The General Surgical Residency Program at Allegheny General Hospital is unique with a close-knit, bright group of residents and a strong emphasis on clinical surgery. Applications are accepted from all qualified candidates. A number of our best graduates have been women. Each year, four categorical first-year residents are matched with the expectation they will graduate in five years.

Although a research year is not required, a one-year research elective is available to one categorical resident each year. The residency offers a busy clinical program in which residents perform a large number and variety of both basic and technically-advanced surgical procedures while honing their equally important nonoperative clinical skills. Level I trauma exposure is an important part of residency training. During the course of the residency, our residents gain a large experience in trauma care, critical care, vascular surgery, minimally invasive surgery, and colon and rectal surgery in addition to all of the other required components of general surgery training. Over the course of the five years, each graduating resident performs about 1,000 cases as the primary surgeon. There are only two clinical rotations outside of the main hospital; a pediatric surgery rotation at The Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh and a burn rotation at the Western Pennsylvania Hospital of Pittsburgh. While the residency is busy, the residents work in a collegial atmosphere among residents, faculty, and ancillary staff. After graduation, about one-half of the Chief Residents enter a competitive fellowship and one-half enter full-time clinical practice. Our Program was last reviewed by the Residency Review Committee for Surgery on September 30, 2003, and we received Continued Full Accreditation with the approximate date of our next review set at February 2009.

Charles F. Cobb, M.D.