top hand fellowships

What is the difference between the Wash U plastic and Ortho fellowship in terms of experience

SLAC, thanks for your input. It is v interesting to see the widely disparate views of Indy. So far, I am hearing 50/50 good/bad and don't know what to make of it.

FYI--Loyola (Chicago) has just been accredited for a hand fellowship. They have a fellow for 09/10 already. don't know about conrete plans for interviewing for 10/11 yet.

Obviously no track record to make informed statements about the program yet, but seems promising and is in a great city.

What about the Stern fellowship in Cincinnati. Has it started to fall off?

Phillyortho - I would agree with SLAC that the Indiana Hand Center still is one of the top programs. Being a recent graduate of the program, I realize that even in my first year of practice, my experience at the Hand Center has made me into a top hand doc. I have been comfortable with every case that I have confronted so far and even have some of my seasoned veteran partners asking my opinion on their tougher cases.

The Hand Center was tough, but definitely not abusive or scut work. I did the cases, instead of watching, and got a good balance of unique cases, e.g., brachial plexus, with the bread and butter ones. Also, I had the chance to see how 9 docs did the same case, e.g., CMC arthroplasty, in 9 different ways. Plus, I have some of the top hand minds in the field on speed dial when I get the occasional exceptionally difficult cases.

At the end of the day, I'm very glad I chose the tougher, but not malignant, program to become the hand doc I wanted to be.

I think there are a few more programs that people forgot to put on this growing list of top tier Hand Fellowships: University of Cincinnati, University of Pittsburgh and HSS. Each is a big program, with multiple attendings and a strong Academic component.

I'll throw my hat in the ring and agree that Indiana is top notch but you do have to work really hard for a year. That said, you can come out able to do just about anything.
As for the Tufts program being mentioned, I interviewed there and feel that while it used to be great it is no longer.

just gonna give this thread a bump and see what people think about a couple other programs. . .

Union Memorial in Baltimore
Stern in Cincinnati
MGH (Harvard)
U MINN

thanks.