I guess my priorities are: being able to secure a good fellowship and receiving a good training.
Does scutwork help prepare you for future practice? Or is scutwork usually handled by other members of the healthcare team in other places?
The scutwork you will be doing in the NYC programs are all the jobs that usually are covered by the rest of the staff who provides care for the patient. You will have to do almost all of this in NYC. In other words, if you order labs, you draw the blood for them. If you order a CT scan, you probably are the one bringing them down there. The stress this adds is what turns a lot of people away from wanting to train in NYC.
If you want to secure the most prestigious fellowships/complex patients:
1. Columbia
2 Tie. Mount Sinai (more GI)
2 Tie. Cornell (more Heme/onc)
4. NYU
All 4 you can get into great fellowships and the training is essentially equal over 3 years. A lot of it is what you make of it and the support you will receive. Columbia also has arguably the best cards program in the country if you are interested in that field.
If most of us were to rank other things such as supportive atmosphere, location, collegiality and overall workload it probably would go like this.
1. Mount Sinai
2 tie. NYU
2 tie. Cornell (these two can be disputed)
4. Columbia
People generally either really love or are totally put off by Columbia's program. I have a ton of friends that had not chosen to rank them after interviewing there. I have also had 1 or 2 friends who are current residents there and love it. You should really read
MedcatHouse reference to Broxzoo (#211). He does an exceptional job summarizing them all and I think a ton of us totally agree with his assessment of each program. I'd say you should apply, see how you feel about each of these programs and honestly just go where you think you'd be the happiest.
