Interview Trail 2005

Very helpful info. I am heading out there for 12/11 interview and you've got me excited (good excited, not dirty excited). Any thoughts about interviews at the OTHER Rochester in the OTHER tundra (Mayo)? I think they already had one interview day.

I went to Mayo on 11/19-11/20 for their interview, here's my info from the Rochester WAY up north.

As expected, very impressive program and facilities - surprising to me was the modesty and genuineness of all the residents and faculty.

Formal reception on Friday night (everyone wore suits). Chairman (Cofield), Program Director (Hanssen), several faculty, and many residents (including interns) were there and were very helpful. I think Dr. Cofield went around and introduced himself to everyone at some point. After about 1.5 hours of the formal reception, the residents (and some spouses) took us (without faculty) to a bar/grill for appetizers and drinks. Residents seemed to have very good camaraderie amongst themselves and were welcoming to applicants as well, they seemed happy and were eager to talk about the program.

Interview day on Sat. 11/20 started with breakfast, opening comments about the history of Mayo (makes you respect the tradition of greatness there) by Dr. Cofield, a tour of the facilities by residents, 2 half-hour interviews by faculty (mine were Dr. Shaughnessy and Dr. Berger and were very friendly with no pimping), and one information session with Dr. Hanssen. The interview day finished with a nice lunch with residents at the Marriott connected to Mayo.

Overall, the faculty just kept telling us how qualified we were and how glad they were to have us - good confidence booster for the rookie interviewees.

Here is what I remember:
-1 faculty consultant (make that 1 TOP-NOTCH faculty consultant) to 1 resident on every specialty (residents say this does not deter them from having strong camaraderie amongst residents)
-residents PGY2-5 are considered "the same" in the OR - and depending on your abilities and your faculty person, PGY2's often operate skin to skin
-contrary to rumors many have heard, plenty of early operative experience and plenty of trauma (though no "knife and gun club" like urban trauma centers)
-good pay, most residents own homes, excellent benefits/health insurance
-1/2 married, 1/2 single coming into residency (there are also 5 women out of the 50 residents - Mayo is proud of this)
-case numbers about 1200 cases over the course of residency (and as previously mentioned, these are usually just the resident and the faculty only)
-Patient Care is stressed as their number 1 priority (then research and education are their other 2 tenets)
-6 months of protected basic science/didactic time in 2nd year
-amazing biomechanics lab with endless opportunities and resources for learning procedures
-well balanced among specialties - anticipated changes: new trauma faculty member in next year or so, new integrated clinics (with neuro, rheum, PM&R) in next few years
-Rochester, MN is TINY, so Mayo knows this and tells people they know they are one of, if not THE, best ortho training program, but they want you to make sure you can handle living in Rochester for 5 years - they say they may rarely contact their "top dogs" some time before match lists are due, but will never PRESSURE anyone out of respect for the match.

Let me know if I forgot anything you are curious about. Overall, I was very impressed with the program and dedication of the faculty. There does not seem to be a single weakness or a mean person that I met. Good luck!!

SkeletonCrew

Mayo on 11/20

I agree with everything SkeletonCrew had to say.
Overall, very happy residents with few if any complaints even when you get them away from the staff. Very strong program. The only weakness seems to be sports and the staff are very up front about it.

Of interest, the Chairman, Dr. Cofield, will be stepping down sometime in the next year. Not to worry though, they say that they rotate chairmen about every 8-10 years to keep new blood in the office. Dr. Cofield has been there 9 years.

I did have a different set of interviewers, but both were very friendly with "get to know you" type questions.

Great experience, would recommend this program to anyone.

Just wanted to move this post back into the frey to see if anyone wanted to share info from their recent interviews.

University of Mississippi:
Interview was very laid back. Multiple one on one with attendings and a couple 2-3 on one interviews as well. Mostly get to know you type of questions. I think the program is fantastic, very under rated. They get plenty of OR experience, and residents are getting fellowships at U Washington and HSS. They seem to have a very personal relationship with attendings as well.

MCV/VCU:
Breakfast in a.m. w/ intro by chair/pd. Then a tour & 3 interviews (one w/ either chair or pd, one w/ an attending, one w/ an attg plus a sr resident), in various orders. Numerous residents pop in to chat in the waiting area throughout the morning. Casual lunch to follow at a wing place, done by 2pm. Laid back, unless you interview with the 2 chiefs (filling in for an attg that couldn't be there) - they fire a list of about 15 questions & it's slight higher-stress than the other interviews.

U of Colorado
They are done interviewing so this won't help anyone out but is interesting anyway. One station w/ PD and chief resident they give you a nut and bolt in non-dominant hand and tell you to assemble it one handed as they fire rapid questions. Guess what, the nut didn't fit the bolt. Then they had you assemble a drill as fast as possible and drill obliquely through a piece of PVC, again w/ rapid questions. Actually kind of fun.
The most interesting part of the day though was when the resident giving the tour bragged about averaging 132 hrs/wk on trauma rotating and stating ortho will NEVER be a 80hr/wk job. Is this supposed to turn me on? If they would have just sent this quote out to us b/f the interview I could have saved myself a trip to CO.