The Division of Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery offers both a 3-year residency in plastic surgery and one year program leading to eligibility for the Certificate of Added Qualifications in Hand Surgery. The program offers a mix of hands-on patient care, classroom lectures and discussion and laboratory study including cadaver dissections and microsurgery training. Residents and fellows are responsible for all phases of patient care including diagnoses and treatment with close involvement by the faculty.

Mission Statement

"The qualities we celebrate in our group are leadership, ethics and integrity, quality in our work, team spirit, candid and open communication, and innovation. We are strong role models for the young physicians we train who will benefit from our knowledge, experience and willingness to continually improve ourselves. We are in the business of preserving and improving quality of human life and all our actions must be measured by our success and achieving this."

The Program

The program offers a mix of hands-on patient care, classroom lectures and discussion and laboratory study including cadaver dissections and microsurgery training. Residents are responsible for all phases of patient care including diagnoses and treatment. Direct faculty supervision is the norm. There are weekly conferences in hand surgery and general plastic surgery in addition to various additional teaching sessions in the individual hospitals. The operative experience is vast with particular emphasis on pediatric, microvascular, hand, posttraumatic and oncologic reconstruction. For more detailed information on the resident rotations you can view the resident's manual {3.8.2.2.4.1}.

History of the Program

The University of Southern California is the largest private co-educational institution on the West Coast and is consistently ranked among the top 20 major universities in federal grant support. It was founded in 1880 and the School of Medicine was founded 5 years later on a separate campus several miles away.

The plastic and reconstructive surgical residency was established in 1982 under the direction of Dr. Thomas Krizek. There were two residents who began the program in 1982 graduating in 1984. In 1983, the number of residents who began the program was increased to three. The rotations currently consist of the Los Angeles County Medical Center, the country’s largest public teaching hospital, Childrens Hospital Los Angeles, City of Hope National Medical Center, Kaiser Permanente West Los Angeles, Rancho Los Amigos Medical Center, USC University Hospital, Cedars Sinai Medical Center, Orthopedic Hospital and the offices of Drs. Zarem, Wootton, Carr and Resnick. The program is now under the direction of Randy Sherman, M.D.