Podiatry Curriculum

First-Year Residents

The Podiatric Medicine and Surgery Residency with Reconstructive Rearfoot/Ankle Program at Valleywise Health Medical Center is currently approved for six residents, two per year for three years. All first-year residents serve as first-year general surgery residents, rotating in various surgical specialties including burn, neurosurgery, trauma, anesthesiology, plastic surgery, vascular surgery and surgical intensive care. Other rotations podiatry residents participate in include internal medicine, pathology and diagnostic imaging. Each service is supervised by an attending surgeon or physician chief who provides continued guidance for that service. The attending chief makes frequent inpatient rounds with his or her team. On operating days, the assigned service schedules its largest surgical load and generally, its more complex operations. On clinic days, each service evaluates newly referred patients and provides follow-up care for established patients.

Second- and Third-Year Residents

The second- and third-year podiatry residents rotate on the podiatry service. Besides inpatient and outpatient care of all foot and ankle complaints from neonatal to geriatric patients, the residents are responsible for all emergency room and inpatient consultations. Our clinic also has a walk-in fracture clinic for isolated fractures of the foot and ankle seen in the emergency department on a same day basis. The second year residents have a curriculum in research; this allows research projects to reach fruition over the two year period remaining. Rotations with community preceptors increase the exposure to surgical volume and diversity of patient socioeconomic groups. Established relationships with community preceptors facilitate a key component of the third year rotation, Practice Management.

At Valleywise Health Medical Center’s Podiatric Medicine and Surgery Residency with Reconstructive Rearfoot/Ankle program, we acknowledge that residents learn in different ways. Our didactics are specifically designed to provide our residents with experiences where they hear, see, and practice hands-on. Wednesday mornings include resident lectures on pre-assigned topics, as well as a monthly journal club. On Monday mornings, the residents are assigned e-learning topics that are viewed and discussed with Dr. Roth. Each week, a test covering the prior week’s topics serves as a self assessment tool for residents and to help study habits and comprehension. Friday morning teaching rounds review the interesting inpatient cases from the week and are used to discuss the surgical cases scheduled later that day. During clinic on Friday, the residents present & discuss in detail, the most interesting case seen during the previous week. Quarterly, cadaver labs are held to apply concepts and skills learned during major sections in our lecture series.

While rotating in surgery or internal medicine, the residents will attend that service’s educational conferences. Other conferences, depending on PGY level and rotation, include:

• Tumor board
• Burn conference
• Trauma Morbidity and Mortality Conference
• Journal Club
• Limb Salvage Conference
• Trauma/SICU Lecture
• Surgery Morbidity and Mortality Conference 

Residents are invited to be members on many of the surgery committees, including the Conference and Curriculum Committee and the Research and Publications Committee. These committees provide our residents with an opportunity to openly express their views and make recommendations concerning the teaching program.

Our residency program is a little different from others. Our PGY-1 trainees are first year general surgery residents; therefore, they are not truly working in podiatry, although several rotations do provide foot related exposure and surgery. These residents are treated at the same level as allopathic and osteopathic residents with the same case load and requirements. Please refer to general surgery PGY-1 for additional information.

Having completed all medicine and general surgery requirements during the PGY-1 year, the PGY-2 trainees begin intensive training in podiatric medicine and surgery. While on the podiatry service at Valleywise Health Medical Center, the residents are responsible for inpatient consultations, outpatient podiatry clinic, including a walk-in fracture clinic, all podiatric surgery, Friday’s case of the week presentation, and assigned lecture topics for weekly conference. Research is taught with the general surgery second year residents, allowing research projects to be completed during the following two years of training.

Third year trainees have one chief elected by the attending staff. The chief resident has administrative responsibilities that the other senior resident does not. On the podiatry service, the PGY-3 residents are the senior residents. Rounds with junior residents are coordinated, journal club articles are assigned, and the surgery schedule is equally and equitably divided. Practice management is included in outside rotations and a behavioral science curriculum is provided.