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Perpetually

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Prepare yourself for a lot of people to tell you that you should stay in Cali for residency if you want a job there.


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Hi Perpetually, we're in a similar situation. I'm ranking MGH as one of my top 4 alongside UW, UCSD and Stanford. I haven't decided on an order yet, although I have an idea where I'd fit best based on my background. My initial reaction to your list was, a. "Wow, he's a stellar applicant!" followed by b. "Why did he put USC above UCLA and UW?" and then c. "Interesting that he put MGH #1." My thoughts:

a. Yeah, you're a very good applicant, congrats on the interviews.
b. UCLA and UW are two of the very best programs for IR, but I haven't heard anything about USC. Maybe someone else can comment.
c. There's a lot of negativity on this board about IR training at MGH, and I know personally of one fellow who left MGH to train at Yale for more case volumes/variety. For me, MGH's DR training and opportunities to participate with imaging research at the Martinos Center and/or MIT were a major selling point of their program. Plus, they have this unique partnership with Nvidia to do machine learning. I think if you went to MGH for DR-only, you'd have a pretty easy time getting into a California IR fellowship. I think if you trained there for DR/IR you could still work in California, but you'd have a harder time, especially in academia. If you take a look at profiles of faculty members at California schools, more than 80% did their fellowship in California. To give you an idea of the odds...almost every IR faculty member at UCLA did fellowship in California:
https://www.uclahealth.org/simin-bahrami
https://www.uclahealth.org/antoinette-gomes
https://www.uclahealth.org/stephen-kee
https://www.uclahealth.org/edward-wolfgang-lee
https://www.uclahealth.org/justin-pryce-mcwilliams
https://www.uclahealth.org/adam-plotnik
https://www.uclahealth.org/scott-genshaft
https://www.uclahealth.org/cheryl-hoffman
https://www.uclahealth.org/michael-kuo
https://www.uclahealth.org/john-moriarty

These are the exceptions:
MGH: https://www.uclahealth.org/david-lu
Northwestern: https://www.uclahealth.org/siddharth-padia

The same pattern is true at Stanford.
 
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all do respect, you'd be an idiot to commit to a residency and fellowship in Boston if your goal is to end up in Cali.

It's one thing to go cross country for the big name if your plan is to back to Cali for fellowship. But you are realllly rolling the dice if you expect to land a good job in cali without training there.

May I ask What is it about MGH that it appeals to you so much?
 
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Greats posts everyone! Any specific thoughts on UCSD for IR/DR? Volume? Diversity of cases? Reputation?

Thank you
 
UCSD: I'm interviewing there next week. I did an away rotation at UC Irvine and the chair of UCI - Dr. Kari Nelson - trained at UCSD. She runs a tight department and definitely knows her stuff. She had positive things to say about UCSD. Claire Kaufman, daughter of John Kaufman, also chose UCSD after completing radiology residency at Yale. I think the main negative I've heard is that there's a lot of driving between the hospitals. If I match there I'm definitely buying another S2000.
 
cowme said:
all do respect, you'd be an idiot to commit to a residency and fellowship in Boston if your goal is to end up in Cali.

It's one thing to go cross country for the big name if your plan is to back to Cali for fellowship. But you are realllly rolling the dice if you expect to land a good job in cali without training there.

May I ask What is it about MGH that it appeals to you so much?
Click to expand...

I was impressed by their laid-back residents and how approachable and nice the faculty were. It seemed like there was unlimited resources for research etc. I was concerned about how MGH IR has poor control of turf from vascular surgery, neurosurgery, MSK, Body, yada yada... But IR is in control of body and vascular IR. They don't do much PAD so they send fellows out to the community for an intensive PAD rotation. They run like a half dozen rooms at a time with lots of volume.

I had low expectations for MGH IR but was very impressed after my time there. I heard (who knows if it's true) the fellow who left MGH IR did so because of personality conflicts and the residents trying to get the higher-end cases which frustrated the fellow to no end.

For UCSD, I think they do lots of vascular access and basic body procedures as fellows and attendings since they don't have PA's to help with cases. I've heard these types of cases can be mastered early on and then takes away from the high-end IR volume over the course of training (TIPS, TACE, Y90, blah blah blah...).
 
I'd be careful to glean so much out of a single interview. Maybe it's a laid back atmosphere, but I know people at all those programs you've mentioned...none are particularly uptight.

I promise you that you gain absolutely nothing research wise by going to MGH over ucla/ucsd/USC. You are a radiology resident, not a phd or physicist. Your greatest research accomplishment as a resident will be some poorly powered retrospective case review or a nice pictorial review of adenomyosis.

What were you so impressed with about IR there? Did you get a case log of every fellow and compare them with the other program? Anything you saw was merely a snapshot in time. (By the way, a fellow being so frustrated about residents taking high level cases from
Him that he transferred is a MAJOR red flag-- that means there's something either horribly wrong with the seniority structure or there is not enough volume to go around)

Look, it's your decision. MGH is arguably the best overall program in the country. But you said yourself what your goal is: job in California. Of the 5 programs you listed, MGH is by far the least likely to help you reach that goal.
 
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Naijaba said:
Hi Perpetually, we're in a similar situation. I'm ranking MGH as one of my top 4 alongside UW, UCSD and Stanford. I haven't decided on an order yet, although I have an idea where I'd fit best based on my background. My initial reaction to your list was, a. "Wow, he's a stellar applicant!" followed by b. "Why did he put USC above UCLA and UW?" and then c. "Interesting that he put MGH #1." My thoughts:

a. Yeah, you're a very good applicant, congrats on the interviews.
b. UCLA and UW are two of the very best programs for IR, but I haven't heard anything about USC. Maybe someone else can comment.
c. There's a lot of negativity on this board about IR training at MGH, and I know personally of one fellow who left MGH to train at Yale for more case volumes/variety. For me, MGH's DR training and opportunities to participate with imaging research at the Martinos Center and/or MIT were a major selling point of their program. Plus, they have this unique partnership with Nvidia to do machine learning. I think if you went to MGH for DR-only, you'd have a pretty easy time getting into a California IR fellowship. I think if you trained there for DR/IR you could still work in California, but you'd have a harder time, especially in academia. If you take a look at profiles of faculty members at California schools, more than 80% did their fellowship in California. To give you an idea of the odds...almost every IR faculty member at UCLA did fellowship in California:
https://www.uclahealth.org/simin-bahrami
https://www.uclahealth.org/antoinette-gomes
https://www.uclahealth.org/stephen-kee
https://www.uclahealth.org/edward-wolfgang-lee
https://www.uclahealth.org/justin-pryce-mcwilliams
https://www.uclahealth.org/adam-plotnik
https://www.uclahealth.org/scott-genshaft
https://www.uclahealth.org/cheryl-hoffman
https://www.uclahealth.org/michael-kuo
https://www.uclahealth.org/john-moriarty

These are the exceptions:
MGH: https://www.uclahealth.org/david-lu
Northwestern: https://www.uclahealth.org/siddharth-padia

The same pattern is true at Stanford.
Click to expand...

nads really surprised yale isn't top 2 for you.
 
Hey Perpetually, sorry if I'm highjacking your thread. I figure we should all post our top 5 on here rather than each starting a new thread. I'm trying to stay in NYC for family. I had a tough time not putting Mount Sinai higher because I love that IR program. However, the DR program appeared less reputable. I chose to rank higher those programs with a more balanced DR/IR reputation.

1) Cornell IR/DR
2) Columbia IR/DR
3) NYU IR/DR
4) Mount Sinai IR/DR
5) BWH IR/DR
 
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Hi Peregrinus, I interviewed at Columbia, NYU and Mt. Sinai. I've heard that Mt. Sinai's IR is the best in NY with the highest volume and diversity of cases. However, their DR just didn't appeal to me (I didn't apply there for DR-only). Conversely, NYU and Columbia seemed very interested in the future of DR and the happiness of their residents. I'm putting those programs in this order on my rank list:

[1-4] as above
5. NYU IR/DR
6. NYU DR
7. Columbia IR/DR
8. Columbia DR
...Mt Sinai.

I'll say one thing about Mt. Sinai -- The residents I spoke with ranked it #1 and loved being there. I almost feel like I'd be taking a spot from someone who really wants to be there if I ranked them super high.
 
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Naijaba said:
Hi Peregrinus, I interviewed at Columbia, NYU and Mt. Sinai. I've heard that Mt. Sinai's IR is the best in NY with the highest volume and diversity of cases. However, their DR just didn't appeal to me (I didn't apply there for DR-only). Conversely, NYU and Columbia seemed very interested in the future of DR and the happiness of their residents. I'm putting those programs in this order on my rank list:

[1-4] as above
5. NYU IR/DR
6. NYU DR
7. Columbia IR/DR
8. Columbia DR
...Mt Sinai.

I'll say one thing about Mt. Sinai -- The residents I spoke with ranked it #1 and loved being there. I almost feel like I'd be taking a spot from someone who really wants to be there if I ranked them super high.
Click to expand...

Naijaba, do you have personal ties to NYC? Why so NY heavy on your list?
 
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Hi Naijaba, yeah, I agree. There were a lot of things I didn't like about Sinai's DR program. It was disappointing seeing all the DR reading rooms and the conference/education center deep in the basement. Plus, there were no opportunities for moonlighting it seems (or very light opportunities in the third and fourth year). I did enjoy many of the residents. Some of them were BRUTALLY honest with what they like/don't like about the program, which was refreshing compared to all the fluff we usually get. And the PD seems nice and very supportive. I know they are working to strengthen the DR departments and I'm sure it'll be a great DR program in a few years.
 
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please feel free to share your rank lists also--it is definitely helpful for everyone!
 
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Perpetually said:
Naijaba, do you have personal ties to NYC? Why so NY heavy on your list?
Click to expand...

I have three priorities: 1. Opportunities to do research in computer science and machine learning during the DR years, 2. Good IR training, and 3. West Coast (California/Seattle) because of family. I actually live in New York right now and love it, but my whole family is in California. I'd be happy living in Boston or New York, they just aren't at the top of my list.
 
Did the students applying look at the fellows case logs? Scope and breadth and volume of cases. This is what I would look at when making a decision for IR training.
 
Some places share their case logs openly and other places have been more difficult


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Hey all, this thread has been pretty helpful in getting a sense for relatively strong IR programs. Anyone mind listing out some of the 'top tier' programs? I've found this info pretty hard to come by.. Thanks a bunch.
 
Naijaba said:
I have three priorities: 1. Opportunities to do research in computer science and machine learning during the DR years, 2. Good IR training, and 3. West Coast (California/Seattle) because of family. I actually live in New York right now and love it, but my whole family is in California. I'd be happy living in Boston or New York, they just aren't at the top of my list.
Click to expand...

Didn’t you post a blog about how you applied IR DR LAST year and matched UW? Why are you reapplying?

Something is off...
 
Lol, I saw the January dates (nevermind it would be later in the month) and also assumed this was a current thread. Ha, thanks for pointing out the (should be) obvious.
 
Yes, I am at UW lol, excited to be nearing the end of prelim surgery.
 
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