Deciding where to seek residency training is not easy for many applicants. The surfeit of good programs contains a few that are "great." By that, I'm not referring to reputation or bandwagon of opinion -- I mean great for the individual applicant. The top program is the one that best cultivates the caregiver, scholar, scientist and teacher in that training physician.

I hope you are looking for a program that has it all for you, and you for it. Undoubtedly, you have worked hard for many years to get where you are. While you deserve a program commensurate with your talents and fortes, your future patients deserve it even more.

What kind of people are residents here? They come from all over the nation and represent 31 medical schools amongst our 39 residents. They are former writers, researchers, bankers, medics, business persons, athletes, teachers and activists. But all have established themselves as students of life -- people who have availed themselves of intellectual and service opportunities and looked to create more -- not just perform well in school.

What is the strongest part of the residency at Carolinas Medical Center? Simply, it is its versatility with excellence. Since 1976, our program has established a tradition of providing quality care to any emergency patient in our region. We provide the area's care to the uninsured and underinsured en masse. We provide the sought-after tertiary care of a major medical center. We conduct the research that pushes the frontiers of emergency care. We train the leaders in our field for the next generation. Traditional labels of community hospital, county receiving hospital, university-style academic center ... they all aptly apply to us.

The feeling in our residency is one of closeness, personal interaction and familiarity. We do virtually all rotations at this 861-bed hospital, and our residents see each other every day at our noon conference. We enjoy collegial and productive relationships with all specialties in our institution.

The goal of our program is to train residents to enter and lead the highest levels of clinical medicine and academia upon graduation. We also hope to instill the desire to improve the specialty in innovative and constructive ways, regardless of practice environment. Our graduates go exactly there -- everywhere. In all corners of the country, in all manner of private and academic position, our alumni distinguish themselves.

Perhaps you should be one of them.

E. Parker Hays, Jr., MD, FACEP
Program Director
Emergency Medicine