University of Virginia Health System

Dear Applicant,

The "lab" years or more appropriately named "research" years provide opportunity for residents to pursue intellectual, professional and personal goals that may be difficult to fit into the rigorous schedule of a clinical resident.

The majority of residents in our program spend 2 years in their research time, but many take more or less time away from the clinical path.  What we do during with this research time is also variable.  We are encouraged to pursue any path that furthers our career development.  Some examples of current and recent past research year activities are:

1) Basic science research: There are many basic science laboratories in the department of surgery and outside of surgery that offer excellent opportunities to be productive in basic science work here at UVa. Probably the most popular laboratories are in cardiac surgery, transplant surgery and surgical oncology. Drs. Irving Kron, David Jones, and Todd Bauer all have NIH Funded labs with prolific research publications. These labs are well-establish and let you hit the ground running, the residents in these labs are very productive, with presentations at national and international meetings and multiple publications.

2) Clinical research: Another popular choice for our research residents is clinical research. Many residents have successfully designed, implemented and published clinical trials in the setting of critical care or surgical nutrition or infections disease under Dr. Robert Sawyer and in melanoma under Dr. Craig Slingluff.

3) Educational research: "War games" is a training tool development by one of our trauma surgeons, Dr. Jeffrey Young. Several residents have worked on educational projects with Dr. Young, leading to new iterations of the "war game" strategy and to many successful publications.

4) Another degree: UVa has an outstanding health sciences department and several of our residents choose to complete a Masters in Public Health or Masters in Science during their research time. This is often combined with clinical research or other activities.

5) International experiences: Either as part of a Masters in Public Health or as an independent project, we have had residents complete health projects in Ethiopia, Kenya and Samoa just in the past 2 years.

6) Out of the box: One of our 2007 graduating chief residents spent her research time working as a health policy advisor on "the hill" in Washington, DC.

7) And of course, we do other things: We have a tradition of being incredibly productive during our research years, but we also find the flexibility in the schedule allows for other things. International travel, getting a pet, buying a house, getting married, having children, golf, riding and enjoying the incredible area of Charlottesville, traveling and socializing are all certainly components of our research years that we enjoy.

Many people ask, are research years required? I think all of us would agree, it doesn't matter because you will love them. 

Sincerely,