"Troubled" Programs...

Can only comment on UWash. No way is that program in trouble. Their residents are definitely strong. Its just not an ideal atmosphere (lots of attitude and micro management at the U).

I'm sure most of the folks that interviewed there had tons of other interviews but ranked UW lower because of the atmosphere. Many extremely stong applicants I spoke with where interviewing at multiple top places. That may have really screwed with PD's heads this year which lead up to strong programs going unmatched. On the flip, UW probably overestimated the general interest in their program and under raked applicants. Put these factors together and there you go.

Having rotated at Harborview, I've heard 1st hand about the program and feel confident concerning the integrity of my previous statments. Same could be said for Rush/UF Gainsville I suppose. Definitely not the friendliest places on earth but you come out strong as hell.

 

some programs save spots for unmatched ortho, radiology, derm and others applicants with impecable credentials.

 

Dude chill,

I think you may be putting too much weight on programs not filling. There is probably a combination of many reasons why a program doesnt fill. If it happens once its probably not much too it other than they were cocky and didnt rank enough people. OR it could be that they ranked everyone and just didnt fill. I think this is possible b/c 90%+ of the people that went through the match for Anesthesia actually matched. Therefore just about everyone landed somewhere. Hence there were more positions than applicants and as a result..unfilled programs. This has been the case for years in Anesthesia. IMHO just because a program is unfilled doesnt mean much to me right now. Im not even sure if trends are helpful. I have a buddy whos at LSU. Thats where hes from and he loves the program, the training is as good as any: level I trauma, transplant, [email protected], pain fellowship opportunites BUT the program has a h/o not filling. Why? Location, Location, Location, not many people jump at the thought of living in Shreveport for 4 years. Applicants still have the luxary of being picky, unlike derm where they'd be happy to go to Baghdad to train. No program is going to be perfect, you just gotta find the perfect program for you. Bottom line = do rotations at your top choices and see for yourself. Whats good for others may not be good for you.

 

My intention was not to chastise you. I aplogize if it came across that way. Anyhoo Good luck

 

I had a pretty good experience when I interviewed at Thomas Jefferson in Phillie for the 2002-2003 match. The one concerning thing to me was that the board pass rate wasn't as high as I would have expected. They had made changes to the didactic program to address this. I was told when I was there that they though part of it was that they had some residents in the upper level who weren't studying. U Penn is a great program and has many spots. There are some other programs in phillie as well. I guess only so many people want to go to Phillie and the other programs got them.

 

I got the vibe that the residents weren't as excited about the new plan to improve the board pass rate as the PD was. By now the plan should be well into effect so someone who has been there more recently would have a better idea about this. The impression I got was that they attributed it to laziness and the quality of the residents. I hate to write that on a large forum like this, but that's what I remember from my visit. It definitely wasn't because they were overworked. The residents I met were very happy with the schedule. There were plenty of days when they would get out midafternoon.

 

I interviewed at mcg and it seemed like a decent program. Everyone I talked with was very nice and the residents seemed happy. They weren't working too hard and this probably isn't the strongest program, but not malignant from what I saw. The big problem comes down to location. Augusta is small and there is nothing to do. The only plus is that it is incredibly cheap. But it seemed like the program was on the way up, used to have fmg's now does not, now has a new chair from mgh, now is doing research, etc. I was also told that they only interviewed 70 -80 applicants. So a short rank list probably hurt them too. I wouldn't say it is a troubled program, someone from my class scrambled there, and I even ranked it #4 or my list.

 

I can only comment on 2 of those programs, and these are just from interviews:

SUNY-Upstate- in Syracuse which is probably a hit against it overall for a lot of people, so there is one reason. Not that Syracuse doesn't seem nice, actually it seems like a pretty cool college town. Also 2 'ship off' rotations, peds in Cinci and OB at the Brigham. They are building a new childrens hospital so then obviously no peds away. This still leaves OB in Boston, but hey, it's BWH. There's two reasons why it goes down in rank on a lot of lists. Also relatively small hospital and no CRNA's.

UMass- Worcester. Again, location, location, location. Sure it's close to Boston. Commuter rail even goes to Worcester. But it's still Worcester. I actually really liked this program a lot. Everyone of the faculty and residents were very nice and really went out of the way to be accomodating. In addition there are some very big name attendings here. I'm reading a book by one right now doing ICU. This is a real sleeper of a program, the kind that you can get into but still go anywhere out of.