Chances for matching into FM as a former graduate

[buffpenguin]

Hey everyone,

USMG
Step 1 240
step 2 ck 226
Step 2 cs passed
Grades: Passed.
Deans" letter: Professionalism remediation for 1 month is stated on there for professionalism concerns.
Letters: 1 EM ultrasound SLOE, 1 EM SLOE(middle1/3-top1/3 i think), 1 family medicine outpatient letter, 1 peds letter.

Applied for EM got 9 interviews(mostly waitlist or because I rotated there), didn't match. Really love EM but second running is FM. Now reapplying this year because I failed to secure any transitional year/prelim year.

What should I do this year. I need a way to make some money to live along with completing a family rotation to get a solid letter from a nice program. Any advice? I am also thinking about taking Step 3. Really unfortunate situation. I think my professionalism issue is basically gonna hold me down everywhere I go. They do not describe what I did in my letter and I wish they did. Since then my letters all talk about my professionalism and hard work.

Any advice would be appreciated.

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[scorm]

What happened with your professionalism? Could programs have found out about it?

 

[yayforscrambling]

What happened with your professionalism? Could programs have found out about it?

I'm assuming they wrote a whole paragraph on his/her MSPE that went like "accused and found guilty of unprofessionalism - his unprofessionalism did not endanger any patients, faculty, or students, and was not sexual in nature, this medical student was told that he would be dismissed if it occurred again, etc etc etc"

they never say what the "unprofessionalism" was... they just say it didn't kill anybody and wasn't sexually related....

two classmates had this happen to them for the most ******ed reasons (one of them hated going to didactics and simply didn't show up) and the other had someone sign his name on the sign in sheet because he was too lazy to get out of his chair (he was like 20 mins early for the class and the sign in sheet hadn't yet been put outside) - so he yells across the room to have his classmate just scribble something under his name.

their unprofessionalism was the kiss of death. Great scores, AMGs, great everything, noncompetitive programs applied to, not a single interview offered... the scramble was pointless...

both ended up matching this year by taking advantage of the fact that the school didn't say what the "act of unprofessionalism" was and so they both spun it in a very cool way in their personal statements. Both matched perfectly - one in EM and the other in IM. Both matched at one of their top 3 ranks I believe.

As you can see, I'm very good friends with both, and hated my school after these guys told me what they had to go through.

In short, unprofessionalism is the kiss of death unless you go head to head with it and literally make it the subject of your PS to reassure programs that you won't be a liability. If you put yourself in the program's shoes, that unprofessionalism could be anything from cussing out a patient to yelling at a nurse. Therefore, if all they have is the MSPE that talks about this unprofessionalism, you won't be getting interviews. Both classmates were extensively questioned during their interviews (when they applied the second time) about the professionalism, and like I said, they had spun it in such a good way in their PS that it turned out perfectly for both.

hope this helps