Mayo Clinic:
Interview benign, nice facilities, dumpy little town, cold as heck.

Albert Einstein (Bronx): "blue collar program," work hard, play hard mentality; heavy on trauma; light on research; know how to spell and what the derivation of "orthopaedics" is.

Ohio State: well-rounded program; new chair- nice guy- cares about residents; even as first year Friday morning is protected time where you go to ortho conferences (even if you are on gen surg, vascular, etc!) -- Friday afternoon is OFF usually! Sweet. 3 five year spots; 1 six year. Have one moral dilemma / patient encounter type experience ready to rattle off.

UConn: excellent training; excellent education. Also well-rounded. Faculty almost all fellowship-trained. Excellent commraderie (OK... my spelling sucks) among residents and faculty. Chair is Browner - trauma guy - very approachable. Residents get good fellowships. Most go into private practice. Interview benign.

Campbell Clinic: Great bunch of guys, friendly attendings, you'll see when you get there. I will say they work their @#$%& off. I'd practice my knot tying and arthroscopy skills since one attending runs you through a few timed physical challenges as they say on Double Dare. Anyway, he says it is more for his curiosity and not incorporated into whom gets accepted. The remainder was 12 other interviews of 15-20 minutes, one on one, with the remainder of the educational staff. Alot of interviews but seems a bit more fair then my other experience.

UConn: a one day only experience. Half day touring facilities and area and half day of intercviews. 45 minutes with an attending and senior resident, then two 20 minute interviews with other attendings of which was luck of the draw. Then they met at the end of the day and made their rank list immediately.

So far NO funny business. Basically want to get to know you and if you'll fit into their program for 5 years. Have got a few strength/weakness, tough/best times in life, and hammered about couples matching and why this area if you're not from. All things one would expect.

What type of couples match "hammering" did you encounter? (and where?) h well:

I've been asked how we were planning on making our rank lists, if we planned on leaving it so she would scramble into an area I got into, what she was going into, basically if she was competitive or not, if she had interviewed already at in my area or had an interview scheduled, and basically how serious we are i.e. "are you going to marry her." I didn't have a problem answering any of these questions because I felt like the answer could only help my cause and it is my situation but would have wet myself if I had to say she was going into derm, rads-onc, etc.

I try to offer up how good my girl is... a few ob/gyn dept have made inroads for me getting an interview... HAVE YOUR "COUPLE" ASK ABOUT THIS AT THEIR INTERVIEW!"

This can be done by mentioning that "Yeah, he has not heard from the ortho dept here... we would really like to come here but of course they need to look at him..."

If your girls (or boys... don't want to leave anyone out) are strong, their dept will go to bat for them just to have a shot at getting them there in july.

At least i think... :tongue:

Anyone else want to post their experiences?

PennState:

very benign interview. no dumb, intimidating questions or playing-surgeon-for-a-day stations. nice hospital. hershey is kindda smallish town. bring your cattle.

a chance to screw is a chance to cure

Wayne and MCO toledo, both were totally chill. maybe one dude per program would ask mild questions, like why ortho, what hobbies you have.. All else was just conversation...

Wayne State does NOT have a written test

Wayne: at the risk of giving away my identity--someone got shot in the childrens hosp while I was on tour. I didn't see any blood, but the cops told us it was not a good time for a tour. Other than that, the interview was more of me asking them questions than them asking me. As previously stated, there was no test.

UConn: Great experience.

Anyone interview at Akron General yet? What was the interview like?
thanks.... :smokin:

University of Minnesota: Interview consisted of four 25 minute interviews with two faculty or one chief and one attending in each interview. Very casual and informative; I had no real difficult questions (except how I'd like to be remembered after my death...I'm gonna die!?!?!?!). Each station was meant to @#$%&s different categories such as personal attributes and technical skills. However, to @#$%&s technical skills they don't have you actually do anything...just tell them why you think you have the necessary skills. Some interviewees did have to read some x-rays and answer some difficult ethical questions, but rare. Facilities were impressive, especially VA and Hennepin County Hospital.

Mayo: Agree with previous posts. Unparalleled facilities. If you're interested in quality research I don't think you can find better support staff (stats, etc.)

IU: Pretty laid back interview. Four brief interviews. Everyone interviews with a chief resident and the director. The other two are random. No real tough questions, mostly get to know you stuff. The director asked everyone about their volunteer experience and what they would do to solve the health care problem.

Anyone interview at U of Arizona or Case?

With you conGW, any info on Case out there?

Wake: nice dinner before is formal, interview day is relaxed lots of time spent talking to other students, not many residents come by because they are so busy, overall nice day and good busy program.

Has anyone interviewed at Univ of Michigan? Any idea about their interview experience?

Univ of Michigan:
Very laid back. brief overview of program by dr. hensinger and dr. blakemore. 10 minute interviews with each of them individually. all they do is ask you if you have any questions for them. then i interviewed with two attendings and a resident. each one lasted about 20 minutes. again, all very informal. after lunch there is a tour.

Anybody been to Greenville S.C. and care to say a kind word or 2 about the interview experience? Also the packet of info they sent stated the average temp was 51-74 degrees. I have never been there but it seems to be lower then what I'd guess, although a good thing if true.

Case- very mellow. Resident hang out thing night after interviews. Super conversational; are you interested in us type of questions. NOTHING to worry about or prepare for.