Chief Resident Letter

Dear Prospective Residency and Fellowship Candidates,

As chief residents, we would like to welcome you to the department of neurology at Barrow Neurological Institute (BNI) at St. Joseph’s Hospital and Medical Center. Thank you for your interest in our program, and allow us to take this opportunity to introduce our program.

Barrow Neurological Institute was founded in 1962, and over the past few years has ranked consistently in the top ten hospitals for Neurology and Neurosurgery in the US News & World Report. In 2006, our new state-of-the art neurosciences tower opened, with 64 neuro-intensive care beds, 32 neuro-telemetry beds, 38 general neurology beds, 10 adult Epilepsy Monitoring Unit (EMU) beds and 5 pediatric EMU beds. We work in close collaboration with the large and world-famous Neurosurgery group and residency program at BNI, and we have support from a large and specialized Neuroradiology group (with a residency and fellowship program) and a Neuropathologist (with a fellowship program).

We offer multiple neurological subspecialties at BNI, including Neuro-Oncology, Neuro-Ophthalmology, Neuro-Otology, Cognitive-Behavioral Neurology, Stroke, Neuromuscular, Epilepsy, Neuro-Immunology, Movement Disorder (with a DBS program) and Sleep. We have the Muhammad Ali Parkinson’s Center, an MDA clinic, an NPH clinic, a Neuro-psychology team, and an inpatient Neuro-Rehabilitation center. There is also a Pediatric Neurology program here, which allows the adult neurology residents a great opportunity to obtain our pediatric neurology training. We have over 17 adult neurology attendings, 8 pediatric neurology attendings, 16 neurosurgery attendings, 10 neuroradiology attendings and one neuropathologist. There are also over a dozen dedicated scientists in the neurology, neurobiology, and neurosurgery programs if you are interested in doing lab-based research while you are here. We offer Fellowship positions in Epilepsy (Electrophysiology), Stroke, Neuro-Oncology, Neuro-Immunology and Movement Disorder/DBS.

With the help of our Residency Director and Chairman we have set up a strong didactic learning experience for our residents. We have daily morning reports, daily noon didactic lectures, Monday morning Neuro-Pediatric Grand Rounds, Wednesday morning Brain Cutting, Thursday morning resident Case conference presentations, and Friday morning Neurology and Neurosurgery Grand Rounds. There are also subspecialty didactic lecture series, including weekly Tumor Board, EMU, Gamma-Knife, and Neuroradiology noon conferences. This past year the residents have also instituted once monthly evening Stroke journal club meetings and a Book review series.

In terms of our Ward service, we have one Stroke team and two General teams. Each team consists of an attending (who switches every 2 weeks), and 2 residents (who switch every 4 weeks). Our year is divided into thirteen 4-week blocks, which are divided into time on the Wards and in electives, including neurosurgery, pediatrics, psychiatry, and any of the subspecialties mentioned above. We also have a night-float system of call, so that no call is longer than 12 hours. PGY2’s do 4 weeks of night float (spread throughout the year), PGY3’s do 3 weeks, and PGY4’s do 2 weeks. We have a large residency program, with 6 residents per class, as well as on Pediatric neurology resident with each PGY2 class.

Phoenix is the 5th largest city in the US, the Valley of the Sun is the 13th largest metropolitan area in the country, and our patient referral base includes patients from throughout the Southwest. Therefore we generally have a large patient census (usually between 15-25 patients per team). We see a very diverse patient population and a wide variety of neurological conditions. Because St. Joseph's Hospital is a Level One trauma center, and because of our large and well-known neurosurgical program, we have the opportunity to see some otherwise very rare cases and conditions. This provides our residents with excellent hands-on experience, because we get the chance to see cases that we might otherwise only get to “read about”.

Phoenix is a wonderful place to live, if you can stand the heat! Our daily temperature averages 100 degrees for ~90 days each year. Our winter months generally reach daytime temperatures in the 60’s. It is true that we have a dry climate with very little rain, but we also do not have humidity, hurricanes, tornados, earthquakes or forest fires. It even snows here (about once every 50 years). You know that you have become a true Phoenician when you reach the day that you realize that you can never again live in a climate where a winter jacket, boots and a snow-shovel are required.

There are numerous cultural attractions in the city and valley, including museums (the Phoenix Art Museum, Heard Museum, AZ Challenger Space Center, AZ Science Center and the Frank Lloyd Wright Taliesen West), the AZ Opera, Ballet of AZ, the Phoenix Metropolitan Opera, the zoo, botanical gardens, and 2 wildlife parks. For sports enthusiasts we have professional Football, Baseball, Basketball, Hockey, Arena Football and Women’s Basketball teams. Other activities include golfing (you can golf year-round here) and numerous water parks and amusement parks. Day-trips include the AZ Sonora Desert Museum near Tucson, Sedona artist colony and the Grand Canyon. The Neurology and Neurosurgery residents go on a rim-to-rim (and back again) hike of the Grand Canyon every year, which is a great bonding experience between the two programs.

We hope that the above information will be useful to you in the process of applying for your Residency or Fellowship. If you have questions, please feel free to contact us.