Good Residency Programs??

[Lolly]

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Hi all,

I am in my first-year and there is lots of talk about us getting into "good" residency programs. So, what is a good residency program?? What does that really mean?? For med schools and undergrad we could always refer to US News (for better or for worse, of course). Where can I find a list of these "good" programs??

Thanks!

 

[EidolonSix]

Firstly, there is not a list of good, better, best residency programs. Much of what is listed in these forums is the most popular form of tripe...Not to say that there are not differences. Much of it is individualized to specialty. Important things are breadth, autonomy, teaching, and environment. Many people feel that to get the top notch fellowships, they have to suffer through a terrible east coast residency program. When you look at the statistics of who gets fellowships, they really is no predominance for ivy league or hard core programs for landing spots. This is a myth that is born out of medical student's inherent competitive nature. When you decide what you want to do, consider the important things that I said...and the reputation issue lower down on the list. I chose an academic residency that, although strong, is not consider top notch or prestigious....what I did get though was a great learning environment, good cases, good teaching, the opportunity and trust to manage my own patients (as an intern) with minimal attending interference and finally, relationships with academic physicians who will go to bat for me to get to the fellowship of my choice. Thats much more important than some fancy name on your CV.

 

[DermRes]

I agree completely. Choice of residency is individualized. Being pedigreed in Ivy league programs becomes important to fewer and fewer people as we go up the ladder of education. Only people who stay pedigreed care about their pedigree probably. For me, getting into medical school was competitive enough that I don't care if I did not get into Stanford Meds as long as I do get into a medical school.

I think eventually, we all start to evaluate residency programs for ourselves with an overall picture rather than based on reputation alone. Of course it should be a factor, but it is probably a less important one now compare to my decision as to which undergrad college to attend.