"Variety of cases, volume of cases, attitude of department that residents are here to learn not work (>300 CRNA's if I remember correctly to handle low-yield cases), built in international rotations. Great PD and solid didactics (protected time out of OR). Huge SIM center with many workshops." | More from this Member | Report Response

"See below. Interview day: low stress, nice little folder to describe everything, great and comprehensive powerpoint discussion to start day" | More from this Member | Report Response

"The city - if you are not a football fan you may hate Pittsburgh. Most of the residents seemed to be older married with kids/expecting kids and many owned a home (very good real estate deals)" | More from this Member | Report Response

"Tour of SIM center, presentation from PD among other faculty, interviews, lunch, tour, meet and greet with chair (prepare a question to ask him)" | More from this Member | Report Response

"Administration: Chair - stable; there for last several years without any rumors of him leaving. Program Director - stable for last few years; great guy, down to earth. Has the pulse of the program. Coordinator: very kind, chatty, funny. Program: 5 year cycle without a single citation. 15 residents/year, some categorical with CBY under guidance of anesthesia dept; some spots are for advanced program. Simply gigantic hospital system that continues to grow...you either will rotate or have the chance to rotate thru 7 or 8 hospitals (several of those are interconnected via skywalk or tunnel); there's gonna be a brand new peds hospital that will be stand-alone and a mile or so away from the main mega-plex. Simulator center space that is INCREDIBLE, and they report having something like 63 mannequins at their disposal for teaching. Training covers everything that you could possible ask about - liver/heart/pancreas/small bowel/multi-visceral/double lung transplants, OB thru the roof, regional opportunities that allowed one resident to get over 600 blocks during his 3 anesthesia years. They report over 100,000 anesthetics per year, which is the greatest number I have heard over the course of 10 anesthesiology interviews (Cleveland Clinic was next highest at 80,000+). Critical Care mecca, with a stand-alone critical care medicine department...seems like you just have to name something and say "critical care unit" after it, and Pitt has it - liver transplant CCU, PICU, NICU, Neuro ICU, Trauma ICU, MICU, Cardiac ICU, etc. - CA1 and CA2 done thru general and various subspecialty rotations - CA3 year done via elective; ACGME just gave them the okay to do a two month elective in Palermo, Italy, and there are plans to set something else up in Qatar or Dubai - CBY year: gives 4 wks vacation. Must do 2 mo CCM (Q4 call w/post call day off), 1 mo anesthesia, 1 mo acute pain, 1 mo EM, 1 mo cardio consult (no call), 2 mo medicine (Q10 call), 2 mo surgery (no overnight call), 1 mo elective, and 1 mo peds EM. Call: I admit I didn't take great notes on this - don't know if it's 24 hour call (I think it's only 16 hrs, but not sure) - but call works out to be something like Q6d, and a weekend day or two per month. No one would pin down hours in specific, but around 55-60 is what I got when doing the math. Education: lectures at least once/week, periodic PBL, and rotation specific lectures. There are mock orals even as CA1 and 2's (and of course as 3's); there are also reviews done after each subspecialty rotation. The program director said he insists on being called or paged if you are not given relief from your OR at the time of a scheduled lecture. My impression was very strong commitment to education of residents." | More from this Member | Report Response