All the above info is good stuff. Let me tie it together a bit for you Street. From a fellow DO, I am fully expecting to have my DO internship in allopathic EM residency approved as my AOA intern year. A couple of my rotations in 2nd year actually count as part of the requirements. I had to have a 2nd medicine month, but it was met with a subspecialty medicine (cards in my case). I had to sell my soul and do an FM elective but my PD helped me do this with completely painless ease. So I will actually have met the requirements for the internship by the middle of the 2nd year, which I am now in. I wanted to keep this option open since my wife is from Pa.
Now as for Geisinger specifically, and perhaps other Pa allopathic EM programs. Geisinger is special because it is seriously a bi-training site (meaning it has as many DO interns and residents almost as it has MD residents). It actually has a rotating internship for DO's. Because of this, the in house allopathic program can generally meet the same requirements, but because the order of the the rotations is different, the intern year requirement is not met until 3rd year (and after you sell your soul for the family medicine elective there too!!).
It can be done. The hardest requirement to get past is the hardship requirement, meaning that you need to come up with a juicy reason why you are training where you are. Family is a good reason, as is other health issues requiring your presence or a spouses presence in a particular area.
Just be smarter than the suits, and play their game. Play by their rules and have some decent evidence if you get called on the carpet. The bottom line is that the AOA does not have the interest to be turning down every resolution 42 waiver request as it is bad business.
