A) Slack preparation.

B) Arrogance that I knew most of it anyhow.

C) Shortage of time.

Pick your excuse - the end result is the worse thing happened...

...I passed Step One. :)


With a score of 185. :(


Now what? I'm a USIMG, graduated from a European School (Germany).

Obviously Neurosurgery and Derm are now off the table but can I still match somewhere in US given I'm not sure I'll do much better on Step 2 (graduated, working fulltime, can't devote much time to study)? Have PhD as well as medical degree.

What are my options in terms of specialties that'll take my application seriously? I'm not a huge fan of family practice.

Thanks.

Now what? I'm a USIMG, graduated from a European School (Germany).

Obviously Neurosurgery and Derm are now off the table but can I still match somewhere in US given I'm not sure I'll do much better on Step 2 (graduated, working fulltime, can't devote much time to study)? Have PhD as well as medical degree.

What are my options in terms of specialties that'll take my application seriously? I'm not a huge fan of family practice.

Thanks.
Unfortunately your options are going to be quite limited. Obviously you must have known how important the step exams are for IMG's. Your only options now are probably family practice, maybe IM, and maybe psych. A good step 2 score would help a lot, however, if your not going to study much you can rule that out.

You're an MD/PhD. That always carries weight. Take Step 2 and start making contacts with some lab doing the same thing as your PhD which I assume is clinical in nature. Contacts, contacts, contacts. Just keep moving toward the goal of coming over. Something will work.

Do try to put forth some more effort for step 2, a 30 point increase wouldn't hurt.

Cheers

PhD or Dr. med. ?
Those two are not interchangeable in the US.
Unfortunately your German Dr. med. is as valuable in the US as a Romanian Dr. (rom.) is in Germany.
Well, if you did some interesting research and published in international journals during your Dr. med. then this counts for you come match season, obviously.

About your scores- try neurology, too. And of course, study harder for the other 2 steps.

Viel Erfolg,
Yours Dr. med. NoSz, MD