Program Review
Staff / Faculty / Chairman
Staff were excellent to work with. Saltzman is really dedicated to building Utah into an Ortho powerhouse(if they aren't already). Stotts (PD) and Aoki (Res selection chair) seem to be great resident advocates. There are big names in all of the subspecialties and they all seemed to be into teaching from my experience as well as co-rotators that were on other services. Some faculty turnover recently, which is unusual supposedly.
Didactics / Teaching
Didactics were the best I saw by far, almost exclusively done by faculty and they obviously put time into them. I think because of this the residents really really knew their stuff here, I really cant remember an upper level resident getting a question wrong in didactics the whole month I was there. It was pretty impressive. Lots of teaching in clinic and OR as well, although like all places this was attending dependent.
Operating Experience
From what I could tell they operate a lot here. All of the chiefs that I worked with were very proficient in the OR. From talking to rotators on all the services and what I could glean from the residents, the best operative experiences were on Peds, Hand, Joints, F&A and Spine. Sports was okay and Trauma was a little hands off. The residents said the best sports experience was at TOSH as a chief where you essentially get your own room. Of course of the trauma that I did see the seniors were quite good. There is also a VA where of course the operative experience is good.
Clinic Experience
Clinic is clinic but there was lots of teaching going on. Every clinic was different but seemed the resident would get to at least see new patients and come up with a diagnosis/plan on them.
Research Opportunities
Lots to go around, one month for research as a PGY4. Mostly clinical and biomechanics stuff. Not as much research support/help as some of the bigger programs. Also not shoved down your throat if it is not your thing (one required project).
Residents
Very fun group, everyone got along great. Very much the outdoor/skiing type. Most not from Utah and only a few that were Mormon from what I could tell.
Lifestyle
Supposedly intern year is not that bad here, they also seemed to be at a lot of the ortho conferences, which I thought was cool (you're not a total GSgy slave for the year).
Location / Housing
Great place to live if you like the outdoors in both summer and winter. Many of the residents said they had good discounts on ski passes. Affordable and safe place to live and a great place to raise a family. Some owned houses/condos, some rented. The single residents seemed to say they really liked it was well. SLC is not as overly conservative as I thought it was going to be.
Limitations
Some will say fellows are a limitation here, but on many services the fellows don't get in the way of resident education. For example on the joint service the residents always did all of the primary joints with the help of the fellows, while the fellows did the revisions. Similarly on the spine service the residents were very hands on even though there were fellows around. Not an incredibly high volume trauma center, very busy peds though.
Overall Rotation Experience / Conclusion
Had an amazing rotation and would love to train here. Agree with the former reviewer that this may be one of the most well rounded programs in the country. Will likely rank it #1.
