Renal application thread '08-09 version

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Here's the 09 renal fellowship application thread.

And here's last year's version

Any opinions re: which renal programs excel at one or the other. There are obvious ways of evaluating this, but i'm just looking for general opinions, maybe from your own programs.

HI Guys ,
application cycle for '09-'10 is fast approaching . Lets all who are planning to apply for Nephrology this cycle share thoughts and support each other through the application process.

I guess I'll start it off. Planning on apply to about 60 programs, don't know if this is overkill but don't want to take any chances. Anyone recommend any places definitely worth applying to as far as being an IMG currently at a university IM program?

Last year's renal fellowship threat was a bit more active. I tried the match last year and didn't work for me so will try again this year.

I am also applying to nephrology this year.However, I am a PGY-2 in a small community program. On J1 Visa. USMLE scores in low 90's. No step 3 yet. No research or presentations related to renal. I am not sure how it goes. Planning to apply 50-60 programs not to major universities though. Any one in the same boat?

lets be active in the forum and help each other. Appreciate any suggestions.

also planning on applying to 50-60 programs. caribbean grad (US citizen), low usmle scores (but never failed), no published research, just a few pending things. hopefully something comes through. we'll hope for the best. for last year's unsuccessful applicants, why do you think you didn't match? what are you doing differently this year in terms of reapplying? just want to get some people talking anything you'd have done differently when you first applied?

Originally Posted by cstyle

also planning on applying to 50-60 programs. caribbean grad (US citizen), low usmle scores (but never failed), no published research, just a few pending things. hopefully something comes through. we'll hope for the best. for last year's unsuccessful applicants, why do you think you didn't match? what are you doing differently this year in terms of reapplying? just want to get some people talking anything you'd have done differently when you first applied?

.

Last year's match was apparently very competitive. As for me, I mainly interviewed at NYC programs and didn't use the "research card" which I think hurt me. NYC it's a difficult market to penetrate if you do your residency somewhere else. Everybody tends to stay local and from what I remember there were many candidates that wanted to stay at their home program.
One other thing that hurt me was that I was very open with my home program and they knew that I wanted to come to NYC so they ranked me low in their list because they got the sense that I would probably not rank them.

IMG

Medical school Graduation yr : 2003

Internal Medicine : University affliated community hospital , July 2007

Publications : 2 case reports in AJKD and KI as primary author

Research : working on Transplant Nephrology at a University , No publication out of research yet

VISA : EAD

Oral/Poster : ACP and NKF

Work exp : Hospitalist for the last 1.5 yr

Application to : 40-60 programs

for those who applied last yr...it would be great if you could give me a fair assessment of my chances and interviews to expect.

It appears that nephrology became very competitive. Is there anyone who could get into it with out any research? DO you think applying to 50-60 programs is fine with my credentials ( PGY-2/small community program/J-1 visa/Scores low 90's,/no real research/good LORs)?

Hi

I am also working as a hospitalist and doing research in nephrology currently on EAD , Our profiles are kind of similar. I am planning to apply 60-70 programs as well. Let us be active in the forums so we can share the fellowship application process.

thanks

Hi , I am also an IMG in community based IM program. usmle scores in high 90 s with no research . Can u guys tell me the deadine to apply for nephrology programs this year ?

I think for many programs deadline is Jan 31st, but it is better to apply as early as possible from Dec 1st.

hi friends,

How is everything going on? I applied to 60 programs.Lets see how it goes. I heard that atleast we should get 6-8 interviews to be on safe side.

DO programs offer prematch as in residency? Appreciate your input. Thanks

Hi Every one,

I am a PGY1, started my residency in july 2008. I intend to apply for nephrology fellowship next year for 2011 start.Trying my level best to improve my CV towards it. i would grateful if any of the seniors in the forum address my following queeries.

1. I am plannning on an away rotation to do next year, would you suggest me to do a clinical rotation or a research rotation?

2. Can any body list me some programme which offer H1B visas for nephrology fellowships?

3. What are the prospects of a 3 year nephrology/critical care fellowship.

Many thanks

nephroaspirant.

Hi,

It appears that many programs already downloaded the application. Any one heard anything from the programs?

Most of the programs I applied have already downloaded the application. Have not heard back from any. What I learnt from people who applied last year is that interview calls start coming as early as the first week of dec.

any word how they will contact us? email? phone?

Last year Georgewashigton Univ sent invitations through regular postal mail. Many programs call too but again most common is through emails.

Hi i have a similar profile too. I have an EAD too and I thought I had an advantage but some of these programs don't recognise the EAD. so my list has been shortened to about 40.

Hi

I am also working as a hospitalist and doing research in nephrology currently on EAD , Our profiles are kind of similar. I am planning to apply 60-70 programs as well. Let us be active in the forums so we can share the fellowship application process.

thanks[/quote]

hi

I also appilied on dec 1 , most of the programs downloaded applications, let us share if u hear from any programs, no call so far,keeping fingers crossed.

I got an interview from University of Virginia today. Anyone else here anything. Anyone know about this program. Thanks

Hi Linus,

Congratulations for your first interview. Could you please share your credentials? Thanks.

Medical School: FMG, 3.9
USMLE: 1 and 2 high 90s and 3 low 90s
Residency: IM at unversity program, strong LOR
Participating in research but no publications
Lots of teaching though
Applied to 26 programs

Congratulations. I am still waiting to hear from programs. How many programs on an average have people applied?

Originally Posted by nephroaspirant

Hi Every one,

I am a PGY1, started my residency in july 2008. I intend to apply for nephrology fellowship next year for 2011 start.Trying my level best to improve my CV towards it. i would grateful if any of the seniors in the forum address my following queeries.

1. I am plannning on an away rotation to do next year, would you suggest me to do a clinical rotation or a research rotation?

2. Can any body list me some programme which offer H1B visas for nephrology fellowships?

3. What are the prospects of a 3 year nephrology/critical care fellowship.

Many thanks

nephroaspirant.

With regards to #1, I'd do the clinical rotation and be a rock star at it. Better to get to know faculty and leave a favorable impression. It makes it that much easier to say, "yeah, he's a good candidate," and puts you above others on the list.

It's virtually impossible to do research for a month, and get something productive out of it unless it's something that you are able to sustain. For example, it took me a year to get funded, IRB'ed up, and get my clinical study going. Chances are that I will have to pass the baton to another fellow before the study is over. Luckily, this is something that I'll be able to take with me to my next job.

Originally Posted by Linus2807

I got an interview from University of Virginia today. Anyone else here anything. Anyone know about this program. Thanks

Hello everyone. Just to introduce myself I am an HO-3 this year. I applied and matched into nephrology last year. I am curious to see how things play out this year. I have a bunch of friends applying this year and I just want to stay in the loop.

I did 11 interviews last year so I figure I may be able to add a few things here and there about programs with which I am a bit familiar. The very specific information (i.e. how much time on a given rotation, call schedule, etc.) you should look into yourself as it may change from year to year.

I interviewed at the University of Virginia. I was very impressed. As they did this year, they offered interviews very early last year as well. They initially wanted to complete their interview process by the second week of January last year, no idea what they are doing this year.

Virginia is not a research powerhouse, but they are making strides. Dr. Okusa is very research driven, and if research is your thing, you can't go wrong there.

On the clinical side and the program side, the Program Director was Dr. Rosner. He is a very nice person who seems quite approachable. On my interview day I was the only candidate, so I was able to spend a decent amount of time getting to know and speak with Dr. Rosner.

The fellows all seemed happy with absolutely no regret about choosing UVa for their fellowship.

Charlottesville is a relatively small town, but it is beautiful. I have been told by friends who are doing residency in Virginia that there is ALWAYS something to do in your free time. If nothing else, just visiting historical sites can keep one busy. Monticello (the home of Thomas Jefferson) is just outside the city and is worth a visit if you go interview there. I went in January for my interview, and the weather was fine (jacket weather).

Why I didn't rank it higher:

1) I had to consider my wife. She has her doctorate degree in her field as well, and the job market may not be the best for her in a city of this size.

2) My family (and hers) is on the west coast.

Overall impression:

Great program! I still ranked it high on my list. Of the interviews I did, there were a couple of programs at which I really did not want to match, this was definitely NOT one of those. Had I matched at UVa I would have been very happy. My wife would have been fine with it too, it just may have been a little tougher for her to find a job.


Does this type of thing help?

hi renaldoc

it is nice of you to comeback this year and join the forum, its a lot of useful information about the program, Congratulations on ur match. Most of the programs i applied downloaded applications, no calls yet. Last year when did u start getting interview calls?

Thanks a lot

I gues this is too early to expect interviews. Any one heard any news from the programs?

Originally Posted by nephron2010

hi renaldoc

it is nice of you to comeback this year and join the forum, its a lot of useful information about the program, Congratulations on ur match. Most of the programs i applied downloaded applications, no calls yet. Last year when did u start getting interview calls?

Thanks a lot

Well, first off, I wouldn't put ANY stock in any of this as things may have changed a lot this year. Remember, last year was the first year of the match for nephrology.

December 1st was over a weekend last year. My first interview offer was in my e-mail inbox at 6:30 AM on Monday morning, and it was from the University of Virginia. Within a day or so came University of Alabama-Birmingham and THE Ohio State University. Those three offered interviews quite quickly.

On a side note, I thought it was interesting how some programs offered their interviews. For example

1) One program called me, but never contacted me via e-mail or snail mail. A phone message was all I received.

2) One program e-mailed interview invititations to some people, while they sent only via snail-mail to others. I assumed I wasn't being offered an interview from that program because they had offered my friends, but not me. Then I get a letter in the mail asking me to interview there.

3) A few programs worked only via snail-mail.

I received interview offers from the first week of December until about the third week of February, so be patient.

Last year some of the programs tried to coordinate their interview dates together to save people on travel money. The New York programs definitely did this, so they may be later in their offers than some.

It is an interesting game this whole match and interview thing. Some great programs did not fill last year (Emory, UCSF, Wash U to name a few off the top of my head).

Good luck to all, and have fun with this. I know it is an extremely nervous time, but try to have some fun too!!!

Let me apologize, I completely overlooked a thread for Nephrology this year. Making this a sticky

I also got called for interview at Univ Virginia. It was a telephone call from the prog coordinator and I scheduled over phone. They had interview dates through april this year. I was told I would be getting the rest of the details in mail, in a week or two. Seems things are a litl slow this year compared to the last, or those who have been getting the interviews are not posting in the forum. Good luck to all!

Originally Posted by JayneCobb

Let me apologize, I completely overlooked a thread for Nephrology this year. Making this a sticky

I see a renal sticky in the threads started by you. I don't think you overlooked it!!

Hi Everyone,

I'm new to this forum and glad we all have a common interest. Let's update this thread as much as possible and post up what places have started giving out interviews.... I've so far gotten replies from Maine Medical and BWH/MGH....

Hi Renaldoc88!

Congratulations! No luck for me so far. Could you please share your credentials?

Thank You

New to the forum
Got IV from Winthrop Univ Hospital
Hopefully will get more
NA

rejection from maine medical center, not a good start i guess

Got interviews from Winthrop and Brown today. A good day today.

congratulations lararenal

do u mind sharing ur credentials

thx
good luck

Originally Posted by lararenal

Got interviews from Winthrop and Brown today. A good day today.

Congrats lararenal! Do you know how well Brown is generally rated among other programs?

hi folks,
glad to see this thread back in effect.
i'm a pgy 2, us grad, big university program.
i selected 13 programs that seemed a good fit for me. i plan on doing about 5-7 interviews. i have gotten 2 already, one of the big boston programs and one big nyc program. i was pleasantly surprised by this. i lucked out and got a paper out last year so that likely is helping my cause. i'm very interested in research but have limited experience. it will be interesting to see how much the big research programs will want to pin down my research interests, etc. i feel like there is soo much i am yet to expereince that i couldn't begin to commit.

Any of IMG got interviews?

Congrats to those who already got interviews. Appreciate if you could share your credentials. I applied to 60 programs. So far no luck for me. Now I am thinking to apply for more programs

Originally Posted by AKI76

Congrats lararenal! Do you know how well Brown is generally rated among other programs?

Brown should be a pretty good program I hope. They interviewed 40 candidates last year. This year should not be much different I believe as I know some other people who are interviewing there.

Guys,I am new to this forum,applied around 40 Nephrology fellowship program.Heard from Maine Medical centre.It was a rejection.Not a good start.I havenot heard from others
PGY2
Low 90 in step 1 and step 2
Small community program
No research experience
LOR may be ok,I waived them so I donot know what they wrote
Very anxious
IMG on H1B visa

what si my chance?

Dear Lararenal
Can you post your credentials?

Got an interview call from Brown.

Got an interview from Medical University of SC today--first one!!!!

Congrats. I also got an interview from MUSC.

It is a GOOD day. I got an interview at U Mass.....