yale vs columbia

[sweet444]

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any advice? saw some info concerning yale in previous post but have not heard much about columbia

 

[speyeder]

Columbia is a relatively small program with 3 residents per year. They only rotate through CUMC; there's no VA. Surgical volume is good, probably second only to NYEEI in NY. In terms of reputation, NYEEI and Columbia are considered the top programs in NYC. Columbia is a retina powerhouse. Their chairman, Stanley Chang is one of the top retina specialists in the world. They also have 3 or 4 other fulltime retina faculty members who are also very well-known, as well as an affiliation with the retina guys at MEETH (although this might only apply for their retina fellowship). In cornea they have Dr. Trokel, who was one of the pioneers in excimer laser use for refractive surgery and Dr. Flynn in peds, who I think discovered ROP. They are well-represented in all subspecialties. Interestingly enough, the former head of the glaucoma dept, Dr. Tsai, just became chairman at Yale this July. Residents rotate through both public and private clinics. The public clinic is where residents see most of their patients and get their surgical cases from, and the private clinics are where the residents get exposure to subspecialties. Clinics were very busy from what I remember. The ophtho dept is housed in their own building within the Columbia Presbyterian Medical Center. The patient population is extremely diverse, with a heavy Spanish contingency. There is extensive research going on at Columbia, with many fulltime PhD's and funding from Columbia University. About 2/3 of their graduates go on to fellowships, and at top places. Overall this is an excellent program with no glaring weaknesses. Only drawbacks might be it's location in Washington Heights and the fact that they usually take 2/3 from their own med school.

 

[sisyphus22]

Columbia is a relatively small program with 3 residents per year. They only rotate through CUMC; there's no VA. Surgical volume is good, probably second only to NYEEI in NY. In terms of reputation, NYEEI and Columbia are considered the top programs in NYC. Columbia is a retina powerhouse. Their chairman, Stanley Chang is one of the top retina specialists in the world. They also have 3 or 4 other fulltime retina faculty members who are also very well-known, as well as an affiliation with the retina guys at MEETH (although this might only apply for their retina fellowship). In cornea they have Dr. Trokel, who was one of the pioneers in excimer laser use for refractive surgery and Dr. Flynn in peds, who I think discovered ROP. They are well-represented in all subspecialties. Interestingly enough, the former head of the glaucoma dept, Dr. Tsai, just became chairman at Yale this July. Residents rotate through both public and private clinics. The public clinic is where residents see most of their patients and get their surgical cases from, and the private clinics are where the residents get exposure to subspecialties. Clinics were very busy from what I remember. The ophtho dept is housed in their own building within the Columbia Presbyterian Medical Center. The patient population is extremely diverse, with a heavy Spanish contingency. There is extensive research going on at Columbia, with many fulltime PhD's and funding from Columbia University. About 2/3 of their graduates go on to fellowships, and at top places. Overall this is an excellent program with no glaring weaknesses. Only drawbacks might be it's location in Washington Heights and the fact that they usually take 2/3 from their own med school.

I rotated at Columbia in August. Everything speyeder said is spot-on, down to the fact that Columbia is freakishly inbred (I believe this extends outside of the ophthalmology department), to the point that one of the faculty members lightly mocked us poor visiting students for "wasting" an away month there... The training though was excellent, a lot of interesting pathology, great teaching from attendings with a lot of one-on-one interaction. Call is q3 first year, and quite busy. They start the day at 7 am if there's lecture, 7:45 is morning report, clinic usually goes on til about 5:30. Residents start getting surgical experience (pterygia etc) in the first year. One negative about the program is that the resident clinic is in the building's basement and is in awful shape - ugly, old facilities, with cockroaches etc. Wash Hts sucks but most of the residents live in nicer parts of the city. I will probably be ranking this program fairly highly (even though apparently they won't be doing that for me)

 

[sisyphus22]

if you're choosing between yale and columbia for interviews, i understand that columbia is a superior program in terms of clinical training and research

 

[indytx]

...One negative about the program is that the resident clinic is in the building's basement and is in awful shape - ugly, old facilities, with cockroaches etc.

Hahah cockroaches, are you kidding me??
E
L T
F roach P
G H T R

 

[azzarah]

Hahah cockroaches, are you kidding me??
E
L T
F roach P
G H T R

I have heard that with the new chairman, Yale is bound to raise to the top....

 

[motorcity]

They are both top institutions, but Columbia's ophtho department is definitely superior. I visited Columbia recently. It was a great place to be, and I think speyeder's post was pretty much on target. The residents seemed to know the faculty very well, and even the big-name people seemed pretty approachable. Dr. Flynn conducts morning rounds with the residents every day, and he has an unbelievable wealth of knowledge. There are also several younger faculty there (M. Chiang, S. Tsang) who are amazingly brilliant and seem to be easy to work with. But it's a pretty small program (3 per year) which is a little in-bred.

 

[EScellCulturist]

I rotated at Columbia in August. Everything speyeder said is spot-on, down to the fact that Columbia is freakishly inbred (I believe this extends outside of the ophthalmology department), to the point that one of the faculty members lightly mocked us poor visiting students for "wasting" an away month there... The training though was excellent, a lot of interesting pathology, great teaching from attendings with a lot of one-on-one interaction. Call is q3 first year, and quite busy. They start the day at 7 am if there's lecture, 7:45 is morning report, clinic usually goes on til about 5:30. Residents start getting surgical experience (pterygia etc) in the first year. One negative about the program is that the resident clinic is in the building's basement and is in awful shape - ugly, old facilities, with cockroaches etc. Wash Hts sucks but most of the residents live in nicer parts of the city. I will probably be ranking this program fairly highly (even though apparently they won't be doing that for me)

..... that means great ophthalmologists such as Brad Straatsma, David Abramson, Barrett Haik, Steve Trokel, et al did their training together with cockroaches. Therefore, the more roaches, the better the program!