The most important aspects are, for me, number one is the PACS system at Ohio State. It is very user friendly and when I was interviewing that was one of the keys was to find a place that has PACS because hanging films is a waste of time and being able to look at priors is an excellent learning tool. And with a PACS set up you can look at a ton more studies in the same amount of time as you would at any other residency program. That being said, a lot of places have PACS setups already, but having worked with Ohio State’s and some of the other PACS systems, the Agfa System at Ohio State is very solid. Another reason I came here was the solid teaching. Now we have two of the editors of the ACR discs working at Ohio State. They are fantastic teachers. We also have several authors and that adds to the teaching. We have excellent conferences and we’ve revamped the morning conferences to the point now where everybody is getting to participate. The other thing that I really liked about Ohio State was that in Columbus you can buy a house on a resident’s salary which you really are going to struggle to do anywhere else.
The major thing that I would recommend to residents coming here and to residents going anywhere is you have to be a directed learner. You have to direct your own learning. You can’t always rely on other people to do it for you. Especially in radiology, there is so much to know and so much to learn. You’re not going to learn it all at the light box, not all the time. You’re going to learn a lot, but you really have to be motivated to be a self learner. And we have plenty of resources and there is plenty of stuff on the internet. You can learn a lot on your own. So definitely being a self learner is the major thing you need to be able to do.
The facilities are excellent at Ohio State. As I mentioned earlier the PACS system is excellent. The dictation system is very easy to use. The information system at Ohio State is fantastic. It is all digital. It’s all on the internet so you can access anybody’s medical records and have anything you need to know about the patient immediately which is a great resource. The resources at the campus are fantastic. They just finished the recreation center which has all new nautilus machines and every work out thing you would ever want to work on. It has brand new swimming facilities. It has rock-climbing walls, has soccer fields, everything! The other facilities…I don’t think you would find anything better anywhere else.
The opportunities are excellent. That was one of the reasons that I came here was that the residents were getting to write a significant number of papers if they wanted to. If you chose not to that was well within your own rights, but there are lots of projects going on. Personally I’m involved in breast mr research on two different aspects. I’m also interested in following nephrolythyesis for a doctor in nephrology. There is just tons of MR research here, especially with an 8 Tesla magnet and a 7 Tesla magnet. So you can definitely find stuff to do if you’re interested.
It has definitely challenged me the entire time. Personally, my biggest challenge has been balancing work with having a family and then everything that goes along with that. It’s required me to do a lot of structuring in my own life which I didn’t like to do but I was able to do. The residency itself is extremely challenging. The call system is very beneficial to the residents but when you are on call it’s not easy and I don’t think it is going to be easy anywhere you go. Radiology is a high volume set up now and you’re going to have to work hard, but on the other hand, after doing call, I was so much better at radiology in general that it’s well worth it.
The faculty here at Ohio State is fantastic. Very easy to get along with. No one is going to make you feel dumb or like you can’t do the job. They encourage you. They challenge you and they will test the depth of your knowledge definitely. But that will just enable you to fill that gap in later and become a better person and a better radiologist.
Yah , Ohio State and Columbus is a great place to go. It’s a great place to be at. It’s a young city. It’s an expanding city and there are professional sports. The Blue Jackets are here and the Columbus Crew. Being a soccer fan is great for me. There a lot of bicycling paths and I love to cycle so I’ve taken advantage of that. Lots of parks and lots of stuff for the kids to do too. There’s COSI for the kids, which is fantastic. The Zoo is good. So Columbus has plenty of stuff to do. In fact, I don’t have enough time to do it all.