Welcome to the Surgical Residency Program

We are very pleased that you are interested in our General Surgery Residency at the Massachusetts General Hospital. Mass General's Surgical Residency Program has long been viewed as one of the finest surgical training programs in the world, with our graduates going on to highly successful careers or leadership positions in surgery.

The principal goal of the program is clinical excellence. We believe that exposure to a large, diverse patient population and broad experience in complex open and minimally invasive operations are essential elements in the training of outstanding surgeons. Thus, while the vast majority of our surgical training occurs at MGH, which is consistently recognized as a top hospital in the nation by U.S. News & World Report, we are increasingly taking advantage of operations in our department that are performed in our community sites. As a whole, the MGH Department of Surgery provides greater than 10,000 surgical admissions and 28,000 operations each year. This abundance of clinical material enables the surgical trainee to gain early experience in the operating room and to quickly develop independent responsibility in the perioperative care of a wide variety of complicated surgical patients. Graduating residents routinely perform between 1,000 and 1,200 major operations upon completion of the residency.

Mass General has been a leader in the evolution of surgical training: It was one of the first programs to institute a rectangular (as opposed to pyramidal) training program and was a pioneer in recruiting women to both residency and faculty and in training residents in complex minimally invasive surgery. Our current program provides strong clinical training with the appropriate mix of supervision and autonomy at all levels, as well as unparalleled exposure to complex open and laparoscopic surgical procedures. Residents are also provided with an excellent didactic program and simulation training. Finally, residents are offered basic and clinical research opportunities to further their careers, either within Mass General/Harvard programs or elsewhere. Here, the individual resident is supported and nurtured to pursue his or her dream — we do not believe in "one size fits all." Recent graduates of Mass General's Surgical Residency Program have obtained outstanding fellowship opportunities and launched successful careers in general surgery. The vast majority of residents go on to subspecialty fellowship training at the program of their choice, followed by careers in academic surgery. Recent graduates have been matched in fellowships at Cincinnati Children's Hospital, Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, University of Toronto (Transplant Surgery), University of Washington (Vascular Surgery), University of Colorado (Cardiac Surgery) as well as various MGH fellowship programs.

We are dedicated to maintaining the tradition of excellence in surgical training at Mass General, as well as prepared to tackle the complexities of modern surgical training. We are excited about the opportunity to develop the future leaders of American surgery and look forward to recruiting and mentoring the finest young surgeons in the world. Clearly, there is no place with a better track record of excellence or with more opportunities for the future than the Massachusetts General Hospital.

We encourage you to browse through our website, to apply to our program, and to discover for yourself why we believe that Mass General remains the premier training program in general surgery today.

Sincerely,

Keith D. Lillemoe, MD
Chief of Surgery

Jonathan Greer, MD
Program Director