Einstein-Monte/ NY programs

[melange]

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Hey all you NYC applicants,

I know there are a ton of us out here. Anyone care to comment on their rank list thoughts? Columbia vs. NYU vs. Sinai, etc.

What do you think about the Einstein-Montefiore program? Residents seemed really happy and friendly. But how does the training compare to the other bigger-name NYC programs?

 

[cleareyedguy]

Einstein is strong, as are a bunch of the NYC programs. As is probably obvious, no place in the country rivals NYC when it comes to the depth of the faculty and residents.

Having said that, each of the programs has its own flavor. An excellent training can be had at a bunch of them. Even the programs that are clearly second tier will have solid faculty, and, if you are attentive and work hard, they will get you excellent jobs afterwards.

Having said that, here are some stereotypes:
Columbia sees itself as the best program.
Cornell does, too.
NYU and Mt. Sinai both say that they are up and coming, and, while they've been saying that for 20 years, there probably is a reputation gap between the 2 New York Presbyterian Hospitals and the rest.
Einstein worries about being in the Bronx, but their school and program is filled with cool, thoughtful people.

More stereotypes

Columbia is all research (plenty of their trainees go into private practice). Their trainees are unhappy (seemed pretty happy) and snotty (I didn't think so). The neighborhgood is dangerous (it is a rough spot, but I think a lot of people commute from the upper west side).

Cornell is all psychoanalysis (their chair is a neuroscientist, 4 of their pgy 2's are hard science MD-PhD's; and most of their trainees don't go into analytic training; several do each year, however, and if you don't like psychotherapy, it's a bad pick). Their trainees all went to Ivy League schools (fairly true). Their patients are rich white people (most of their patients are medicare/medicaid, and, being New York, most are either non white or grew up speaking another language--ironically, it probably has the MOST diverse pt population in NYC). They have great housing (true). It's very upper east sidish (most of their faculty actually work at the Westchester division).

Mt. Sinai is about to go bankrupt (couldn't tell; may be true). They have a chip on their shoulder (may be true. Even though they're very good, they are probably fourth in the Manhattan hierarchy, and they hate it).

NYU is Bellevue (they do rotations at several places). NYU is disorganized (it is very big and much more spread out than some place like Cornell). NYU is cool (it did seem fairly laid back in a busy sort of way).

I didn't look at the others, but I have heard good things about St. Vincent's, Cabrini, and BI, though my take is that many of their residents are either international grads or less driven by medicine (I took a look at one of these 3, and the residents kept falling all over themselves emphasizing how easy the place is--this kept me from applying).

 

[melange]

Thanks for the helpful post, cleareyedguy.

I hadn't heard about the financial issues at Mt. Sinai - what's the deal there?

I agree that Columbia considers itself the best program in New York. I think that is probably true, in terms of the training. The residents are ambitious and serious about their education and careers.

 

[sga430]

i am an img with my step 2 ck score coming in about a week. i got 5 interviews. just got one at Harlem which is a Columbia affiliate. Anyone know anything about this program?? I heard a lot of the NY programs that take IMGs r what i call "sweatshops" (meaning all work and not much time for learning.) is this true?

 

[prominence]

I heard a lot of the NY programs that take IMGs r what i call "sweatshops" (meaning all work and not much time for learning.) is this true?

i personally agree with this assessment. the workload is much easier in the midwest compared to lower tier NYC programs.

 

[cleareyedguy]

Two clarifications:
While Columbia does consider itself the best program, Cornell considers Cornell the best program. They (Cornell) would say that Columbia has a bigger research program, but that there is plenty of research at Cornell and that the teaching and camraderie set it apart. Who knows?

I don't know about workload; the NYC programs seem to think the 80 hour/week limit is difficult to abide by. This implies they work long hours.

Columbia and Cornell have multiple psych sites (like Harlem and St. Luke's-Roosevelt at Columbia and Lincoln at Cornell). These programs get some medical students from Columbia and Cornell but function quite autonomously from the parent insititutions. I don't know if they are harder, but there is probably less didactics.

My take on Mt. Sinai is that it is a great place with a long-standing strength in psychiatry. The overall institution has been hemorrhaging money for the last decade, however, at least partly because of the ill-fated merger of its hospital with NYU's (that merger is now defunct). Ken Davis, the former psychiatry chair is Dean, and their recent chair, Jack Gorman, left last year and was recently named the head of McLean. Their chair is now Dennis Charney, who had run NIMH (I think). It isn't clear to me the extent to which the money troubles influence the psych residents, but there is a good bit of concern. Oddly, Columbia and Cornell both chose their psych chairs to be the medical school dean abot 10 years ago (Michels is now COrnell's University Prof, and Pardes now runs the NYPH system).

Speaking of mergers and chairs: the merger between New York and Presbyterian seems to have worked much better for both parties than NYU_Sinai and has led to some combined training programs (e.g., child and forensics). There is still a good bit of rivalry between the two schools, but there seemed to be quite a bit of back-and-forth between the faculty and residents. As for chairs, the Columbia job was open for quite a long time, but they hired Jeff Lieberman last year from UNC. The Cornell chair is a scientist who has been there for ten(?) years.