Army residencies

[Joob]

I am currently an osteopathic student and I was wondering if I should take the USMLE along with the COMLEX or not. I am a first year student, so I have not really decided on any particular specialty. Also, if I were to do an IM residency in the army, whats the chance of diong a fellowship after my service obligation?

---

Members don't see this ad.

 

[colbgw02]

IIRC, osteopathic students need not take the USMLE for army residencies. depending on how likely you think you are to do a civilian allopathic residency (slim to none), you could hedge your bets by taking both.

you're at least 7 years from starting any IM fellowship, and the changes that could occur between now and then in army GME pretty much make any talk of your chances of no utility.

 

[Mirror Form]

you'll be at a disadvantage if you don't take the usmle and are applying to a competitive field

 

[cyclegirl]

I do not know if this holds true for the Army but I met with the Dean of Navy students and he said there is no point for you to take both the USMLE and the COMLEX. He said they view them as equals even if you want to go into something competitive.

 

[HumptyDumptyMil]

I do not know if this holds true for the Army but I met with the Dean of Navy students and he said there is no point for you to take both the USMLE and the COMLEX. He said they view them as equals even if you want to go into something competitive.

I've heard the same thing from a GS resident in the Army. The same doesn't hold true for civilian residencies.

 

[psychbender]

you'll be at a disadvantage if you don't take the usmle and are applying to a competitive field

Mirror, I'd be interested in where you heard that, as it's the opposite of what I've always been told for the military medical world.

 

[Mirror Form]

Mirror, I'd be interested in where you heard that, as it's the opposite of what I've always been told for the military medical world.

The USMLE is mandatory for applying to most competitive civ residencies. I'd be pretty surprised if there is absolutely no disadvantage to not taking it when applying to the competitive military ones. Although the military is pretty friendly toward DO's, there are definitley still some PD's who are biased, especially in the competitive fields. They're not going to care what your test scores are unless you have a usmle score so that you can be stacked up against the allopathic grads.

 

[Gastrapathy]

The USMLE is mandatory for applying to most competitive civ residencies. I'd be pretty surprised if there is absolutely no disadvantage to not taking it when applying to the competitive military ones. Although the military is pretty friendly toward DO's, there are definitley still some PD's who are biased, especially in the competitive fields. They're not going to care what your test scores are unless you have a usmle score so that you can be stacked up against the allopathic grads.

There is absolutely no benefit to taking the USMLE if the applicant is applying only to military programs. These "biased PDs" that you know just don't have a say in the way the point system is structured and, frankly, don't seem to have any trouble taking DO's into the most competitive military specialty slots. Also, he wants Internal Medicine, so he has basically a 100% of selecting for the residency of his choice at a military program.

A couple more thoughts for the OP. If you want a competitive IM fellowship as a DO (Cards, GI, Allergy, H/O), you would be wise to consider staying in to do it. There remains a significant bias against DO's in civilian fellowship matching. For example, in 2006 GI took 4x as many foreign allopathic grads as osteopathic grads (without the denominator, these numbers are hard to interpret, but I suspect that quite a few more than 14 DO's applied for GI that year). You also get paid as IM staff while a fellow which is a pretty sweet deal (120K/year while still in training).

If you are dead-set on applying for fellowship after leaving the military, I suppose you might consider completing the USMLE now to make that application more competitive. Good luck.

 

[Mirror Form]

There is absolutely no benefit to taking the USMLE if the applicant is applying only to military programs. These "biased PDs" that you know just don't have a say in the way the point system is structured

the point system? Remember that there are differences in the Army and in the Navy. Unless things have changed greatly in the past couple years, the Army PD's can easily select who they want. I've never heard of ANY INSTANCE where a residency program had to take an applicant they didnt like as much as another b/c of points (partially thanks to the huge number of points that the PD's have at their discretion).

Although I would agree that if the OP is going to IM, then he doesn't need to take the USMLE's. However, if he wants one of the more competitive fields, it will likely help if he gets a good score.