We would love to interview in person and take you on a tour of each of the hospitals we rotate through. However, due to virtual interviews, we have included the information below to give you the next best thing. Below is a brief description of each hospital with pictures or videos, the services we cover, and our experience within them. We look forward to discussing more with you during the resident mixer and interview!
Saint Luke’s Hospital
Saint Luke’s Hospital is a faith-based not-for-profit hospital that was founded in 1882. There are currently 16 total hospitals affiliated with Saint Luke’s in Kansas and Missouri. Our main location is at the flagship hospital at the Plaza location. It is a 630+ bed hospital and tertiary referral center for the area. It is nationally ranked by US News & World Report for Cardiology and Heart surgery, it is also ranked as High-Performing in Gastroenterology, Geriatrics, Neurology, Orthopedics, and Pulmonology. The Marion Bloch Neuroscience Institute is one of the nation’s leading stroke reversal programs for preventing and treating stroke. While also being renowned for treatment of complex brain and spinal cord injuries. It is also a level 1 trauma center, houses advanced surgical care, liver, and kidney transplant programs.
During our 4 years as Med-Peds residents, while at St. Luke’s, we cover the general Medicine wards on the Medicine teaching service, and rotate through the Medicine Intensive Care Unit, Cardiac Intensive Care Unit, Emergency Department, Cardiology, Nephrology, Pulmonology, and Hematology-Oncology services. We also have the unique opportunity to care for heart, kidney, and liver transplant recipients on each of the primary subspecialty services. Many of our electives take place at SLH, where you get the option to rotate in the numerous subspecialties the hospital has to offer. With a recently remodeled resident lounge with television, ping pong table, kitchen with frequently stocked snacks, and private resident call rooms, spending an extra night covering the wards or sub-specialty services ends up not being too bad.
University Health – Truman Medical Center
University Health Truman Medical Center (UHTMC) is the only safety net hospital to serve the medically indigent in the Kansas City Metro. It is composed of two acute care academic hospital locations (Hospital Hill and Lakewood), the University Health building for subspecialty services, a Behavioral Health Hospital, a long-term care rehabilitation facility, and multiple primary care practices located throughout the metro. UHTMC ED is one of the busiest in the metro and a dedicated level 1 trauma center that sees some of the highest acuity patients in the area.
As a Med-Peds resident, the Hospital Hill location is considered our ‘home-base’ and the hospital that we spend most of our time. We cover the general medicine wards (coined ‘DoRo’ for “Docent Rotation” by the UMKC 6 year combined Bachelor’s/M.D. program), Progressive Care Unit, Intensive Care Units, and Subspecialty services available at UHTMC. As you would expect with resident run programs, we cover the same breadth of services as at St. Luke’s while also gaining valuable perspective practicing within a second healthcare system. During our Pediatric rotations, we also rotate in the UHTMC Well-Baby and Neonatal ICU.
We have the unique opportunity in Internal Medicine to serve as Resident In-Charge (RIC). Starting in the 2nd year of your residency, you spend one day a week during your DoRo rotations acting as the lead supervisor, triage, and assign patients to the 6 resident teams from the Emergency Department and clinics, and assist with transfers from other hospitals.
Our Med-Peds Continuity Clinic is also housed in the Hospital Hill building, which is connected by a sky-bridge to Children’s Mercy, the free-standing Children’s Hospital we rotate at. Check out the Resident Continuity Clinic section and Children’s Mercy sections below!
Children’s Mercy Hospital
Children’s Mercy Hospital is a free-standing pediatric hospital and tertiary referral center. It is nationally ranked by US News & World Report in 10 pediatric specialties. It has 300+ beds, is a Level 1 Pediatric Trauma Center, houses the largest PICU in the region (40+ beds and expanding), a Level 4 NICU (85+ beds), Fetal Health Center, Fetal Surgery and Heart Transplant Program, the largest Clinical Pharmacology Program in North America, and now a newly built Research Center. CMH is conveniently located on Hospital Hill, across the street from University Health Truman Medical Center.
As Med-Peds residents, we spend 6 months out of the year “on the other side of the street”. We rotate on the inpatient pediatric wards teaching service, the Pediatric ICU, Cardiovascular ICU, and the combined primary sub-specialty services of Gastroenterology/Neurology and Nephrology/Pulmonology, Hematology-Oncology, and Cardiology services. We also rotate within the inpatient or outpatient subspecialties during our elective months.
The resident lounge is considered a second home when on Pediatrics. It is a large, comfortable space that includes a kitchen and dining area, lounge area with TV, movies, AppleTV, private call rooms, and also houses our Peds Chief Resident and Program Coordinator offices, as well as the large conference room where we hold noon conferences and didactics. The walls of the resident lounge are decorated with resident artwork which has become an entertaining tradition over the years.
MedPeds Resident Continuity Clinic
The Primary Care Center for Family Health (or Red Clinic) is the UMKC Med-Peds Continuity Clinic located on the 4th floor of the University Health Truman Medical Center. It consists of 17 exam rooms, with flex space for overflow into the Gold Clinic as needed. It is a busy clinic that is staffed entirely by; Med-Peds trained attendings, MedPeds residents, nurse practitioners, and our hard-working support staff. Each resident starts out with a panel of patients handed down from a previous 4th year graduating resident. You will soon start to grow your own panel by picking up patients from the adult and pediatric inpatient services as well as the UH Well-Baby Nursery. Don’t worry, we don’t throw you into the fire right away—interns will start with a smaller number of patients which slowly increases over 4 years. Our goal is for you to have all the tools and training available to be an efficient and knowledgeable primary care physician by the time you graduate.
We share a common resident workspace, which allows clinic to become a small reunion and time for us to catch up with one another. We have a very supportive environment and are always willing to help each other out if needed. Our support staff is also helpful and always there to lend a helping hand.