Mcmaster Family Sites

[k508]

Is anyone able to shed some light on the CONS that exist for the Mac family sites, especially Brampton vs Halton vs KW. I was blown away by their presentations and hadn't really considered them as a top option for residency before now. Since I'm not from Mac I am curious as to what the opinions are of those who are very familiar with the sites. I think I have a good grasp of the pros, since I asked a million and one questions on interview day but am curious about some of the less ideal aspects.

[Intrepid86]

Is anyone able to shed some light on the CONS that exist for the Mac family sites, especially Brampton vs Halton vs KW. I was blown away by their presentations and hadn't really considered them as a top option for residency before now. Since I'm not from Mac I am curious as to what the opinions are of those who are very familiar with the sites. I think I have a good grasp of the pros, since I asked a million and one questions on interview day but am curious about some of the less ideal aspects.

 

The regional sites host fewer medical students than the central Hamilton location, so if you're interested in teaching students as a resident then you may have less opportunity to do so. However, this isn't necessarily a con depending on who you ask.

[Belle_MD]

Would love to bump this thread - had an amazing experience at Mac interview yesterday and seriously considering Halton, Hamilton, Brampton sites (I’m from Ottawa so not too familiar with each site). Would love to get more info from past or current residents at those sites! 

[toki]

I would like to know this as well! 

[Birdy]

I’d like to plug one of the smallest Mac sites - Grand Erie Six Nations in Brantford - because quite honestly the learning is fantastic. I feel like it’s a bit of a hidden gem of a program. There are bimonthly sim sessions with the emerg docs, POCUS training, really fantastic staff who work 1:1 with residents for the most part so you end up with quite a bit of independence. Admin staff are responsive. Oh, plus overnight call is only on one rotation, otherwise you’re done at 11pm. And no CTU; it’s two blocks hospitalist. 

[magneto]

On 1/25/2019 at 3:19 PM, Birdy said:

I’d like to plug one of the smallest Mac sites - Grand Erie Six Nations in Brantford - because quite honestly the learning is fantastic. I feel like it’s a bit of a hidden gem of a program. There are bimonthly sim sessions with the emerg docs, POCUS training, really fantastic staff who work 1:1 with residents for the most part so you end up with quite a bit of independence. Admin staff are responsive. Oh, plus overnight call is only on one rotation, otherwise you’re done at 11pm. And no CTU; it’s two blocks hospitalist. 

I often hear people say no CTU as a plus. What's the difference between hospitalist rotation vs CTU rotation? I thought it is more or less the same work you do as a resident. My call was similar too on both rotations. I have done both CTU and hospitalist and found them to be very similar. Maybe staff might be a family doctor on hospitalist rotation rather than IM staff but other than that what's the difference? Thanks for answering. 

[JohnGrisham]

50 minutes ago, magneto said:

I often hear people say no CTU as a plus. What's the difference between hospitalist rotation vs CTU rotation? I thought it is more or less the same work you do as a resident. My call was similar too on both rotations. I have done both CTU and hospitalist and found them to be very similar. Maybe staff might be a family doctor on hospitalist rotation rather than IM staff but other than that what's the difference? Thanks for answering. 

In my minimal experience hospitalists patients are usually less complicated than the average CTU patient.  More bread/butter patients. Very limited and regional exposure of course.

[Birdy]

On 1/28/2019 at 10:45 PM, magneto said:

I often hear people say no CTU as a plus. What's the difference between hospitalist rotation vs CTU rotation? I thought it is more or less the same work you do as a resident. My call was similar too on both rotations. I have done both CTU and hospitalist and found them to be very similar. Maybe staff might be a family doctor on hospitalist rotation rather than IM staff but other than that what's the difference? Thanks for answering. 

Great question. 

A major difference is that I didn’t work in a big team. No JMR/SMR, usually no medical students or other residents at all unless there was someone on elective. It was me one on one with my staff. 

The patients overall did tend to be in hospital for more ‘bread and butter’ stuff since that hospital also has IM, but I did have some more complex cases sprinkled in as well. Honestly I feel like the mix I had at my site was about the same with respect to breadth and acuity as what the family residents on my CTU team in med school were being assigned from the list. We also work with the internists when doing call (no overnight call, but evening/weekend) so you do get some internal medicine exposure, so more complex consults, and I often got to follow these patients if they stepped down to hospitalist. I got to pick and choose my own cases and go where the learning was best since there was no one ahead of me. Plus the staff docs I worked with loved teaching and it was a heck of a lot of fun to work with them.  

One of the staff docs I worked with was IM-hospitalist (the others were FM) and so his list included both IM and hospitalist patients. My understanding was I could only be required to care for the hospitalist patients on the list, but I was allowed to be part of internal cases as well as there were some interesting ones.