•••••I just signed my PGY-2 contract this week. Most programs send you a list of the interns/residents that matched into the program. This past month I've been getting a ton of information about housing, neighborhoods, real estate agents, etc. from my residency program. Of course they did practically make me sign my life over to them. I had to fill out about a billion application forms for all the potential sites I had to rotate through, get new letters of reference, sign a release for a background search by the police, get my MA medical license by May, etc. This was in stark contrast to my internship which didn't ask for nor did they give me much more info other than to show up at this address on so and so day. This probably had to do with the fact that they knew we were only there for one year.
Its wierd that you go through this whole match process a whole year in advance and you don't sign a contract until a few months before you start. I guess that the PGY2 position is tentative upon successful completion of internship! Received Congrats phone call from Residency Co-ordinator and letter from Pd. Received contract 4 days later. Surprised as salary had gone up which is nice (although it's not all that great to begin with, except the cost of living is low where the hosp.is located), have to have state license by July,lots of forms to fill out, had to give vacation dates and told me starting date is June 24,2002, one full week of orientation. Sent me some info on Real Estate...plan to go there next week and try to figure out where I want to live...the PD said I have to live 10/15 mins from hosp. Hope I can afford it!!! Small town so I should be ok. I'm use to lots of traffic and 45/60 mins to get anywhere, so the lack of traffic should be a plus.Looking forward to getting started. Although I am a golf nut so we'll see, and of course it's that dreadful surgery training!!!