my chairman said Rochester was a good school to look at.

You should check out Wisconsin. When I was on the interview trail, I thought it was the most well-balanced program I came across. Good academic reputation (not HSS, but solid) with a great operative experience. We don't log the numbers that many community programs do, but I think we're well above average for academic programs. We have a VA and a community rotation, where you get a lot of autonomy in the OR. We also do the big complex academic cases where your involvement is a little less hands-on. Two of our five residents that just graduated went straight into private practice and felt comfortable doing so.

I also thought Minnesota and Utah were well balanced programs with solid reputations and good operative experiences. I did not feel that the "top" academic programs had as good of an operative experience, but this was largely based on my interview experience and talking to rotators.

Campbell Clinic

Carolinas Medical Center

Are we playing "name your ortho program," guys?

4 residents a year
no fellows!
Good group of residents (have a football team and fantasy leagues)
Provided loupes & lead
Resident clinic (learn how to coordinate all aspects of care)
Early operative experience
Daily conferences (including basic science)
Good mix of old & young faculty
Q month grand rounds w/ famous speakers in all specialties (Vacarro, Weiss, Williams, Ramsey, Richmond, Beaty etc)
Book fund
Coures q year (AO, scope course, board review, etc)
Diverse training which includes most of the best rotations in philadelphia
-Academic instituitions=Drexel(strongest affiliation), Penn, Jeff
-Large busy community hospital with huge private group=abington hospital
-Diverse peds rotation=st. chris and shriners hospital
-Great foot/ankle& tumor @ penn with wapner and lackman
-High volume hand= hahnemann, methodist (jeff hand center), abington
-Elective and traumatic spine= abington, hahnemann
-Sports in private and academic centers including college team and area high school coverage with an arthroscopic laboratory & curriculum
-Penetrating and blunt trauma including pelvic reconstruction at both a busy level I and II hospital
-jt reconstruction including renowed surgeons like norman johanson and busy private surgeons like andrew star