Away rotation and breaking into a region

[DrMasochist]

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Reading from others' experiences, in order to increase your chances of "breaking into a region" for residency, one has to do an away elective in that region.
So for example, if I want to do my residency in Chicago, let's say Loyola, but also wouldn't mind going to Rush or UIC, and I do an away at Loyola, does that increase my chances of getting interviews at Rush and UIC as well?

Do the other Chicago PDs see that since I did an away at Loyola, I'm actually serious about relocating to the Chicago area, even if I have absolutely no ties? Or would doing an away at Loyola only increase my chances of getting an interview there and no where else?

If anyone has some anecdotal info about breaking into a region by doing an away in that region, please feel free to share. 🙂

 

[tiger816]

I had the same question a year ago.

Personally I think it only helps at the program you rotate at because the other programs simply don't know that you rotated in their city. They would have to see it on the list of rotations you have done, which honestly I don't think many look at. They'll look at your class rank, third year grades, step score leaving them no reason to look at your fourth year transcript.

I say this because I did an away rotation in a diff region and no program from that region ever mentioned it

Sorry if this is a little disheartening. I still fully support doing away rotations (they helped me greatly to match), but I think the best thing you can do is send a different personal statement to the Chicago programs containing a paragraph saying you want to move to Chicago and why.

 

[Bradstein]

If you do your rotation early enough and it goes on your transcript I think it makes a difference. I know Rad Onc at my home program (Midwest) won't really interview someone from the Coasts unless they have a reason to come to the midwest, like family OR they have rotated somewhere in the Midwest.

 

[kavorca]

You could mention it in a special personal statement for all the Chicago schools so they will know. You can have a bunch of PS and submit different ones to different schools.

 

[cowme]

It can help at the program you rotate at.

But it can also hurt for other programs in the region.

You think UChicago won't notice that you chose to do your away rotation at Northwestern?

 

[qxrt]

It can help at the program you rotate at.

But it can also hurt for other programs in the region.

You think UChicago won't notice that you chose to do your away rotation at Northwestern?

It's kind of hard to tell. There would still be some advantage in that UChicago now knows that you are interested in ending up in Chicago, which might more than make up for the rotation at Northwestern. Knowing what I know now about how much regionalism matters, just having gone through the interview and match process, I think I'd err on the side of doing the away rotation anyway (if I had no connections to the area). If you're a competitive applicant for one competitive program, then the other comparable program in the city likely won't snub you for that.

 

[Bradstein]

You think UChicago won't notice that you chose to do your away rotation at Northwestern?

They will totally hold a grudge that you choose to explore one over the other with limited information

 

[viper930]

Really think the whole away rotation thing means very little outside of potentially helping a *tiny* bit at the actual institution you want to go to. Even then, it's very difficult for a med student to really wow trained radiologists. We simply don't know jack **** at this point in our education. Because of this, I imagine it's really hard for them to favor you over someone else who has better scores, clinical grades, letters, and didn't do an away there but interviewed just fine.

 

[AlexMorph]

Really think the whole away rotation thing means very little outside of potentially helping a *tiny* bit at the actual institution you want to go to. Even then, it's very difficult for a med student to really wow trained radiologists. We simply don't know jack **** at this point in our education. Because of this, I imagine it's really hard for them to favor you over someone else who has better scores, clinical grades, letters, and didn't do an away there but interviewed just fine.

Agreed. One thing I will add though is that suppose you were to get a fantastic letter from a radiologist in Chicago for example, that probably would help your application in breaking into the region.

 

[qxrt]

Away rotations will definitely help if you're interested in a specific institution or a particular region of the country that you otherwise have no connections to. I've known too many stories of people matching at one of their away institutions to think otherwise. It not only helps you get an interview there (many programs will grant interviews at a higher rate to rotators than non-rotators), but the interview itself also tends to go more smoothly when your interviewers already have a good idea of who you are, as this will make you stand out from the line-up of applicants they see for the first time.

Of course, this assumes that you make a good reputation for yourself and are appropriately aggressive without being annoying while on the actual away rotation.

My opinion is that you should definitely do an away rotation only in two cases: 1. There is one specific program that you are definitely interested in matching at, and/or 2. You have no connections to the region of the country.

If you already have connections to the region of the country you want to match to (e.g. your permanent address is there, you went to college there, etc), then an away is not necessary. I didn't do any away rotations yet matched at my desired location, all the way across the country, most likely helped by my strong connections to the state in question.