Away elective at midtier Cali program or at top tier East coast ?

[godblessMD]

Hi, I'm currently a 2nd year resident US FMG at an east coast lower tier program. I don't have a ton of research but have 1 paper (like 5th author from before med school), a few case reports / presentations, and book chapter, with a few possible abstracts in the works. I know I'm not a strong candidate and am open to going anywhere for GI but am interested in california for fellowship. I am thinking of doing an away GI elective at a midtier California program where I would have a chance at matching versus doing an away elective at a top tier east coast program to get a strong LOR from a "big name" such as at one of the Harvard programs or maybe Hopkins. What're your recommendations?

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[gutonc]

Hi, I'm currently a 2nd year resident US FMG at an east coast lower tier program. I don't have a ton of research but have 1 paper (like 5th author from before med school), a few case reports / presentations, and book chapter, with a few possible abstracts in the works. I know I'm not a strong candidate and am open to going anywhere for GI but am interested in california for fellowship. I am thinking of doing an away GI elective at a midtier California program where I would have a chance at matching versus doing an away elective at a top tier east coast program to get a strong LOR from a "big name" such as at one of the Harvard programs or maybe Hopkins. What're your recommendations?

Are you sure your program will let you do an away? Typically, they will only do so for rotations that are not available locally (since they still have to pay for you but don't get any work out of you while you're gone). So if you already have a GI rotation available, it's unlikely they'll let you go somewhere else to do so. You can get around this by doing a more sub-specialized elective (liver transplant, IBD, etc) but it will be harder to find and harder to get.

 

[godblessMD]

Are you sure your program will let you do an away? Typically, they will only do so for rotations that are not available locally (since they still have to pay for you but don't get any work out of you while you're gone). So if you already have a GI rotation available, it's unlikely they'll let you go somewhere else to do so. You can get around this by doing a more sub-specialized elective (liver transplant, IBD, etc) but it will be harder to find and harder to get.

Hey thanks for the reply, yes my program allows me to do 1 away elective even if its one we already have.

 

[Gastrapathy]

Go to the East Coast program and get the letter.