Virtual House Staff Interviews

The New Norm in 2020

Like most other programs in 2020, Jefferson Urology conducted its first-ever “virtual” resident’s recruiting and interview season. The first part of the process was announcing and then hosting several online open houses. Since applicants could not travel to site visit programs, the opportunity to experience the program through a video presentation and then interact with the resident’s real time in chat rooms was the next best thing. Dr. Alana Murphy, Associate Urology Residency Program Director, led this initial project. She first scripted and then produced a three-minute video to highlight our training program that featured several faculty and residents. The video is available on-line and can be viewed anytime at: www.jefferson.edu/university/jmc/ departments/urology.

Our Department received nearly 400 applications for our residency three spots in the last cycle. Over two days in December 2020, we interviewed 36 candidates from across the US on the Zoom® video conferencing platform with each applicant receiving at least 4-5 interviews. Our Residency Program Director Dr. Patrick Shenot along with Associate Program Directors Dr. Murphy and Dr. Costas Lallas, did an amazing job sorting through the applications to arrive at such a highquality pool of resident candidates. Special thanks to Kelley Lilly who served as the unofficial “Zoom® air traffic controller” on interview day switching all the interviewees in and out of their respective interview sessions. The nationwide interview process was loosely governed by a set of standards distributed by the Society of Academic Urology (SAU) to insure fairness and consistency in this virtual process that was never fully tested before going mainstream. Based on the initial success of these virtual platforms, perhaps in the future some type of “hybrid” interview process where the efficiency and cost savings of the virtual interview can be enhanced by some type of in person experience.

The Urology early match results were released on February 1, 2021. We are pleased to report that the following individuals will be starting the Urology residencies at Jefferson this summer: • Mauro Dispagna

State University of New York Upstate

Medical University • Zachary Prebay

Medical College of Wisconsin • Sage Vincent

Sidney Kimmel Medical College Dr. Pat Shenot, Deputy Chair and Residency Program Director, presenting our training program on the open house video.

A clip from our Urology residency program open house video. Here our video producer, Dr. Alana Murphy, is shown reviewing a radiology image with PGY2 Resident Dr. Halle Foss and PGY4 Resident Dr. Edward Kloniecke.

Our open house video featured resident testimonials why they choose Jefferson for their Urology training. Here at PGY 2 Dr. Halle Foss and Chief Resident Dr. Thomas Hardacker. Dr. Pat Shenot in a behind the scenes view of the Department of Urology open house video shoot.