Alumni of the Transitional Radiology Preliminary Program explain how the program benefited them professionally and personally.
Ryan Peterson, MD
I had the privilege of doing my transitional year internship here at Emory. At first, I was nervous like anyone coming to a large program, but I quickly learned that I was surrounded by dynamic and hardworking teachers interested in my success. I also discovered a great support system with not only my co-interns also going into radiology, but also the interns destined for other subspecialties. I still have strong relationships with those people I worked with as an intern those many years ago. I felt that having a year to learn the system helped me focus more on learning radiology after my internship. I had elective time in radiology to dip my toe into learning how to dictate and to help me find faculty mentors early on in my training. I recommend the internship to everyone and would do it again (if I was ever forced to repeat internship).
Nicole Dragna, MD
I am so glad I chose to do my transitional year at Emory. During the transitional year, we had two months of dedicated radiology time where we dictated our own studies, read out with the attendings, and attended noon conference with the radiology residents. It was a great opportunity to meet people in the program and I felt that I had a head start with already having dictated so many cases. Because we rotated through other electives, wards, emergency medicine, and ICU at different Emory Healthcare sites, I experienced the unique ways these different sites work. This also gave me the opportunity to learn from some fantastic attendings and residents in the other Emory graduate programs. Now when I am reading studies, I often know the provider taking care of the patient and feel comfortable calling them and discussing the patient.
Maxwell Cooper, MD
The Transitional Radiology Preliminary Program at Emory enabled me to achieve my goal of building a solid clinical foundation for radiology residency. I gained extensive experience taking care of common general medical conditions as well as complex and critically ill patients. The Emory Healthcare network and Grady Memorial Hospital provided exposure to diverse patient populations with a wide variety of pathology. The TY program allowed me to complete rotations in both diagnostic and interventional radiology, which enabled me to learn the basics of radiology before entering radiology residency. The TY program allowed me to become familiar with the multiple hospitals in Atlanta that we rotate through as residents, which provided a big advantage entering radiology residency. I also was able to participate in medical innovation projects through Emory’s collaboration with Georgia Tech, which I have continued in residency.
Ayman N. Abunimer, MD
I appreciated how the program gave me the opportunity to rotate across multiple departments, hospitals, and specialties. The transitional year gave me broad clinical training and experience while simultaneously offering enough flexibility in electives to pursue my own interests in research and the subspecialties of radiology. I entered my advanced program with a presentation at an international conference based on research I had done in interventional radiology during my transitional year. The diversity of experiences at different hospitals in the TY was excellent preparation for the rotations at Emory's numerous hospital systems and their EMRs. I could not imagine how difficult it must be for people who did not do the TY here at Emory to transition in the beginning of their advanced programs. On a personal side, over the course of the year, I formed friendships with people in different departments and outside of medicine as well.
Jeffrey Bodner, MD
Choosing the transitional year program at Emory was one of the best decisions I made prior to starting my interventional radiology residency program here. I made valuable friendships with my colleagues and developed great relationships with attendings and staff within the various hospitals we rotate at Emory. I also gained experience with the various electronic medical records, PACS, and location of various departments at these rotation sites that helped me moving forward. Despite not being a categorical internal medicine resident, I always felt respected and appreciated by the department at conferences and on rotations. My elective on vascular surgery, rotations in emergency medicine, and having two radiology rotations my first year was much appreciated (and uncommon within many intern year programs).
