TOP 5 ACADEMIC ORTHOPAEDIC SURGERY RESIDENCY PROGRAMS

I think the definitive question should be "who would you let operate on your wife/husband"? Some guy who's in the OR doing the operation day in, day out .... or some snotty bow tie wearing prick who wrote a great book but who only cuts a few time a week??

Say no more. Train me by the clinician any day.

ortho2003: don't be so defensive. It's just a discussion.

Academics is a competitive game, programs are constantly trying to recruit the best and brightest, biggest names to boost their research program/prestige. While clearly not important to you, it is REAL; not a figment of our imagination.

Yes...Wash U has to be the top academic program right now.

Wash U, can be compared, can't be beat.

ditto.
People seem to like compartmentalizing everything in a nice neat little box.
It usually turns in to a big round of dick waving b/c someone has an insecurity and needs to feel "special"

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im an east coaster at one of the aforementioned 'big' programs, but who cares i sure as hell dont all i know is that im damn happy just to be doing what i want

holla back if you hear me

There is no way to rank the consensus top 5, 10, or 20 programs, but everyone seems to think it is necessary.

How are you going to rank it? IS NIH funding the be-all and end-all? If so, then IU, Michigan,and San Diego must be in the top 10.

Is it big names? That seems to be all Harvardorthorez is concerned with in his/her post. If so, then I think you guys are once again showing your East coast arrogance. Seattle has the names equal to your programs...speaking of Seattle, there is a shoulder guy there, who obviously couldn't hold a candle to the Jefferson guys, but some of you may have heard of him...Fred Matsen.

Should we base it publications? If so, then all we need to do is look at the last 5 years of JBJS and the major subspecialty juournals and we can easily come up with our top programs.

Maybe we should consider operative volume. I've done 2500+ operative cases single scrubbing. How many cases do the residents at harvard get without fellow or other resident in the room competing with them? Whether you like to admit it or not, operative experience does play a role in academic orthopaedics too. It doesn't matter who your staff is if you can't see them behind to two fellows and the chief.

Bottom line is we have no idea what the top program, academic or not is. You can't base it on names and NIH funding and unless you have spent a few years there, which no one on this forum can say for any program other than their home program, you have no idea what the program is like. If you are gogn to try to do it based on names, NIH funding, publications, and heresay o this forum, then all you are doing is participating in mental masturbation and ego stroking.

For those of you that need a little less ego stroking, but really want an academic program with opportunities for an academic career, any of harvardorthorez's top 5, along with penn, rochester, cleveland, case, hjd, pitt, rush, hopkins, Michigan seattle, UCSF, Virginia, UTSW, and many others are elite "academic" programs that are very difficult to place in a rank order(unless you are form the East Coast, then we know that Iowa and Mayo ar the only programs that can be mentioned outside Boston, NY, and Phili).

I will quit

I've always felt that Jefferson is one of the best ortho programs in the country. The only comment above I question is Jefferson being the busiest spine center in the country. I don't think this is true. They may be the busiest for spine TRAUMA (Seattle may give them a run) but not for elective spine. There are a lot of spine centers with way more than 4 surgeons that have higher volume of cases.

Also don't forget about the Jefferson Hand Center, one of the better hand fellowships in the country. I believe a weakness in the program is ortho trauma, at least it was a few years ago. There are way too many level 1 trauma centers in Philly and the love is spread rather thin, at least compared to some really busy trauma centers.

This link has the amounts of NIH funding for 2005.

The top five NIH funded programs are:
University of Rochester, Jefferson, Yale, Iowa, and Wash U.
Rochester has the most funding at 4.0 million (9 awards), while Jefferson is second with 3.1 million, but 11 awards.

This of course just gives us an idea of which program have significant amounts of research going on. There are clearly sources of funding other than NIH, but NIH is the largest scientific funding organization in the world and for orthopaedics as well.

I'm a fourth year interested in research and looking at programs and this is definitely helpful. I actually rotated at Yale and Jefferson and am astonished at how much basic science and clinical research both places have. I didn't get the impression that Yale was clinically as strong, but they definitely have quite a bit of research in process. They also have a research block for the residents. Jefferson recently added a two month research block in the PGY-3 year, and apparently may be adding another block of research/elective for the PGY-4 or PGY-5 year.

I hear that rochester is even MORE amazing for research. Any one have any experience there?

It is true that the three shoulder/elbow surgeons left Penn for Jefferson. I'm a Penn resident and it really has left our program much weaker. Dr. Williams is really the most well known name in shoulder surgery, with multiple textbooks, and a great teacher and it is really a loss to the program.

In my opinion the top academic programs are:

HSS, Mayo, Rush, Jefferson, and Iowa.

I dont think Harvard really fits this list anymore. HSS and Mayo are obviously undoubtedly on the list. I'm going into Spine and Jefferson really is the spine leader in the country. With Alex Vaccaro, the new chairman Todd Albert, Hilibrand, and Anderson it is the busiest spine center in the country. They get all the spine trauma being the regional spinal cord injury center and they have the most sought after spine fellowship in the country. I have a buddy across the water at Jeff and he says the program has changed considerably since Albert became chairman - with the junior residents being pulled off the scut services (joints/spine) to have a more operative experience early. My buddy is a pgy-2 and he actually even said that the chairman (albert), met with our chairman (lackman) and there may be a chance that lackman leaves us to go to jeff. This is really upsetting because it would further weaken our program. Its apparently all financial - penn is not interested in putting up for the great surgeons that we have/had.

Iowa is still debatable, it may be close with Cleveland Clinic and Pitt.