University of Florida-Jacksonville (Jax) Residency Reviews

[BoxerJoe]

I have been a lurker until now. I thought I would share my thoughts on a few places that have not been reviewed.

UF - Jacksonville

I was very impressed by this program because they have a very good patients to learn from. It is a county receiving hospital but doesn't have the true look of one. They get tons on trauma and manage the airway on 100% of them, while also running a good amount of them. The trauma bay was filled when we toured and looked like an exciting place to work and learn. The ED was big with 6 trauma bays and 4 medical resuscitation bays, among many other beds in what they call the ED ICU. The fast track area was recently built and looks fantastic. The residents seemed to be very happy there and could not stop talking about how much autonomy they get. Its a truly resident run ED but the attendings are nearby to help with any questions or problems. All of them seemed to enjoy living in Jacksonville, most living away from Shands because its in a shady location. The faculty is well known. They also have a good mix of single and married residents who enjoy hanging out together and drinking. The PD is on high ACEP committees and has a lot of EM leadership experiences on a national level. The research they have is cutting edge and I think on par with many other places. The commitment to resident education was strong as well. I liked this program very much and I think this will be in my top 3, if not my top choice in the end. PM me with questions. Thank you.

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[SecretReviewer]

Format stolen, of course, with a couple things added. But it keeps these things more ordered.

Residents: All of them seem to be happy with where they are. Nobody (including the 'terns) felt like they were lacking any exposure to procedures or experience in running ths show

Faculty: They've got some really good ones. Harwood-Nuss is retired, but Dr. Caro, Dr. Godwin, Dr. Luten (Breslow-Luten fame) are still there, and they know their stuff. Some people state that the program is mostly hands off, but I know from experience that this isn't entirely true. You can have as little oversight as you want, or as much as you need. They run a national difficult airway course there.

Facilities: Shands Jax is not very up to date. They still have a grease board as a tracking board, and all charts are handwritten. They are building a new Obs Unit (CDU), which will be done when the new class starts this fall. The trauma bays are the newest part, and they are separate from the rest of the ED. There is a 4 bed Resus unit, which can be (and does get) expanded when needed. They have an 18 bed "ICU" that often is extended with hallway beds, as well as a psych "fish bowl". Then there is a huge fasttrack called Flexcare that is open 24 hours per day, and residents rotate through it. They used to go to Gainesville for their community month, but now they don't anymore. As of my interview they did not have a community hospital set up yet.

Curriculum: 3 years, of which at least 24 months are spent in the ED. Off service rotations might not be the best, as the big medicine/cardio/whatever stuff is in Gainesville. The EM residents are the big fish in the little pond in Jacksonville. There are floor months, but overnight call is very minimal, as almost everyone has night float systems.

Patient population: Definitely a mixture of inner city poor/crack patients mixed with older affluent people who associate Shands with "University Hospital" (what it used to be). The rich mostly go to Mayo, and there are other hospitals in town.

City: Jacksonville is a very large city that is quite spread out. It isn't like the rest of Florida in mentality, it is more like a city in Georgia (ie, no snowbirds, not a huge Hispanic population). The beach is close and very nice, and there are some great places to live. COL isn't all that high in Jacksonville either, the state doesn't tax the first 25% of your house, no state income tax (big difference to some places).

Salary:06-07, and these represent a $1,900 increase from the year before
PGY1 $41,434.45
PGY2 $42,778.65
PGY3 $44,268.64

Overall: It is a great place to learn medicine that lacks some of the shinyness that some places have. However, you have a lot of opportunity to do extracurricular stuff, such as Jaguars games, the UF/Georgia game, Gator Bowl, ACC championship, NASA launches, and DMAT. You are also within 30 minutes of the beach.

 

[Janders]

You'll get better answers the more specific your questions are.

I went to school at UF, and did a month of EM at Jax, along with about 3 months of various off-services. Its a very strong program with a county-flair. The ED is very busy, and the population is often of the under-served variety. I think as far as procedures go, the residents there were as good as any. Despite the crowds and the bustle in the ED, I found the conferences well done, and the teaching good. The program is high on resident autonomy, especially for a 3yr program. It is close to the beach. The cafeteria is good, as far as hospitals go. One of my closest friends match there this year, and I keep in touch with a couple of the other residents.

Thats my thumbnail.

 

[StudentDoc327]

PROs: I rotated there and loved it. You will love it to if you love county. 3 year program that used to be a 2-4 (faculty there say they still wish it was but they were losing quality applicants), and you can tell by the autonomy afforded to the residents early off. Not a place for people who need hand holding, but you will get guidance mostly from the senior residents but also from faculty who act more like consultants. Completely resident run. Busy but not too busy that you can't think county hospital with a lot of high acuity running through there ICU and resucitation areas and a lot of primary care running through the fast track, all 3 areas are run by residents. Great population to learn EM from. Patients are mostly indigent, primarily black and white. Nursing and ancillary services are good for a county. No drawing blood or putting in IVs and push only sick patients to radiology if you are worried about them (although students sometimes push people to x-ray to speed things up if they are not seeing patients). Front-loaded curriculum with interns worked VERY hard during first year even during ED months and significant drop off thereafter. PGY-3's work < 40 hrs/wk and most moonlight and earn a SIGNIFICANT addition to their salary that year. One of the best trauma systems I have seen in terms of relations with surgery. Trauma gets sent in to a special area adjacent to the main ED and the EM resident who is stationed in trauma works with the trauma team. Technically they switch off with surgery on who runs it day after day but there is so much trauma that usualy the trauma team gets busy in the OR and the EM resident who is on the resucitation shift gets to run much of the trauma on most days. EM is the strongest department in the hospital hands down. Consultants and other services don't come down to the ER unless asked and looking back on it I only saw one consultant in the ED the whole time and I think it was an interventional cardiologist guiding an EM resident through a procedure he was suppose to be doing but the EM resident wanted to try (and he did it). The leadership/administration (Godwin, Caro, Morrissey) are some of the coolest and funniest people I have ever met as well as being excellent clinicians and teachers. Conferences are very good and all have some form of hands on activity with the high tech simulators they have there. The senior residents are very good at what they do and run the ED w/o much help from the attendings.

Cons: The city of Jacksonville. The social scene is just bad. It's hard to find something to do on a Friday or Saturday night and you can forget about going out during the week. Also not much diversity. However, if you are not into that you should be fine. The city has everything else that a big city has (malls, theatres, food, etc). If this program was in a bigger, more active city it would have been at the top of my list. As far as the program: 1/2 shifts are fast track for the first year and like half of the second year with the other 1/2 being ICU (which is more like the real ED w/o the primary care and lacs/abcesses/std's/etc, its not really an ICU thats just what its called). Somewhere in the middle of second year they start letting you work the resucitation area (all unstable patients + trauma... either if EMS brings in someone unstable or if someone in the ICU or fast track becomes unstable they get wheeled into this area where the one and only resident who is staffing it will handle the resucitation) which is separate from the ICU and REALLY cool, but after your one dedicated month you only get like 3 shifts there per month for the remainder of your residency with the other shifts split 50/50 between fast track and ICU. It kind of sucks though when you are working the ICU part of the ED because you lose your patient if they become unstable and the resuc resident takes over. I think the residents pretty much master the fast track area pretty early in the second year though they still spend roughly 40% of their shifts in it. Trauma is plentiful but about 90% is blunt. They round like Internal Medicine (well maybe not that bad but it typicaly lasts for over an hour) on all the patients in the resuc area and ICU area every 8 hrs I think. They say its a strength of the program because its like you are seeing that many more patients without really seeing them but im not so sure all the residents really thought the same especially after a long and taxing shift. Teaching during these rounds is very dependent on the attending sometimes good sometimes not. Godwin is being promoted from PD to chair of something or other so he will still be pulling shifts and what not but I don't think he will be as involved as he was with the program. Although his replacement, Caro, is awesome as well.


Ummm thats all i can think of PM if you want any more info

 

[anonymousEM]

Jax grad...few things are a little skewed here. Consultants DO come to the ED...from every specialty...maybe you don't notice as much as a student since there are so many residents around and as a residency run program there tends to be a lot of commraderie between many of the off service residents and the ED residents as we rotate together and solve interservice issues often between chiefs and not involving the PDs (with a much more palatable result for everyone involved!) As far as procedures, we did the ones that were indicated. Rarely do I remember a cardiologist ever arriving before we got a transvenous pacer in...so all they needed to do was see the patient breifly and get their orders in...maybe that's another reason the consultants didn't seem to be around.

As far as the shifts, the work is in an area that was intended for fast track but the patients that are actually triaged to the area in use are intermediate for the most part...though sick patients end up there when the place is slammed. A traditional fast track means only quick in & out patients...residents see lots of belly pain, do some sedations and countless elderly weak and dizzies (never fast) with normal vital signs in that area. In fact managing this area as a resident is often tougher than the monitored slam dunk admits of chest pain and short of breath that dominate the other side.

In short, we worked hard but got a great training. Interns work the most hours but by the time we were seniors we worked less than some of the attendings leaving plenty of time for extracurriculars like going to the beach, golfing, or moonlighting!

 

[sproggin]

I just have to defend Jax nightlife a little.....I just started intern year here. And by the way, LOVE IT. But I went pretty hard the first two weeks before starting and yes it doesnt compare to any of the huge cities (this coming from a person from a big city) but EVERY night at JAX beach theres a drink special and a good looking crowd to be found (maybe not Monday, but thats it). The people are super friendly here (may not have the best grammar some of them) but Im near the beach, I can surf before work, come home relax on my hammock, and have $2 beers pretty much any night of the week.
And the program, to be honest wasnt my first choice (mostly due to lack of knowledge), but the more Im finding out about it, the more I love it. They work you hard intern year but then your 2nd and 3rd year is alot easier than other programs. From what I hear after two years youll be comfortable with EVERYTHING and then 3rd years is just cruisin. You will see and do everything here. My classmates are intubating starting day one. You gotta love county patients though. I wouldnt want to train anywhere else. I can take care of Grandma Jones with Pneumonia later on. Its called residency, work hard, see it all, learn your stuff, be a great doctor.

 

[Xanderain]

I did a Neuro rotation there, but of course, with the stroke team, you spend a lot of time in the ER. I found their ER to be extremely over-crowded, with a good number of the patients being in shackles (for whatever crime they might have committed), and the attendings there are some of the nastiest and meanest doctors I have ever met. With that said, it is likely that you would get good exposure to a lot of interesting cases there, and if you could handle the occasional nasty attending, you might like it there.

 

[Interpolfanclub]

As an EM resident at Jax I feel compelled to come to the defense of my program and its' attendings. I'm sorry if the previous poster had a negative experience with one of our attendings. Everyone has their off days, and Jax can be a stressful place to work. With the stress of the ED and the sheer number of attendings and range of personalities it is difficult to maintain a pleasant disposition all the time. I would not categorize any of our attendings as being mean and nasty. There is just a range of personalities and as with any program there are some attendings you get along with more than others.

I feel the strengths of this program are without a doubt due to its' county nature. We are given a great deal of autonomy beginning intern year and it is definitely a resident-run ED. Lots of lines, intubations, codes etc etc. You hit the ground running here. You are given a very active role in patient care from the beginning, not much hand holding here at Shands.

Weaknesses are also tied to our county nature. To speed things up I push patients to xray, hang fluids, clean up spills etc whatever it takes to get the job done. If you want to go somewhere and never do "scut" then Shands is not the place for you. But if you want to go to an EM program where you will see sick people and know how to manage them and have done every conceivable EM procedures, we're your program.

The drawbacks to this program (pushing patients to xray etc.) are not going to affect you when you are out in practice. But if you haven't done enough lines, LPs...not good. Not something you are going to have to worry about being a UF grad. We are also one of the oldest programs in the country. 1975. I wouldn't go anywhere else. PM with questions. Thanks.

 

[anonymousEM]

I also graduated from Jax 2 years ago. I completely agree with the above poster. Does the ED suffer from overcrowding, sure, so does every department in the US. But, that means you get to learn how manage patient flow and have the opportunity to care for as many sick patients as possible before you are out there on your own. I am currently working in another county hospital, teaching situation and I can honestly say that I have a lot easier time working there than many of my colleagues who completed residencies at other top-notch programs. It's not because I have more book knowledge, but I'm used to always having multiple critical patients in the ED and comfortable managing a lot of truly sick patients at once.

For those of you who are trauma junkies, you'll get your fix and then some...I think the last numbers I heard were approximately 30% penetrating trauma. Another strength is that the administration is really receptive to resident input when it is constructive regarding curriculum. When we said rotations weren't working, they were dropped and substituted with better learning experiences. The hospital wasn't pretty, we didn't have rotations in Hawaii or waterfalls in the lobby, but they spent the money on important things for training like all of the airway toys (faculty is nationally known for instructing in The Airway Course) and there is now an amazing simulation lab. In general, I thought that the ancillary staff was pretty good for the situation as well. There are faculty who are state and nationally known for activism in EM, the editor of a major EM textbook just retired as dean of GME, renowned Peds EM experts (the color coding kids system is a collaboration of Drs. Broslow and our own Dr. Luten), folks who have been involved with editing national journals...the list goes on. International opportunities are increasing.

If you need someone to assign you 3 chapters of Tintinalli every night and to give you a quiz in conference each week to get you to read, this is not the place for you. I, however, found that I really flourished in the environment. It wasn't easy, but it made me a confident EM physician. I'd do it again in a heartbeat!

Judge for yourself, not based on someone's neurology rotation. Good luck!

 

[anonymousEM]

regarding shackles, Jax has the city contract for the jail pts. You see a lot of folks of varying degrees of illness in jumpsuits, but it's not a big deal either way.

 

[EdEmEr]

Question: How well respected is your program and could your residents get almost any job they wanted? My understanding is that this is one of the top places in the SE and that graduates are highly sought after. Is this correct?

SCUT: This is my general philosophy from a 4th year medstud perspective and not specific to UF/Jax.

If you are EXPECTED to scut as an intern under the assumption that you pick up skills that could help in the future, I'm not sure this is really that important but fine...so be it.

If you have to scut every now and then to get things moving when it gets busy, fine. You are part of an ED team and you can help out.

HOWEVER, if you spend your entire residency pushing patients to the radiology suite and starting IV's because the hospital is short staffed and overwhelmed, welcome to cheap labor my friend. We as doctors have to train to make decisions and that HAS to detract from your educational goals. Am I wrong?

I also graduated from Jax 2 years ago. I completely agree with the above poster. Does the ED suffer from overcrowding, sure, so does every department in the US. But, that means you get to learn how manage patient flow and have the opportunity to care for as many sick patients as possible before you are out there on your own. I am currently working in another county hospital, teaching situation and I can honestly say that I have a lot easier time working there than many of my colleagues who completed residencies at other top-notch programs. It's not because I have more book knowledge, but I'm used to always having multiple critical patients in the ED and comfortable managing a lot of truly sick patients at once.

For those of you who are trauma junkies, you'll get your fix and then some...I think the last numbers I heard were approximately 30% penetrating trauma. Another strength is that the administration is really receptive to resident input when it is constructive regarding curriculum. When we said rotations weren't working, they were dropped and substituted with better learning experiences. The hospital wasn't pretty, we didn't have rotations in Hawaii or waterfalls in the lobby, but they spent the money on important things for training like all of the airway toys (faculty is nationally known for instructing in The Airway Course) and there is now an amazing simulation lab. In general, I thought that the ancillary staff was pretty good for the situation as well. There are faculty who are state and nationally known for activism in EM, the editor of a major EM textbook just retired as dean of GME, renowned Peds EM experts (the color coding kids system is a collaboration of Drs. Broslow and our own Dr. Luten), folks who have been involved with editing national journals...the list goes on. International opportunities are increasing.

If you need someone to assign you 3 chapters of Tintinalli every night and to give you a quiz in conference each week to get you to read, this is not the place for you. I, however, found that I really flourished in the environment. It wasn't easy, but it made me a confident EM physician. I'd do it again in a heartbeat!

Judge for yourself, not based on someone's neurology rotation. Good luck!

 

[anonymousEM]

I don't know of anyone who has had a difficult time finding a job he or she wanted in a town he or she wanted to live in. In fact, the benefit of an older program is that there are grads of the program all over the place willing to lend a hand or recommendation when you need it. That being said, I don't know of any of my med school colleagues (who did residencies all over the country who have had difficulties either...). I think training in EM is similar enough that getting hired in most markets is more about being a good fit--either with the dept's niche (International, EMS whatever) based on interests developed in residency or with the group's personality etc.

I have no idea what kind of interaction occurred between the other poster and an attending. In general I found the group easygoing and friendly to work with, though we all certainly have better days than others. It is not ever appropriate to berate or abuse colleagues. Again, I've been out for a couple of years, but the group is more or less the same and I'm surprised to hear anything like that on these boards.

During my residency the scut was limited and actually the techs were top notch...I rarely started an IV unless we were going for an EJ or central access after multiple others had failed. I wouldn't say my time was wasted on lots of scut, but you had to know when to step in and help out. It was more an interest of prioritization...knowing who was the sickest one who had to go to CT next in the dept, should I spend 1 min pushing someone to XR so that the nurse can start the antibiotics on a septic patient etc. Occasionally we all do something outside what is truly our own responsibility to make sure that we are all doing the best thing for our collective patients.

As far as the city, Jacksonville can be a great place to live if you're a beach fan or just like a laid back place but there's not a big downtown scene, you need to be ok with driving a car everywhere--public transportation is not the city's strong point and it is a very spread out.

Best of luck with your decisions.

 

[FullThrottle]

Here's my small contribution to the thread. Hope this helps for the applicants.

When I ranked my programs back in the day I looked at the overall curriculum, people I would be working with, faculty, city vs. community, volume, level of acuity/procedures, resident autonomy vs. not, location, cost of living, gut feeling, among other things.

So far I am very happy with the training I am receiving at UF Jax. Settling into Jacksonville was a smooth transition. Cost of living is nice. I drive a used car that is fully paid for and is economic on the gas. The city itself is not a huge metropolis like NYC or Miami but large enough to have an NFL team. Traffic isn't too bad most of the time. People are outgoing. Among the residents, we go out as a group when our schedules permit. PGY1's through 3's all hang out and everyone is inclusive from my experience here. We watch each other's backs to make sure everyone is doing well physically and mentally.

Interns focus on getting adjusted to the new environment of residency in a 100K+ Emergengency Dept. / Urban inner city environment. Lots of Trauma, blunt, stab, MVA. Lots of sick people, Chest Pain, Dyspnea, sepsis, dialysis, hypertensive emergency, DKA, AMS, etc, etc. Lots of poly substance abuse, toxic ingestions. Fair amount of psych stuff. We don't have a full blown transplant unit over here or a Burn center. Complicated burns when called for get transfered to Gainesville, but you still do your part in stabilization. Lots of uninsure patients and insured patients. Lots of multiple co-morbid trainwrecks, HIV population, STDs. Good amount of orthopaedic and pediatric emergencies.

Big trauma center: EM and surgery work together to run traumas. EM residents get great exposure.

Three adult ED areas: Flexible care, Emergency Critical Care, Resus

- Flexible Care (Flex): Work more at your own pace. A lot of abdominal pain/newly pregnant with belly pain/eptopic rule out, etc. Most of the basic ortho stuff seen here. Low risk chest pain sometimes gets triaged into here as well. We have an area of the ED called the Cardiac Decision Unit where low risk chest painer's can go for further workup including cardiac CT, cardiac enzyme eval. without the full blown admission. You sometimes get acute appys and pancreatitis in flex. Fair amount of eye stuff too. We have ophtho available for consult. As a random side note, we also have podiatry in house for consult.

- Emergency Critical Care: You chest pain/dyspnea with multiple co-morbids (i.e. CABG in the past, TIMI of 5, used cocaine last night) kind of folks come in. Toxic ingestions, etc. This area serves the sicker folks. I've had shifts in here where I admitted over 70% of the patients.

- Resus: Here is where your cardiac arrest, sever sepsis, massive PE that coded etc etc folks go. Second year residents and above man this station. These are the sickest of them all from a medical standpoint. The trauma center is just a few steps in the next area.

Sim center is very cool. Size of an ER full of different scenerios (trauma, acls, procedure sims, dental emergencies, etc)
Faculty: Different styles but all are excellent. Very confident in their teachings. Very approachable and knowledgeable.
Conference: Once a week (Thursdays) Relevant discussions and presentations to the specialty mixed with sim cases. Online access to workshops and questions. UF virtual library has a ton of e-books/journals/resources you can access from home. You get $150 for books your intern year.

Off service rotations: Excellent faculty and friendly envirnoment. You get out of it what you put into it. Simple as that. There's a lot of room to do stuff. All you have to do is ask, show motivation, and interest.

Will continue this post later...

 

[tdubb]

osu

 

[thepeoplesdoc]

I'm a current resident at UF-Jax I know it's about that time of year that fourth year med students start to put together their rank list so I just want to tell you the major reasons why our program is so strong:

1. Variety of Clinical Pathology. The pathology is fantastic on the trauma side (two major highways going through city provide many MVCs, an active gun and knife club provide plenty of penetrating trauma plus we have 2 helicopters that fly in stuff from outlying areas), and on the medical side (lots cardiac patients, lots HIV patients, lots dialysis patients,lots of tox/OD patients and lot of drunks).

2. Opportunities for procedures: The interns get first shot at all the medical airways with the 3rd years backing them up (at many other programs it's only the 3rd yr who does these; 2nd yrs and 3rd yrs do the large majority of the trauma airways at UF-Jax). Many interns have over 40 intubations by the end of their first year. As interns you'll get many chances for central lines, chest tubes, fracture/joint reductions, LPs....etc. Many procedures like these are frequently given to med students because all of our residents get so much experience at performing them. This past fall I supervised a med student that got an intubation,central line and chest tube all in the same shift (Good luck finding another program where that happens).

3. The Faculty: Are awesome and that's the honest truth. We have a great mix of attendings, as far as age and where they trained (UF-Jax, Maryland, Albert Einstein, CMC, UCLAHarbor, Navy-SD,&#8230;&#8230;&#8230;..etc) Many of our faculty are fellowship trained as well (Peds EM, Tox, Critical Care, International Medicine, Ultrasound). You will get a variety of views/perspectives on how to successfully tackle different medical problems&#8230;&#8230;&#8230;&#8230;.a great thing that cannot be overstated





I know when I was on the interview trail I heard that UF-Jax was malignant&#8230;&#8230;&#8230;&#8230;it may have been this way 5 or 6 years ago but I don't know that for sure because I wasn't around the program then&#8230;&#8230;..what I do know is that it's definitely not a malignant program now. Interns work 20-21 12-hour shifts a month, 2nd years work 18-19 8- hours shifts a month and third years work 15-17 8-hours shift a month and are allowed to moonlight. This year no one is scheduled for over 55hrs a week on our ED schedule. Our attendings give us a lot of autonomy to make our own decisions and treat us with respect. We do round at shift change which normally takes on avg 40-45min in ECC and about 20min in FLEXcare (I know a prior post says we have a bunch of attendings who yell and treat us disrespectfully and that we round for 3 hours per shifts&#8230;&#8230;&#8230;I don't know what to say to that other than its completely dead wrong)



The bottom-line is that if you come to UF-Jax you will certainly work hard (which by the way if you are not working hard in residency, you are not in a good residency), you are going to see a lot of sick patients and you will become an extremely strong and confident emergency medicine physician who will get any job you want when you are done with residency.

 

[OceanRscue]

Currently an intern at Shands Jax. There are 3 primary reasons why I chose our program:

1. Philosophy: Our program is built on the foundation of recruiting confident and eager residents who learn well through doing. From day one, you are expected to be seeing your own patients and developing your own plans, and then using the knowledge and experience of the senior resident and attending to improve on this plan. We also do more procedures in your first year than you could possibly ever want to do. It is nice to be so proficient at lines and procedures in your first month that you are comfortable scrubbing in with the med student and instructing them.

2. Faculty: Many of you may hear a rumor along the interview trail that there is no attending supervision at Shands. The truth of the matter is that there is 24/7/365 supervision by the most amazing faculty and a leadership which is second to none. We have a large variety of faculty from young to old with varying backgrounds (military, EMS, critical care, peds, academic, private). You cannot ask for a more supportive, interactive, and academically oriented faculty than the one we have in our department.

3. Residents: It's hard to get 45 people from so many different areas of the country in one place and have them all work well together and efficiently, but we do it well. I think it helps that Shands is a pretty unique environment that people either love or hate, it's a very intense Emergency Department and a lot is expected out of you from the beginning, so anyone who ranks it high is the type of person who is looking for that experience. When we all work in the ED together, we come together very well as a team and learn a lot from each other. Our cohesiveness makes mandatory things like conference and journal club (usually at a local brewery or some one's house) something to look forward to.

Shands Jax is not an easy place to work due to our volume and pt population. But we are here because we want to be the best and want to be able to handle anything. I wouldn't trade the experience for anything.

 

[wheels22]

Another intern here at Jax this year-just want to throw in my two cents-
My intern year has been fun so far. I was nervous coming off 4th year of medical school which is basically a 5 month spring break, but it has been way better than I could have imagined. First off you have a class of 15 interns, which means there is always someone on an easier month who you can go get a drink with any night. Out of the interns I probably go out with 9 of them on a weekly basis. But not Ocean Rescue. He's blackballed. JK. He's a future chief. The 2nd and 3rd year residents are great too. The 3rd years here are more self sufficient and well trained than any other place I rotated. That was a big reason I chose Jax. The faculty are great. Good mix of young and older faculty. The PD is so nice, loves to teach, and is not intimidating at all to work with. The assistant PD, Dr Morrissey is my idol. Hawaiian shirts, layed back attitude, crazy smart. Just the coolest person. He's like if Jimmy Buffett was an ER doctor. The actual ER is nice. It definitely gets crazy and you are thrown into the mix on day one. I intubated someone at 1135am on July 1st, 5 minutes into my first shift. I dont think there are many places that that happens. It does get overwhelming at times but its still fun. Everyone is there with a common goal and helps you out when you need it. You do tons of procedures, see tons of sick people, and really gain confidence early on to handle multiple sick people at once. The off service months are good too. Medicine is an outpatient month where most days I just went to the ED and put in central lines. Trauma was my favorite offservice month. As an intern you do all procedures on the traumas. I put in 5 chest tubes(overweight floridians on scooters=chest tubes), ran a ton of traumas, and took occasional naps. Very enjoyable. OB/Gyn is not bad, you just hang out in L and D and catch babies. Cardiac ICU is not the most fun month, but its low stress and the nurses are nice up there. Then there is MICU where you get lots of procedures, Ultrasound, Peds ED, and ortho. I've yet to do these but I've heard good things.
Overall, great training, great teaching from faculty, and a nice place to live. And lastly I'm moving into a beach house with another intern next year and all of yall are welcome to visit. Salt Life.

 

[shandswhich]

I'm a current second resident at Shands and just thought it would be helpful to post why I chose this program when I was looking for the right place to spend 3 years and train.

The patient population - It's perfect. We have navy residents that come spend a month here in our ED and I've heard them say "I've never seen so many crictically ill patients in my entire 3 years as a resdient as I have in one day at shands." So you get the picture. Sick people. You learn to manage everything you need to know in the real word and more! It's very reassuring.

The amount of procedures you get to do in your first year tops most programs. You become very comfortable with all procedures (lines, LPs, paracentesis, intubations, etc.) We are very profcient, everyone in the hospital knows this to the point where during codes, or in the MICU, nurses and staff are relieved to see us. We get the job done. As a second year I've been involved with 2 emergent surgical airways and have had multiple trauma airways.

The attendings are amazing. There is not one attending that I don't feel comfortable around. Maybe in the past this program was malignant but the past 2 years that I've been here has been nothing but great relationships with my attendings. I look up to the attendings we have. Many of them are young and already accomplished in their careers. What's really cool is that we have multiple female attendings too. That was something I looked into as a resident. This is a young vibrant program that is passionate about emergency medicine.

The other thing you should know about that is unique to Jax is our resusication month. As a second year you run all the resusications and traumas that come in. Some of those are cardiac reds with CPR/ACLS in progress etc. Some of those are GI bleeds with scary crash airways. It's great experience to stand at the foot of the bed and direct traffic and run the show! Alot of programs don't have this...why? Cause they proably don't have sick patients. Ask where they intubate people and where they do resusications and what you get to do as a resident? Our 1st years do the airway, 2nd years run it, 3rd years help both of us where we need it and then our attending is a our little birdy on our shoulder reminding you not to forget about this or that....

Jax is a mixture of a big city with at times a little town feel but somehow has a gun/knife club and a really nice beach. I think one of Jax's draw back is that is so spread apart. There's different 'areas' to live in i.e. Riverside/Avondale is more of a downtown/walkable/hipster area to live. The beach is well the beach - can't beat that. Downtown is hit or miss with living. Southside has the town center which is so awesome. It's a huge outdoor mall with multiple restaurants from cheap to expensive and fancy. It's a newer area with condos etc. The mandarian area is farther south and it's more of your family area.

I hope that helps? Good luck with the match. Research as much as you can. Email residents that attend those programs and lastly...don't believe everything you hear.

 

[thepeoplesdoc]

Here is a website for the program made by one of the 3rd year residents

jaxem.org

 

[golghiapparatus]

Current UF-Jax intern, thought I'd throw in my 2 cents since it is that time of year and I remember going through all of these reviews last year and finding them helpful.

I'm three months into intern year at Jax now and it has been everything I expected and more. I came here for the learn-by-doing philosophy, the autonomy, the volume and variety of critically ill patients, and the location near the water and the beach.

ED months are split between the ECC (high acuity) and Flex (lower acuity). As a second and third year you also do random Peds EM shifts during your EM months. During intern year all ED shifts are 12 hours, but during 2nd and 3rd year you do mostly 8s. You do about 16 to 18 shifts per month as an intern, fewer as a senior. So far I'd estimate that about 1/3 of your shifts as an intern are in ECC and 2/3 in Flex. The 12 hour shifts in ECC are awesome and brutal. The entire throughput of the ECC is split between one intern and one 2nd year resident. These patients are almost all level twos with vital sign abnormalities, lots of comorbids, etc. There is a 3rd year resident supervising the department and as an intern you typically run your patients by the 3rd year. Most of the time I would see my patients, put in orders, write a quick blurb, then go see my next patient. At some point I would talk to my senior or to the attending about my plan, but I felt like I was managing patients independently from day one. Seniors and attendings have a pretty good idea of what is happening with patients and they definitely keep an eye on the critical patients, but typically they don't step in unless something bad is happening. The nursing staff is generally excellent and they keep an eye on your patients and will sometimes let the senior know if it seems like you're in over your head with a particular patient. You pretty much spend your 12 hours feeling like you are 5 patients behind and not knowing what you're doing, but somehow you get through it and live to tell the tale.
I should also say that help is always there if you need it and you aren't expected to be self-taught. You learn as you go and figure things out with a little help along the way.
Flex care is more relaxed and a slower pace. Lots of lacs, abscesses, vag bleeders, pain complaints and occasional random craziness that slipped through triage (ruptured ectopics, DKAs, appys, etc. Here you're working more directly with the attending and there is more time for teaching.

Oh, and interns get first dibs on all medical airways (not trauma airways), and we get tons of procedures early on.

Feel free to PM me if you have any questions.

 

[EmergMed2017]

Hey guys. I've been on the site but made a new profile for anonymity. I'm a 4th year going into EM and I found these threads so incredibly helpful that I want to help contribute to keeping them up to date.

I interviewed at UF-Jax and these were my notes on the program:

Residents: My favorite that I've met on the trail so far. They're super chill people who get along and seem to be satisfied with a beer and a football game -- right up my alley. There's 15 per class so I think it's a pretty ideal size to be big enough that we're not getting sick of seeing the same people but not too big that I feel lost. They all seemed very happy here and had nothing but great things to say (specifically about their autonomy in the department)

Location: Not a big metro center if that's what you're looking for but it seems to have many different neighborhoods within the city where you could probably find whatever you're looking for. In all honesty, I would probably prefer a place a bit bigger with more options of things to do but I really can't complain.

Facilities: It's a county program. So if shiny, beautiful new things are a priority to you, you probably won't be wow-ed by it. I, however, am more of a county-hospital person and I loved it. There are patients in stretchers in the hallways and to be honest they could probably do more for patient privacy but even still I felt very much at home there. If you're into that type of environment I'm sure you will too. They spend most of their time at Shands and their PICU rotation at the private children's hospital nearby. Interns work 10s and everyone else works 8s, I believe. Jax has some pretty rough areas so I'm told there's plenty of violent crime to go around for training.

Curriculum: you have to do a month on wards which is a bit bleh but other than that it seems pretty fair. Interns spend most of their time on the FlexCare side (lower acuity) although they do spend time with the more sick patients (about 1/3 of their shifts). The trade-off is that they get even more autonomy in FlexCare whereas in ECC (high acuity) they work directly with the 3rd year -- which probably isn't a bad idea so I don't kill someone. Interns get dibs on all medical airways and 2nd years get first crack at all trauma airways. Not bad if you ask me.

Overall: Overall I loved this place. It is exactly what I want in a program. The only con is that Jax isn't a metro center but I could put that aside for this program. It will definitely be ranked highly on my list. Probably number 1. But keep in mind that if you don't like county programs you may not feel the same way.

Hope this was helpful. Happy interview season!

 

[Doc Doc Doc Goose]

Any updates in the program or thoughts from more recent residents?

 

[saltlifesaver]

Any updated reviews on the UF Jax EM program?