Einstein in Philly is a small, community type program that offers great training. I rotated there for a month and loved the program. It's a lesser known program, but is set up purely for resident training.
There are two residents per class and all the sub-specialties with the exception of tumor (only UPenn has tumor in Philly) are represented by fellowship trained docs. The attendings are what make the program very resident friendly. They are more like colleagues than superiors.
The program is set up where you spend 1-2 months on each service. You are basically matched up with 1-2 attendings and do everything that they do (OR, office hours, etc). As a PGY-2 you are first assist on every case the attending you work with does. Thus you get great OR experience early in your residency. The program also has 1 hour of protected time each morning for didactics which is very well organized.
In addition, the Gen. Surg. year is very benign. They were q5 even before all this 80 hour stuff went into effect.
The negatives of Eistein: not a "well known" program, located in North Philly (slightly shady area), with only two per class you can't really hide and thus have to be on top of your game all the time.
I've also heard good things about Union in Baltimore (small, community program). Dr. Sawbonz previously posted a description of it if you want to take a look.
Hope this helps. Good luck to all in the match.
