medical school appointments, like assistant deans or chairing important committees) and young faculty members who are in the growth phase of their careers.