Several Questions:
1) How are residency matches? I couldn't find anything more than that they mainly match primary med. I'm interested in Neuro, but it doesn't seem that they have any matches in that specialty.
2) How is the research at UNM? Is it possible to get super involved in this?
3) What are some of your favorite experiences?
4) What are some of your least favorite experiences?
Thank you so much for being willing to talk with us through this process!!
1) We match very well.You aren’t going to coast on name recognition coming out of UNM like you might elsewhere but you aren’t going to be held back by going here either. You get out what you put in, overall. No question we mostly match into primary care, and I think that’s mostly self selection. I know coming in that I wanted to do a surgical subspecialty and never felt pressured away from it. Can’t remember the exact numbers but this year we had people going into very competitive specialties including a couple into IR, one derm, ENT, ortho, neurosurgery.
I don’t remember neurology specifically but we always have one or two I believe.
2) Research opportunities are there for sure. I published 3 papers while I was there, presented a few times, went to conferences. Again, it’s not handed to you but you can definitely get involved if you seek it out.
3) favorite experiences: classmates were great, not cut throat really at all. Didn’t have to go to lecture which was a huge plus. clinical years are a major strong point. You get to get your hands dirty and have more autonomy as a med student than you do most places which has made me WAY more comfortable as a resident. You can get involved clinically earlier than most places which helped me with getting letters of rev too.
Also, if you’re in state, it’s cheap. If I’d gone to the top med school in the country I still would have been fighting to match at the program I matched at, so I don’t regret that I got here with less debt.
4) least favorite: mostly stuff that would be true anywhere. Hated studying for step, hated tests in general. Stuff like that. My biggest beef with UNM was probably that I don’t think they taught towards step 1 very well. Didn’t matter for me really because I was very self motivated to study but that’s not true of everyone. That said, I think they’ve changed the curriculum a lot since I was there.
honestly, I’m not sure it matters a ton where you go to med school. You can do anything out of anywhere, but I have no regrets about choosing to stay here for med school
