Curriculum

Our five-year program begins with the PGY-1 year in the Yale-New Haven Hospital System in a diversified experience of monthly rotations that includes general surgery and polytrauma, vascular surgery, burn surgery, neurosurgery, surgical intensive care unit, emergency room, anesthesia and orthopaedics. The content of the PGY-1 year is determined by the orthopaedic program director and the residents' education committee and is compliant with ACGME requirements.

During the second year, residents rotate exclusively through clinical orthopaedic services. These include orthopaedic trauma; pediatric orthopaedics; a foot and ankle service; a combined sports and hand service (designed to give exposure to these popular subspecialties early in the program); and the nearby West Haven Veterans Administration Medical Center. 

Four-fifths of the year is spent at Yale-New Haven Hospital where the experience includes rotations on the trauma, spine, and adult reconstruction (joint replacement and oncology) services. A rotation at Waterbury Hospital involves each resident in a high volume, highly skilled and efficient hip and knee joint replacement experience where substantial clinical research opportunities exist. During the third year each resident is provided with an elective rotation at Yale that allows one to focus on those subspecialties that he/she is considering for fellowship education, devote protected time to research, or combine both in a self-designed experience.

The fourth year residents spend three-fifths of their time at Yale, one-fifth at the Veterans Administration Medical Center, and one-fifth at the Hospital of St. Raphael in New Haven. At Yale-New Haven Hospital there are separate sports, hand, and protected research rotations. At the Hospital of St. Raphael the resident is chief resident on the orthopaedic service. The Veterans Administration Medical Center rotation is also a chief resident rotation with a wide variety of adult reconstruction surgical cases and hand and upper extremity problems. A combined outpatient clinic with rheumatology adds essential experience with the non-operative management of joint diseases.

During the chief residency year four-fifths of the year is spent on clinical services at Yale and one-fifth is devoted to completion of research projects begun in the earlier years. The culmination of one's research is the presentation of results at the annual disputations conference held at the end of the academic year. The clinical rotations during the chief year are trauma, spine, pediatrics, and adult reconstruction.