I'm a UCSD resident - was disappointed that no other residents had shared some positive points about UCSD - so thought I'd say a few things.
UCSD is often over-looked as being nothing more than located in San Diego, and therefore residents have a great life and no one gives it much more thought. But if you believe that, you'll be selling yourself short.
The program here at UCSD is robust, educational, balanced, and very enjoyable. We have a great diversity of hospitals (VA, Childrens, Community, Private, Kaiser) and a range of attendings from young and just out of fellowship (great teachers, let you do a lot, fun to work with) to older and well-established (great wisdom, high expectations, make you a better person/surgeon).
The residents are equally diverse and come from a variety of backgrounds with a broad spectrum of hobbies and interests. We're overall very hard-working, we all get along, and we still have time to enjoy San Diego.
Not much needs to be said about San Diego - it's the greatest city in the world. Last Sunday (literally...December 12th 2010) I was at the beach because it was 85 degrees outside. Where else can you do that?
But....don't discount San Diego's other advantages - namely that we're 20 miles from Mexico and serve much of the South-West United States. For those two reasons, our trauma experience is amazing due to a combination of border jumpers, Mexican patients (failed treatments in Mexico), and desert injuries (ATV/dune buggies). The Children's hospital is always ranked in the top 3 for Orthopaedics, the Hand service regularly has top ratings, and our chairman is a spine surgeon and thus that is another strength. We have hired fellowship trained surgeons in foot/ankle, oncology, sports, and joints - all within the last two years! As you can see, we're committed to improving every specialty in orthopaedics, and we're doing a great job.
In addition to all this, we have a great operative experience and all of our chief residents go on to match at top their top-choice fellowships, which are always the top-rated ones around the country.
One thing that makes us unique is a dedicated research year during PGY-2. Many applicants falsely believe this is a disadvantage of the program. From my perspective, and the perspective of the program, the research year is one of the things that makes the residents and the program so strong. Everyone has the potential to get MULTIPLE publications based on original clinical and basic science research during that year. That means that when you graduate, your CV looks way better than everyone else you're interviewing against. Just like when applying to residency... everyone "looks good on paper," but if you have 10 publications and the guy next to you has 1 case report - you're gonna look like a rockstar. Those publications also get you a better/higher paying job down the road, so the "year of lost earnings" will certainly pay itself back significantly.
Additionally, during that research year residents actually have time to read up on Ortho - something that every says they want to do during intern year, but nobody actually has time to do. That's one of the reasons we score well on the in-training exam.
Lastly, if you had a "research" year, where would you want to spend it? San Diego... of course. Even with research and studying, it's a totally chill year and many residents use that time to get married, have children, take significant vacations, work in 3rd world countries, etc...
Overall, UCSD is an incredibly well-balanced program with the STRENGTH of a research year that is not matched by any other California program, and maybe not any program anywhere.
If you were lucky enough to be offered an interview at UCSD - we look forward to meeting you in January. If you have any questions in advance of your visit, please feel free to PM me.
