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What is your in-state status?:
Out of state
On what date did the interview take place?:
2/1/2008
How do you rank this residency among ALL other residencies?:
9 out of 10
How do you rank this residency among other residencies to which you've applied?:
9 out of 10
What is your ranking of this program's facilities?:
10 out of 10
What is your ranking of this program's location?:
8 out of 10
What is your ranking of this area's cultural life?:
7 out of 10
What was the stress level of the interview?:
3 out of 10
How do you think you did?:
7 out of 10
How did the interview impress you?:
Positively
How long was the interview?:
20 minutes
How many people interviewed you?:
5
What was the style of the interview?:
One-on-one
What impressed you positively?:
1. Strong commitment to getting the best educational experience for the residents as possible. Exceedingly high surgical volume (80,000+) per year yet residents only do about 30% of the cases which gives them enormous flexibility in scheduling only the best cases for the residents. Of course protected didactic time and the attendings really try to challenge the residents by assigning residents difficult cases constantly. 2. anesthesiology department has high visibility within the hospital - they are very well regarded and respected. As an example, they have their pre-op clinic staffed by their most senior faculty (chair, vice chair, etc) who all still staff rooms daily/weekly. This helps them interface with surgeons and rest of the hospital. 3. ALL attendings run their own rooms (no residents or CRNA's) at least one time a week. 4. Stable faculty with low turnover with high faculty: resident ratio. Although they could support many more residents with their surgical volume, Dr. Evers (chair) has really pushed to keep their resident #'s low (12 categorical/6 advanced) to optimize each residents learning experience. This helps the residents get phenomenal case complexity and volume despite every fellowship under the sun. 5. Subspecialty experience is impressive - no weaknesses anywhere except regional (??) but that seems to be a VERY common theme as I’m discovering on the trail. Strong CT, peds (St. Louis Children's), OB (about 3500 deliveries a year, high risk), pain, transplant, and ICU. CTICU 100% staffed by anesthesiology (also claim best outcomes of all the units in the hospital) and half of the SICU attendings. Residents stated that teaching in the CTICU was fantastic with tons and tons of teaching. 6. Research - if you want it, it's here. Top funded anesthesia research department. 7. High commitment to simulation research and training. Currently 2 big sim centers and will open a children's center in April 09. Dedicated faculty for simulation education and training. 8. Fellowships: they have it all here. At an advantage if you are in-house because they like to take their own. 85-90% do fellowships - have that in my notes but will have to double check. Most do fellowship at Wash U. Was surprised to hear the chair state an "expectation" to have their residents do fellowships. However I talked to several residents who had not made up their mind about fellowship or not. 9. COL in St. Louis is very affordable with lots of residents owning houses throughout metro area. 10. Facilities: BJH is simply a gorgeous hospital. Very big but everything is connected by skyway. 11. Good comraderie and residents seem happy to have matched there. CA-2 class sent to ASA every year all expenses paid. 12. Very responsive to resident concerns. Continually revising CBY based on intern feedback. Chair and PD (who are both fantastic) fight VERY hard for their residents. 13. Resident flexibility in developing own anesthetic plans - attendings come from all over the world which gives the residents broad exposure to many different ways of doing anesthetics. Report as inappropriate
What impressed you negatively?:
1. CBY definitely on the hard side but anesthesia relevant. 4 months of medicine (1 mo cards), 2 mo surgery, 2 EM (but trauma bay only). 2. Hrs: definitely crept up there (65ish) CA-2 and CA-3 year for a few months b/c CA-1 do not take call for the first 3 mos of the year. I kept hearing about 55-65 hrs a week depending on what rotation you were on. Several CA-2 mentioned never going a call night w/o sleep (usually a few hrs). Report as inappropriate
How was your interview day? Please summarize.:
Well attended dinner @ a very nice restaurant night before. Interview day started @ 7:15 for 1 hr tour, continental breakfast and program review by PD (Dr. Cox), then Dr. Evers comes gives a talk about Wash U Anesthesiology and his vision of the program. Dr. Cox deals with the specifics and Dr. Evers does the sell. I got the strong impression throughout the interview day that they want to turn out strong residents who have a high commitment to the field and will promote it, especially pre-op and post op. They are not interested in promoting technicians or people who want to do B&B anesthesia in a rural community. Anyways, after the sell there are 5 interviews (PD, chair, 3 faculty). All were very familiar with my app and asked me intelligent questions about it. Very conversational vibe but they do want to know that you know what anesthesia is about. Nice lunch to finish the day and lots of residents came out to chat with us. Overall had a great day. Impression: Superb program that will challenge you with great cases and give you easy opportunities to tons of great fellowships if you want. Had a feeling I would fit in very well with the program and I thought the residents were great. I will likely rank it very highly. Report as inappropriate
What was your primary mode of travel?:
Airplane
What was your total time spent traveling?:
4-6 hours
What airport did you use?:
Lambert
Where did you stay?:
At program supplied housing
What is the name of the hotel you stayed in?:
Parkway
How would you rate the hotel?:
8 out of 10
Would you recommend the hotel?:
Yes
About how much did you spend on room, food, and travel?:
$501+
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