Texas input needed

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About a week ago I interviewed at Texas A&M Family Medicine Residency.
While there, things were great. New clinic, great people, faculty very impressive. They really talked themselves up regarding procedures (which is attractive to me).

But can anyone give me anymore input on these guys???
Know anything from your interaction or colleagues opinions?

From looking online they used to be Brazos County Family Medicine and the scutwork.com reviews...leave a little to be desired. They were filled with FMG's until the last couple of years (sorry FMG's, no offense) but seemed to be on the up swing.I'm having a tough time deciding whether I got a great sales pitch (was a great interview day) or whether they are really offering such a quality program just a few years after not matching all their slots.

Taking them at face value, the program would go near the top of my rank list. But how do I tell the truth after one day there with only their input on themselves?

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About a week ago I interviewed at Texas A&M Family Medicine Residency.
While there, things were great. New clinic, great people, faculty very impressive. They really talked themselves up regarding procedures (which is attractive to me). But can anyone give me anymore input on these guys???

From looking online they used to be Brazos County Family Medicine and the scutwork reviews...leave a little to be desired. They were filled with FMG's until the last couple of years (sorry FMG's, no offense) but seemed to be on the up swing.I'm having a tough time deciding whether I got a great sales pitch (was a great interview day) or whether they are really offering such a quality program just a few years after not matching all their slots.

I was in the match process recently (don't want to say which year for reasons that will soon become obvious) -- and the invitation letter I received sounded like they were a little, ok a lot, impressed with themselves....but the coordination of residency interview times, etc. left a bit to be desired. The chief resident at the time, who corresponded by email, struck me as a pompous ass who had never been in a position of responsibility before in his life....all I know for sure is that no one that I know of, outside of those who went to A&M for medical school have heard much about them.

Good programs in Texas -- Waco, Christus Santa Rosa in San Antonio, Tyler - all great programs, good feel, full scope with solid attendings/residents.

Middle programs -- Conroe, Temple, Baylor Garland, Charlton Methodist

Places I wouldn't send my dog to/don't even interview at -- UTSW, UTSA

JPS - big program, the big hitter on the block for a long time...problem is resident supervision is a bit lacking and it's a little 'cowboy' but the FM residency runs that hospital...people are cool....
 
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JustPlainBill, thank you so much for the input. This is exactly the input I could use -- an outside perspective on the place based on colleagues or others that have interviewed. While in this process its tough to keep objective and take a step back.

Thanks again and appreciate anyone else chiming in.
 
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If you look at the Residents page you'll see they've recruited quite well the past couple years, and there's a reason for that. I would definitely label it a program on the upswing.

True there are a lot of Texas A&M Med school grads in there, but 1/2 of the past class was from other schools.

So, it's unopposed, procedure heavy, has smart and pretty aggressive faculty. Cost of living is great, College station ISD is well known, lots of College Sports keep you entertained, B/CS is a good place to raise a family. Also University affiliated comes with its perks as far as facilities, teaching medical students, etc.

A really great program the previous posters missed include Memorial Southwest in Houston -- LowB should be around to comment.

JPS is a fricken blast. It's a huge county hospital, a teaching hospital for two medical schools, multiple other residencies (not I-med) to work with. It's definitely more aggressive than the average residency as far as oversight goes, I'll agree, but if it's your style, it's your style.

K thanks bye.

:cool:Smiley:cool:
 
AFSmiley is spot on. The program was previously filled with FMG because nobody knew about the program...website was not too helpful and residency was called Brazos County FM as you mentioned. In the past several years, several new faculty came in and residency became affiliated with Texas A&M HSC. And the new faculty started pushing recruiting a lot more.

The numbers are real. It's an awesome residency because it's unopposed so all the specialists call on the FM residents for everything and all of the attendings are trained in everything (OB, scopes, ultrasound, etc). They know the residents plan to go to small towns or do international medicine (for the most part) and know that they want to learn how to do all these procedures. The OB numbers are more than some OB residents get. And there are 3 u/s machines in the clinic...available for any musculoskeletal, OB, or vascular ultrasound you can imagine.

Final answer is that if possible, you should try to spend more time at the program. The best way to know what a program is really about is to try to spend at least a couple days or a week there (if you don't have room in your schedule for a month).
 
A really great program the previous posters missed include Memorial Southwest in Houston -- LowB should be around to comment.

Thanks for the shout out to comment on programs in Texas, but I'm sure much has changed since I was a student. JPS and Memorial Southwest (unopposed program in southwest Houston/Sugar Land; not to be confused with UT-Houston/Hermann in downtown Houston) were known to be the best places to train in Texas.

Of the Texas programs, I looked at JPS in Fort Worth, Memorial Family Medicine Residency in Houston/Sugar Land, and Christus Santa Rosa in San Antonio back when I was student. I didn't bother applying to the other programs listed because I wasn't interested in living in the middle of nowhere. I'm sure much has changed since I applied and there are more qualified people who can comment.
 
I did an extended interview with Texas A/M after being impressed with those guys at the National AAFP Conference. I also had never heard of it and wondered how a program so good on paper was unnoticed and figured it was not at good as made out to be.

But I really liked my time there. The really do all those procedures and surgery. The most impressed I was was when watching the residents do things instead of the attendings. They do a lot of stuff no one else does (they were doing colonoscopies in their office).

I'm not from Texas and ultimately I wanted to go somewhere closer to home. But I would recommend that program highly. I met a lot of residents and they were genuine. And they were good.
 
I did an extended interview with Texas A/M after being impressed with those guys at the National AAFP Conference. I also had never heard of it and wondered how a program so good on paper was unnoticed and figured it was not at good as made out to be.

But I really liked my time there. The really do all those procedures and surgery. The most impressed I was was when watching the residents do things instead of the attendings. They do a lot of stuff no one else does (they were doing colonoscopies in their office).

I'm not from Texas and ultimately I wanted to go somewhere closer to home. But I would recommend that program highly. I met a lot of residents and they were genuine. And they were good.

That brings up an interesting point --- I've got an attending who repeatedly points out that doing office procedures is fine, but you need to be mindful of things like colonoscopies, etc.....the reasoning is that if you upgefucht a situation - a) you need to be prepared to recover it (i.e. for some reason perf a bowel, get ready to cut) and b) if such upgefucht'ing leads to a lawsuit, you won't be judged as an FM doc doing a procedure like a colonoscopy, you'll be judged against the standard for board certified GI docs doing the procedure.....

made me think twice.
 
That brings up an interesting point --- I've got an attending who repeatedly points out that doing office procedures is fine, but you need to be mindful of things like colonoscopies, etc.....the reasoning is that if you upgefucht a situation - a) you need to be prepared to recover it (i.e. for some reason perf a bowel, get ready to cut) and b) if such upgefucht'ing leads to a lawsuit, you won't be judged as an FM doc doing a procedure like a colonoscopy, you'll be judged against the standard for board certified GI docs doing the procedure.....

made me think twice.

This is late reply, but concerning the above I would like to point out that if you perf a bowel a GI doc will not be qualified, even less qualified than the people at the FM residency, to do anything about it surgically. I had a lot of concerns about them before I did my rotation there, but towards the end I cornered an attending and asked some hard questions about their outcomes, which is the real measure of competency, not the rumor mongering that goes on via internet sites.

Basically, concerning colonoscopies and the guidelines that are posted for fellow in GI, the residents meet or exceed them. They have a longer withdrawal time, they have a higher than average polyp detection rate, and they have had no post-polypectomy bleeds.

Concerning their obstetrics, a study was done but the head Ob/Gyn in the hospital and found that the residents had fewer 3/4 degree lacs than the Ob/Gyn attendings with deliveries.

They follow everything and they have the numbers because they know that their reputation in the past was as described above.

These guys have been getting great recruits and have excellent teaching. Definitely a program to consider.
 
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