recommendations for any Illinois peds programs?

[xTinaBna]

hi!

i will be entering fall '07 as a med student at Touro University COM. I am originally from the illinois area and would like to reside here in the future. Does anyone recommend any specific peds residencies in this area? I have worked for Advocate Health care for the last 4 years and would love to do a residency at either Christ, Lutheran, or illinois masonic (those are some of the hospitals within the Advocate system), do you think they would accept an osteopathic med student for a peds residency there (provided i do well in school and on boards)?


Also, do all fellowships take several years to complete? are there any that take just a year? Thanks for the help

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[Micah6:8]

Advocate Christ definitely takes DO's in its program. I know several graduates from CCOM are accepted there each year.

 

[xTinaBna]

Advocate Christ definitely takes DO's in its program. I know several graduates from CCOM are accepted there each year.

do you think going to a med school in california hinders my chance of getting into Christ or other illinois programs? i know that ccom has more opportunities to get experience in the chicago area. i have spoken with the clinical director at tucom...she said my whole 4th year can be completed in chicago if i wish..but my 3rd year rotations are to be assigned. So it doesn't seem like i'll have much early experience with hospitals in illinois since you apply for residency your 4th year right? thanks for the input!

 

[14022]

it will not hurt you in the least. christ is a very good program and it didnt even fill last year. i think the main reason is that it is not known nationally since it is a community hospital. they tend to attract local applicants because of the local reputation. but being from out of the area will not hurt you, in fact it will likely help you since it will make you stand out among the other local applicants. lutheran general is also a very good program. i would definately go to either of those before rush, loyola, or uic despite them being academic programs.

i would try and rotate at both christ and lutheran as a third or fourth year. i am sure you will be more than welcome. dr. roy (the program director at christ) is a wonderful resident "advocate" (pun intended) and i am sure he would love to help you arrange a rotation there.

to answer your other question....most fellowships are 2-3 years. i dont know of any one year fellowships.

 

[xTinaBna]

it will not hurt you in the least. christ is a very good program and it didnt even fill last year. i think the main reason is that it is not known nationally since it is a community hospital. they tend to attract local applicants because of the local reputation. but being from out of the area will not hurt you, in fact it will likely help you since it will make you stand out among the other local applicants. lutheran general is also a very good program. i would definately go to either of those before rush, loyola, or uic despite them being academic programs.

i would try and rotate at both christ and lutheran as a third or fourth year. i am sure you will be more than welcome. dr. roy (the program director at christ) is a wonderful resident "advocate" (pun intended) and i am sure he would love to help you arrange a rotation there.

to answer your other question....most fellowships are 2-3 years. i dont know of any one year fellowships.

thank you SOOO much for the helpful info!

 

[jocg27]

it will not hurt you in the least. christ is a very good program and it didnt even fill last year. i think the main reason is that it is not known nationally since it is a community hospital. they tend to attract local applicants because of the local reputation. but being from out of the area will not hurt you, in fact it will likely help you since it will make you stand out among the other local applicants. lutheran general is also a very good program. i would definately go to either of those before rush, loyola, or uic despite them being academic programs.

i would try and rotate at both christ and lutheran as a third or fourth year. i am sure you will be more than welcome. dr. roy (the program director at christ) is a wonderful resident "advocate" (pun intended) and i am sure he would love to help you arrange a rotation there.

to answer your other question....most fellowships are 2-3 years. i dont know of any one year fellowships.

It sticks in my head from some other post that you are at U of C...What were your perceptions of it during your application/interviewing/ranking process, and how has it been going so far?

 

[jocg27]

i would definately go to either of those before rush, loyola, or uic despite them being academic programs.

.

And also, just wondering if you could talk more about this. I know the advocate programs are both really strong and underrated, but what are your thoughts on what puts them above those 3 academic programs?

just wondering...thanks!

 

[kristing]

And also, just wondering if you could talk more about this. I know the advocate programs are both really strong and underrated, but what are your thoughts on what puts them above those 3 academic programs?

just wondering...thanks!

I rotated at Lutheran, and it was a great place. I also interviewed at Christ and would have gone to either of those 2 programs, if I wanted to live in Chicago. They are smaller than the big academics, and they have a nice family fell to them. They are much more family friendly than NW, from what I have heard from people familiar with the programs. Those might be reasons why that person said that!

 

[skapone33]

Any info on any of the other programs in Chicago? Thanks!

 

[Pedialyte]

Does anyone have any opinions of the academic Chicago programs? (Northwestern, UChicago, UIC-Chicago, Rush, Loyola?) Thanks!

 

[14022]

Does anyone have any opinions of the academic Chicago programs? (Northwestern, UChicago, UIC-Chicago, Rush, Loyola?) Thanks!

There have been many threads on these in the past, so do a search for more info. I applied to all of these except UIC-Chicago, and I interviewed at all of them except Loyola.

I did not apply to UIC because of their reputation. I had heard their facilities are pretty poor and that the vast majority of their residents were not US grads. The reason I cancelled my interview at Loyola was because I went to Rush prior to my scheduled Loyola interview and I felt that these programs were fairly similar. I didnt feel like Rush was a great program for my goals. It is a fabulous place to go for general pediatrics training. I felt it had the best general peds training of all the programs in Chicago in fact. But I felt their subspecialty presence was poor. They dont have specialists in all subspecialties and for many of the specialties they will have one or two attendings that also split time at other hospitals. Also, I did not like Rush because there are only 11 residents a year and they have a small facility dedicated to children in the main hospital. The research they do is primarily more general peds and public health related, which wasnt very exciting to me.

Northwestern is a phenomenal program in a great location, although they will be moving from Lincoln Park to downtown in about 6 years. They are by far the most academic of the Chicago programs and has the best national reputation. It has a lot of subspecialty presence, making a broad exposure to a wide variety of areas of pediatric medicine (both medical and surgical), although maybe at the expense of general primary care peds training. I felt that it was a bit too academic. There is a definate hierarchy among housestaff and attendings. Some attendings do not round with the interns. The interns report to the senior, and the senior will then round with the attending. The attending will then have didactic lectures for the team but the attending wont discuss management of the patients with the intern. This is not true for all attendings but it is for some of them. They work their interns VERY hard, such as Q4 call for 11 months of intern year. They dont feed their residents, and since the hospital is in Lincoln Park most residents live in that pricey area, both of these factors making it difficult to live on a resident's salary. I did not like the current hospital. It is pretty cramped and seemed kind of uncomfortable in patients' rooms (small rooms with 2 patients in each room) and the residents lounge and work areas. Plans are in the works for a new hospital but it wont be ready until you are long gone from residency.

University of Chicago is pretty much in between Northwestern and Rush. They are a program on the rise with a new hospital that opened last year and with additions to the new hospital currently being built. A new pediatrics research facility is in the works as well. Compared to Northwestern, the residents have a better quality of life with fewer call months intern year (6 months Q4 call). The general pediatrics training is better at U of C. I rotated at both as a medical student, and I think the teaching at U of C is better and attendance at conferences is better at U of C as well. Subspecialty presence at U of C is very good, but not as good as Northwestern, especially in the surgical subspecialties, with the exception of neurosurgery. The residents at U of C definately are nicer and they seem happier as well. I think the best thing about U of C is that it prepares you to do anything within pediatric medicine and it will train you to do it well. The residents are treated very well at U of C and everyone seems very happy to be there. The reputation at Northwestern currently is still better than U of C nationally, but this may change as many faculty members continue to leave Northwestern in high numbers. This may give current Northwestern residents an advantage in fellowships but who knows if this will be the case in a few years.

 

[14022]

And also, just wondering if you could talk more about this. I know the advocate programs are both really strong and underrated, but what are your thoughts on what puts them above those 3 academic programs?

just wondering...thanks!

For Christ at least, they see a higher volume of patients than the other three, they have a much stronger subspecialty presence, and they have a stand alone childrens hospital. I think these three are key in giving Christ a hand up on the other three. I cant comment as confidently on Lutheran General since I did not interview there. I have a friend there and she liked it the most among there, Christ, Rush, and Loyola.

 

[ruthmd]

I'll add my two cents to scholes comments- which I completely agree with, btw. I'm a graduate of UIC, and I interviewed at NW (childrens), U of C, Christ and Rush. I cancelled my interview at Loyola because my hubby and I were not focused on staying in Chicago, and because I interviewed at UofC with a Loyola student who expressed some serious concerns about the program.
I did not apply to UIC at all, for many of the reasons scholes stated. I did my peds sub-I there, and I have to say I learned WAAAYY more and got much more hands on experience and better teaching during my third year rotation at Christ. I think an interesting statistic to look at is how many people in the medical school's graduating class seriously were looking at staying at that program for residency- and i think of all of us who went into peds, the ones who interviewed at UIC only did so for practice with interviewing. If you look at our match list, though, we sent 2 to Rush, 1 to Children's, and 2 to Christ, and there was a lot of interest in UofC among all of us. If you're interested in general pediatrics, please do yourself a favor and look at Christ (although they do have pretty fair fellowship placement of those interested, they just tend to attract more people interested in gen peds). I was actually much more impressed with Christ than Rush- much better subspecialty representation, much better facilities.