12-26-2016, 06:44 PM
UCSD.
4 weeks total. 2 weeks spent at the main university Hillcrest hospital. 1 week spent at the private Thornton hospital. 1 week spent at the pediatric hospital.
Hillcrest: the trauma and stroke center of San Diego. Busy service with lots of operative autonomy and unpredictability. Neuro Critical Care manages all the sick patients, which lets the residents operate. The intern runs the services and does the discharges, consults, bedside procedures (including EVD). There is a PGY 2 and 3, who operate. A PGY 7 is the chief resident.
Thornton: the private hospital with mostly elective cases. Lots of tumor, MIS spine, MVD, and peripheral nerve. Not a very busy service, and a lot more "tame" of a hospital. The PGY 2 and 3 operate, and alternate who does the floor and ICU work, and a PGY 7 is the chief.
Childrens: A fellow and a PGY4 staffs this hospital, and are run by two very busy pediatric neurosurgeons. A lot of interesting pathology and lots of autonomy.
VA: subinterns do not rotate here, but a PGY 4 runs the service here.
Research/Elective: The resident will take very little in-house call and are mostly protected. These will be the PGY 5's and 6's. Two were doing stem cell research, one was doing something with monkeys. Current chiefs did infolded elective clinical rotations in Mexico, and UC-Irvine (Delashaw). One of the residents will be going to Sydney.
Residents: All get along well. They are spread out across 4 different hospitals, so they don't see each other often. They definitely make up for it on friday conferences or during interview dinners. They are sort of like the "in" crowd and all enjoy each other. Many are married, some have children. If you are single, San Diego has some very young and attractive people (the nurses!).
Attendings: All very nice. Bob Carter was especially nice. He seemed like a father figure that looked out for your success. Attending involvement was variable in the OR. Most attendings were uninvolved and let the residents operate. Many of the residents were quite good.
Role of the subintern: There were 5 of us, but we were split up across 3 hospitals. All ICU patients were covered by a subintern, which was presented every morning. All OR cases had a subintern, and we did many of the tying, knot-cutting, assisting with positioning, and drilling a burr hole or two. A presentation of our research or another interesting topic was presented at the end of our subinternship. Clinic was covered by us, which gave us time to get face time with the attendings. There are weekly meetings with the educational director to discuss the cases we saw, which was very educational. There was no student-abuse or scutwork here.
All in all, I did 3 subinternships, and UCSD was the best and most educational of them all. There was harmony between residents, between residents and attendings, between residents and students, and even the attendings and the students. No place else can say that. I was extremely tired at the end of the rotation, but it was due to working and learning hard, and not doing stupid things that other programs force students to do. Check this place out for yourself and form your own opinion.
4 weeks total. 2 weeks spent at the main university Hillcrest hospital. 1 week spent at the private Thornton hospital. 1 week spent at the pediatric hospital.
Hillcrest: the trauma and stroke center of San Diego. Busy service with lots of operative autonomy and unpredictability. Neuro Critical Care manages all the sick patients, which lets the residents operate. The intern runs the services and does the discharges, consults, bedside procedures (including EVD). There is a PGY 2 and 3, who operate. A PGY 7 is the chief resident.
Thornton: the private hospital with mostly elective cases. Lots of tumor, MIS spine, MVD, and peripheral nerve. Not a very busy service, and a lot more "tame" of a hospital. The PGY 2 and 3 operate, and alternate who does the floor and ICU work, and a PGY 7 is the chief.
Childrens: A fellow and a PGY4 staffs this hospital, and are run by two very busy pediatric neurosurgeons. A lot of interesting pathology and lots of autonomy.
VA: subinterns do not rotate here, but a PGY 4 runs the service here.
Research/Elective: The resident will take very little in-house call and are mostly protected. These will be the PGY 5's and 6's. Two were doing stem cell research, one was doing something with monkeys. Current chiefs did infolded elective clinical rotations in Mexico, and UC-Irvine (Delashaw). One of the residents will be going to Sydney.
Residents: All get along well. They are spread out across 4 different hospitals, so they don't see each other often. They definitely make up for it on friday conferences or during interview dinners. They are sort of like the "in" crowd and all enjoy each other. Many are married, some have children. If you are single, San Diego has some very young and attractive people (the nurses!).
Attendings: All very nice. Bob Carter was especially nice. He seemed like a father figure that looked out for your success. Attending involvement was variable in the OR. Most attendings were uninvolved and let the residents operate. Many of the residents were quite good.
Role of the subintern: There were 5 of us, but we were split up across 3 hospitals. All ICU patients were covered by a subintern, which was presented every morning. All OR cases had a subintern, and we did many of the tying, knot-cutting, assisting with positioning, and drilling a burr hole or two. A presentation of our research or another interesting topic was presented at the end of our subinternship. Clinic was covered by us, which gave us time to get face time with the attendings. There are weekly meetings with the educational director to discuss the cases we saw, which was very educational. There was no student-abuse or scutwork here.
All in all, I did 3 subinternships, and UCSD was the best and most educational of them all. There was harmony between residents, between residents and attendings, between residents and students, and even the attendings and the students. No place else can say that. I was extremely tired at the end of the rotation, but it was due to working and learning hard, and not doing stupid things that other programs force students to do. Check this place out for yourself and form your own opinion.
