Medical College of Wisconsin Department of Medicine Curriculum & Schedule
Sam Weinberg, DO, PGY 3
Why did you choose MCW for residency?: I chose MCW because of it's a strong academic program in a vibrant and diverse city. The I&O schedule system was the best for me and my family.
What is your favorite thing to do in Milwaukee?: I enjoy spending time at Lake Michigan, exploring the bike trails, and finding new local breweries.
What is something you like about your residency colleagues?: Everyone works very hard and is always willing to help out. I feel my fellow residents have my back and are there to support me.
What do you like doing in your free time?: I like beer and biking, preferably biking to get a beer. When I'm not at the hospital, I like to be outside as much as possible.
Schedule & Inpatient Team Structure
Our overall program structure is a 50/50 system that we call “I’s/O’s.” I’s are inpatient (ward) months, and O’s are elective (with outpatient continuity clinics) months. I months and O months alternate through the year. During O months, residents have weekend days (or an equivalent number of days) off – so this schedule promotes wellness.
View sample PGY1 schedule (PDF)
Nighttime Coverage
Some of our inpatient months have overnight call; some have night float. Having overnight call was a purposeful decision. We believe there is educational value in having some training in the hospital at night—you will see things and learn things at night that you wouldn't otherwise.
See the table below for details.
| Rotation (clinical service) | Site | Intern overnight call? | Resident overnight call? |
| General Medicine | VA | 1 time per month | Every 4th night |
| General Medicine | FH | Every 10th night | Every 5th night |
| General Medicine | St. Joseph | NA | Every 4th night |
| Cardiology | VA | NA | None |
| Cardiology | FH | None | None** |
| Heme-Onc | VA | Night float (~7 nights)* | None |
| Heme-Onc | FH | None | None |
| MICU | VA | NA | Every 4th night |
| MICU | FH | Internal night float (~6 nights) | Internal night float (~6 nights) |
| Transplant | FH | None | None** |
| *When interns are on VA Heme-Onc, they do night float to cover the general medicine team. Night float is M-F, with the weekends off. **A senior resident night float team covers the cardiology and transplant teams at night |
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Night Float
PGY2/3 residents: Night Float is an O month. Each resident has approximately 8 days off during the month.
PGY1s: VA night float is paired with Heme-Onc wards to provide exposure to overnight cross cover issues. Interns work directly with the on-call team’s senior resident. Night float works Monday-Friday, with the on-call team interns each covering one call night per month (on the weekends).
Team Structure
- MCW residents love working together on teams. The team structure varies, depending on the usual workload of each clinical service (see table below).
- Most of our teams feature PGY2/3 residents supervising interns. Both M3 and M4 students are often on the teams as well.
- All the hospitals have hospitalist services that also admit general medicine patients and are available for overnight supervision as needed.
| Rotation (clinical service) | Site | # of housestaff teams | Housestaff team structure |
| General Medicine | VA | 4 | 1 resident, 2 interns |
| General Medicine | FH | 5 | 1 resident, 2 interns |
| General Medicine | St. Joseph | 4 | 1 resident, 2 interns (St. Joe transitional year interns) |
| Cardiology | VA | 1 | 4 residents |
| Cardiology | FH | 2 | 2 residents, 3-4 interns |
| Heme-Onc | VA | 1 | 1 resident, 3 interns |
| Heme-Onc | FH | 1 | 2 residents |
| MICU | VA | 1 | 4 residents |
| MICU | FH | 2 | 2-3 residents, 2-3 interns |
| Transplant | FH | 1 | 1-2 residents, 0-1 intern |
Tailoring Your Schedule
In our program, residents can tailor their experience to their needs. Everyone will graduate with experience in general medicine and subspecialty wards, ICU and ambulatory care. Beyond that, we offer a wide range of electives (from patient safety and POCUS to GI consults and women’s health). We encourage residents to request rotations to help them fill in knowledge gaps, solidify future plans and then prepare them for the subspecialty or practice of their choice. That means that we work with each resident to tailor their experience to their interests and needs.
View Rotation Descriptions (PDF)
For example, what if you wanted to pursue a hematology-oncology fellowship? Two of our former residents did just that: Kathleen Monahan and Nicole Held tailored their experiences. See their schedules below.
| Kathleen Monahan Schedule | Nicole Held Schedule | |
| PGY1 | VA HONC wards FH leukemia wards |
VA HONC wards |
| PGY2 | FH Leukemia wards FH/VA HONC consults VA HONC wards Research elective (Onc project) |
FH leukemia wards FH HONC consults Research elective (Heme project) |
| PGY3 | VA HONC wards Bone marrow transplant wards FH/VA HONC consults Research elective (Onc project) |
FH leukemia wards |
| Products | Presented at the Multinational Association of Supportive Care in Cancer 2019 Publication: accepted |
Presented at American Society of Hematology 2019 Patient Safety Indicator-12 Rarely Identifies Problems with Quality of Care in Perioperative Venous Thromboembolism |