Pediatrics Residency
Welcome and thank you for your interest in the Spectrum Health/Michigan State University College of Human Medicine Pediatrics Residency Program at Helen DeVos Children's Hospital! Located in one of the fastest growing cities in the Midwest, we are nationally ranked in six pediatric sub-specialties by U.S. News and World Report and offer a complete educational and clinical experience in our state-of-the-art, free-standing, children’s hospital. We prepare our residents to become excellent general pediatricians that are prepared for future careers in outpatient care, hospitalist medicine, or sub-specialty care through exposure to a broad array of pediatric disease and with mentoring by dedicated core faculty. Through our Michigan State University College of Human Medicine affiliation, we offer the academic, educational, and research experiences that are traditionally provided by university-based residency programs, while also allowing for a personalized educational experience associated with community-oriented training.
We hope the following information is useful to you. Thank you again for considering us for your residency training and please feel free to contact us with questions.
From the Program Directors
What do you want to be known for when you leave residency? Excellence? Teamwork? Kindness and Compassion?
When you join the Spectrum Health/Michigan State University College of Human Medicine Pediatrics Residency Program at Helen DeVos Children's Hospital, you will be joining a group of stellar pediatricians-in-training who have identified these as the values that they want to be known for. As program directors, we recognize that cultivating these values is our mandate!
Excellence: The 300 pediatric physicians who practice in more than 50 subspecialties at Helen DeVos Children's Hospital have joined us from around the world to provide excellent tertiary and quaternary care that is recognized by the US News and World Report. Your educational experience will include an abundance of patient exposure in our emergency department, PICU, NICU and inpatient floors along with opportunities to participate in a wide variety of standard and unique elective opportunities. The Academic General Pediatrics Clinic is a leader in the community for access to diverse patient background, vaccination rates and quality initiatives. You will have access to cutting edge genomics research both at Helen DeVos Children's Hospital and through our partnership with Michigan State University College of Human Medicine. Our safety and quality program is recognized across the country as innovative and successful.
Teamwork: From the minute you walk in the door, you are an integral part of our team – a team that comes from all parts of the country and brings a wealth of diverse backgrounds. You will work shoulder-to-shoulder with the attendings as together you provide care for children with kidney and bone marrow transplants, level 1 trauma patients, complex cardiac surgery patients and much, much more. However, simply being a team member is not adequate. By the time you graduate, you will be a team leader prepared and ready for the most rigorous fellowship training or ready to lead a community through your position as a general pediatrician. Through teaching curriculum, business curriculum, participation in quality/safety projects, leadership development, advocacy and community engagement, you will learn to be a team leader when you walk out the door.
Kindness and Compassion: This is critical. As pediatricians, we know we need to be kind and compassionate towards our patients and families. We also need to learn how to be kind and compassionate towards ourselves and colleagues. Through protected didactic half-days, generous and flexible vacation dates, retreats, wellness events and mentorship programs, we strive to make resident wellness one of our top priorities. We know you will sense this when you join our team!
We are looking forward to meeting you when you come visit us in Grand Rapids, Michigan (Forbes Magazine’s 2017 No. 1 Best City for Raising a Family)!
Sincerely,
Kira, Justin and Raj
Welcome from the Chiefs
Welcome to the Spectrum Health/Michigan State University College of Human Medicine Pediatrics Residency Program at Helen DeVos Children's Hospital! We are excited that you are considering our program and cannot wait to share the many aspects that make it an excellent choice for your residency training… read more.
The Spectrum Health Helen DeVos Children's Hospital is a state-of-art, free-standing children's hospital and Level I trauma center. The Gerber Foundation Neonatal Center at Helen DeVos Children's Hospital is Michigan's largest neonatal center and the fifth largest in the nation with more than 1,300 babies admitted annually.
Like most pediatrics facilities, we practice a family-centered rounding style. Our continuity clinic experience is unique in that we have the option of spending one half-day per week of the third year in a clinical setting of your choosing, whether a private practice primary care clinic, a community clinic, a subspecialty clinic, or even a hospitalist or critical care role. At Helen DeVos Children's Hospital, we truly care about individualizing your education to help you reach your professional goals. As such, we offer several curriculum tracks.
Within each track multiple electives can be selected based on your interests and goals. Here is a sampling of the electives we offer.
| Advanced EM | Cardiology | Global Health | Orthopedics | Radiology |
| Allergy and Immunology | Center for Child Protection (CCP) | Healthy Weight Center | Palliative Care | Research |
| Anesthesiology | Culinary Medicine | Hospitalist | Pathology | Rheumatology |
| Antimicrobial Stewardship Program | Dermatology | Medical Examiner | PM&R | Sedation |
| Bone Marrow Transplant | Education Leadership | Medical Genetics | Primary Care Experience (PCE) | Sports Medicine |
| Burn | Endocrinology | Nephrology | Psychiatry | Surgery |
| Business of Medicine | ENT | Neurology | Pulmonology | Toxicology |
| Cardiothoracic Surgery | Gastroenterology | Ophthalmology | Quality Improvement | Urology |
Didactics
Our faculty is dedicated to your learning whether in a clinical setting or through our various didactics.
| Monday | Morning report |
| Tuesday | Grand Rounds or Morbidity and Mortality Conference |
| Wednesday | Multi-Disciplinary Case Conference led by an intern with small group discussion of differential and workup plans with input from various subspecialists depending on the case |
| Thursday | Protected didactics 1200-1600 consisting of board review Q&As, mock codes, journal clubs, and an 18-month lecture series given by sub-specialty faculty based on Nelson’s with a focus on ABP general pediatrics learning objectives. |
| Friday | Morning report, Psychiatry Rounds, QI/Safety Rounds, or the ever popular Infectious Disease Bug Bowl |
At Helen DeVos Children's Hospital, you have a voice in how our residency is run, including multiple committees you can be a part of, including:
- Pediatric Resident Council (PRC) - made up of four residents from each class nominated by their peers to act as liaison between the residency administration and the residents. Duties include helping to plan the annual intern welcome party and holiday party as well as being a representative voice for concerns and ideas for improvement. PRC meets monthly and submits a report to the chiefs detailing their discussions and conclusions.
- Pediatric Evaluation Committee (PEC) - includes residents and core faculty and deliberates changes to curriculum, new rotations, and other such academic concerns.
- Clinic Improvement Committee (CLIC) - consists of residents and clinic attendings who meet monthly to discuss ways to improve resident, as well as patient/family experience.They also help take the lead on clinic QI projects and new standardized patient care plan roll-outs.
- House Staff Council (HSC) - consists of two delegates from each residency and fellowship program at Spectrum Health and tackles system-wide concerns and ideas for improvement that can affect all housestaff. Housestaff from this body have also participated in the interview and selection process for recent Office of Medical Education hires, including Dr. Candace Smith-King, Designated Institutional Official and Aissa Seck, director, graduate medical education.
- Diversity Council - made up of housestaff from multiple programs and helps to plan events like the Whitecaps game during orientation, our recent Diversity Grand Rounds with Dr. Rhea Boyd, and other diversity and inclusion initiatives.
- Wellness Council - consists of housestaff from multiple programs and helps plan wellness events throughout the year in addition to the spring Wellness Week.
You have opportunities
We work with each resident to pair them with both faculty and resident mentors at the beginning of intern year to act as advisors and guides. We also have access to Encompass, an employee assistance program which offers a variety of services from providing lawyers and CPAs to mental health services and much more.
We have fun
When we are not working in the hospital, we love having fun and maintaining a healthy work-life balance! One of the first things we do in the year is a program retreat for all pediatric and internal medicine/pediatric residents where we get to know one another a bit better and have fun on the lake shore. The Office of Medical Education’s Wellness Division helps to centralize many of our wellness initiatives from the annual Wellness Week, to Practical Medicine 101 events which focus on subjects like physician finances, dealing with medical mistakes, and crafting winning CVs. We even have a Business of Medicine elective which focuses on learning about the business and leadership opportunities in the field of medicine and to gain experience navigating an outpatient office, large health care system, and/or an academic medical center.
We have an annual Resident vs. Attending kickball game that always offers great bragging rights for the year. We also have multiple sports teams depending on the season and your interest, including volleyball (indoor and beach), basketball, soccer, and kickball. We even have an occasional dodgeball match against the internal medicine program.
If sports aren’t your thing, don’t worry! There is plenty to do in Grand Rapids (museums, concerts, award-winning restaurants and breweries, beautiful parks) and plenty of new friends just waiting to meet you here at Helen DeVos Children's Hospital. Our program leadership team has an open-door policy, and we encourage our residents and you to always approach us with any questions or concerns you may have.
Peds and neuro residents dressed up for Halloween to bring smiles to patients faces. The Helen DeVos Children's Hospital Child Life team organizes a Halloween party for pediatric patients to dress up and trick-or-treat at the hospital.
Spectrum Health provides a comprehensive and very competitive benefits package for our residents, staff and their families. In addition, our program provides educational monies to support your ongoing education. Download our salary and benefits document to learn more.
Applications and the following documents are accepted only throughthe Electronic Residency Application Service
We require:
We require:
- Excellent communication skills
- MD applicants should have scores of 205 or higher on both Step 1 and Step 2 of the USMLE
- DO applicants should have scores of 550 of higher on both COMLEX 1 and 2
- Must pass the CS exam on the first attempt
- Recent clinical experience within the United States
- Applicants must have graduated medical school within the last three years
- All candidates must possess U.S. work authorization or be eligible for J-1 status
Step 2 exam results are encouraged, but not required prior to your interview. Results for Step 2 CK and Step 2 CS exam must be available to be considered for ranking.
For more information on our program, contact Julie Beute, program coordinator.
Pictured: Julie Beute, Kimberly Longstreet and Sue Heinz
Pediatric Residency Program Coordinators
All visiting medical student applications must be submitted through the Visiting Student Learning Opportunitiesprogram (formerly known as VSAS). The Spectrum Health course catalog for rotation opportunities starting in July for the next academic year will be posted in March. Applications will be accepted starting April 1.
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About West Michigan
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