Originally posted by Fanconi
Yes. Very nice e-mails. No promises or guarantees, but very friendly and warm.
Can anyone give us an inside scoop as to their impressions of the program? Maybe a Mayo med student or current resident? Or someone who knows the program well? Do you have any concerns or issues with the program?
Thank you SO much for any information you'd like to share. 🙂
I am neither a Mayo student nor a resident (at least not yet) but spent perhaps the best month of my medical school career out there last summer. So these are my impressions, please season them with salt to taste.
I did a month on one of the two inpatient GI services at St. Mary's and was blown away. It is of course easy to be impressed by the physical structures and the facilities they have in place. Equally impressive is the incredible organization and coordination they have between all facets of healthcare. Staffing is great, nurses are well trained and of pleasant disposition (most people, most of the time) and have 2-3 patients on average. Nurses stay with the teams and floors so they get to know the patients and physicians quite well. Nurses tend to be present in the room during rounds so they have a better idea of the plan (cutting down on miscommunication and endless pages).
Other ancillary staff are excellent as well, multiple phlebotomy and PICC teams mean labs are drawn promptly anytime of day or night they are ordered. One of the best things for me was getting in at 6:45 am and having all the am labs back and on the computer (where I come from labs dont come back before 9:00-9:30).
Admissions tended to be rather smooth as practically every test and study known to modern medicine is available on weekdays. The one interesting thing on this note is that almost nothing gets done on weekends. I also noticed a very strict approach toward admissions and consultants every so often turned down admitting patients they felt were better served by the Clinic. They were also tough on getting patients out as soon as medically possible. Thus, for most cases hospital stays were pretty short and patients were either discharged to be seen in Clinic (sometimes w/in 24hrs of discharge) or to be followed up at their home base.
Teaching. This is clearly the strongest part of the program. GI had morning report every day, a case was presented by the post call team with all pertinent data and was discussed by both services and their consultants (Mayo/British term for attendings). After rounds and before noon conference was another dedicated teaching session by one of the two consultants. The lectures covered the GI core curricullum and were as good as any reviews published in NEJM. Noon conference was well attended, with food served. The quality was also of the highest. On more than one occasion the presenter was the author of the most recent review in the NEJM etc. Teaching was also done during rounds of course and rounds meant seeing patients (so a lot of mileage on those long corridors of St. Mary's!). We had lots of patients and were very busy but a lot of stuff got done quickly so I also had ample time to read between all the above. I got on very well with the residents and they took me under their wings pretty readily.
The main down side of course is that Rochester is Rochester and that is a fact that any one there has chosen to live with. There is a serious paucity of decent eateries in that town. The town also feels weird as everything seems to revolve around Mayo.
I hope this has answered some questions. No doubt it has raised some.
😎