Crozer Chester Internal Medicine to Sponsor Green Cards for IMGs

Starting 2008 residency Year (i.e. 2008 Match candidates), the Internal Medicine Residency Program at the Crozer Chester Medical Center, PA, has decided to sponsor Green Cards for visa-needing IMG Residents, after they successfully complete the first year of their program. Here's the visa policy mentioned on their website.

Here's the FREIDA entry for the program - shows 8 positions per year and using Mandy's Prematches Determining Algorithm, we can deduce that Crozer Chester gave out about 5 Prematches duing the 2007 Match Season.

Since they offer Green cards only after completion of the first year, IMGs would either need an H1b or a OPT (F1 visa subtype) or any other eligible EADs to cover their Intern year (i.e. First Year Residency / PGY1 / R1 Year). Thankfully the program itself sponsors H1b visas. Obviously, J1 guys will not qualify.

Other Residency Programs known to have offered Green Cards for residencies in the past include: Abington Memorial and Albert Einstein. Interestingly all these programs are in the state of Pennsylvania.

Hmmm - I wonder how they get their lawyers to sponsor Green Cards during Residency. I guess they do it using the EB1 track. Here's the requirements for having an EB1 track sponsored. I may be wrong, but if thats' correct, then publications, prior residency and excellent USMLE scores may be needed to qualify, or the program itself maybe offering specific experiences during the First year which enable residents to qualify. Any readers with confirmed information about this, kindly drop a comment to correct me and/or enlighten us all further.

Anyways, the word is that after an IMG completes an interview and the program is interested, the program's lawyer evaluates the candidates and lets the program know whether or a not a green card is possible for the candidate. Thus, one tip for candidates interviewing at Crozer Chester is that - if they let you know that a Green card is possible / not possible for you, it implies that they took the trouble to evaluate you - which means they do consider you a good candidate..good enough to ranked.

A Green card sponsored during a residency itself is one heck of an advantage for jobs and fellowships later - all will agree :-)

One things for sure - the program's gonna experience a hurricane of IMG applications the next year - both from candidates without a residency and those already into PGY1 residencies...
Hopefully other program directors will read this blog, take notice, learn and do the same ;-) he he he he he he ho ho ho


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