Applying to anesthesiology as a PGY-1 transitional year intern?

[deleted436726]

---

Members don't see this ad.

I'm a just-graduated USMD who failed to match EM this year but managed to scramble into a transitional year program. Due to the competitive reality of EM these days I realize I may need to apply to a second specialty or switch specialties entirely. Originally I had planned to apply to IM but had been miserable at the prospect of doing IM for the rest of my life. Long story short, I recently came to realize I had overlooked anesthesia and would actually be quite happy in the field. I already requested an anesthesiology block for my TY and will hopefully have letters in time for ERAS.

I realize that as a whole anesthesia is not exactly uncompetitive, but on paper my application should be fine and my USMLE scores may actually be slightly above average. Is there a difference in competitiveness between categorical anesthesia positions and advanced/PGY-2 positions? After having already completed a TY, I should be able to apply for the latter, right? If I match an advanced position, can I start right away or would there be a gap year in between?

 

[IMGASMD]

Did you figure out why you didn’t match? Did you have enough interviews? Did you not rank enough places?

apply for “physician only” position, then you don’t wait. Advance position is actually for two years out spot. So you’d start ca1 in 2021.

Sounds like you don’t want to do anything other than EM. I’d imaging if you got a TY spot, it would be at a big hospital; hopefully they have an EM program?

 

[deleted436726]

Did you figure out why you didn’t match? Did you have enough interviews? Did you not rank enough places?

apply for “physician only” position, then you don’t wait. Advance position is actually for two years out spot. So you’d start ca1 in 2021.

Sounds like you don’t want to do anything other than EM. I’d imaging if you got a TY spot, it would be at a big hospital; hopefully they have an EM program?

Likely due to a combination of a poor selection of applications (overestimated my competitiveness and didn't apply to enough mid-range/low-tier programs, especially in my own home region) and possibly a subpar letter from an away rotation. I ended up with 10 EM interviews and ranks total last year, which statistically should have been fine but in my case, I guess not. "I don't want to do anything other than EM" was my initial thinking, but I realized I had tunnel vision and was brooding too much over what specialties I didn't like vs thinking about what I did like - hence anesthesia. I want to make it clear that I'm not treating anesthesia as a backup specialty.

MY TY spot is actually at a small community hospital that also happens to have an EM residency, so in any case I'm definitely going to explore the feasibility of staying in house since that would be the smoothest option.

It looks like there were 97 Physician-Only anesthesia positions in the 2019 match, 91 of which filled. Exactly how competitive are these spots in the grand scheme of things?

 

[IMGASMD]

Likely due to a combination of a poor selection of applications (overestimated my competitiveness and didn't apply to enough mid-range/low-tier programs, especially in my own home region) and possibly a subpar letter from an away rotation. I ended up with 10 EM interviews and ranks total last year, which statistically should have been fine but in my case, I guess not. "I don't want to do anything other than EM" was my initial thinking, but I realized I had tunnel vision and was brooding too much over what specialties I didn't like vs thinking about what I did like - hence anesthesia. I want to make it clear that I'm not treating anesthesia as a backup specialty.

MY TY spot is actually at a small community hospital that also happens to have an EM residency, so in any case I'm definitely going to explore the feasibility of staying in house since that would be the smoothest option.

It looks like there were 97 Physician-Only anesthesia positions in the 2019 match, 91 of which filled. Exactly how competitive are these spots in the grand scheme of things?

Wow, 10 programs and still didn’t match? That sucks. I don’t know if anyone can tell you exactly how competitive they are. Since, there are ultimately less than one of of those per program. Last time I checked, maybe 120-150 programs in the US. A lot of those physicians only spots, from what I’ve heard, a lot of times may be promised to some internal candidate. (This was years ago though, not sure how the match rules had effects on this.)

Apply broadly to EM, maybe even reach out to some of those programs you interviewed and see if there was something you’ve overlooked. 10 is a good ranking list, just sayin.

As for anesthesia, apply to all positions. Sometimes after, during the interview, even for categorical they may tell you we have a spot that can potentially open next year..... sometimes better be lucky