Cheers to the m4's...

[Catfish John]

...and a couple of questions...

First off, congrats to all those who matched successfully. Best of luck to y'alls as you move forward into this grand profession, and hope the remainder of your 4th years are super chill. Maybe you can shed some light on a couple of things for me...

I'm beginning to schedule my 4th year right now as an Anesthesia wannabe MS-3, and it looks like I'm going to be doing my Gas external electives in Fall and early Winter after saving many lives in my sub-I and smoking Step 2. My question is--did any of you schedule a Gas elective at a place you were fairly interested in WHILE you were interviewing? Were you gone for a great deal of time during the elective and did you feel like you were able to make a positive contact, or did it seem like you were just going through the motions? Should I do everything I can to avoid doing an Anesthesia elective during interview season?

While we are at it, did anyone match at a place at which they did not do an external, and only visited on interview day? Feel free to post your external spots and where you ended up matching. Or to ignore this message altogether

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[chicamedica]

You know, I had the EXACT same question running through my mind earlier today!!

 

[Chillio]

I think most ppl matched somewhere they didnt do a rotation at. I'm going to UMD and I didn't rotate there. I did my elective at Loyola in September but I don't see why you can't do it up to feb when programs put together their rank lists

 

[powermd]

I matched at a program different from where I did away rotations. I think the best advice here is to do away rotations where you think you want to go, just to be sure, but also make sure to do an away rotation somewhere where you can get a LOR from a well-known anesthesiologist. It may help to do your aways in the same geographic region you hope to match in.

 

[VentdependenT]

I did an anesthesia elective during interview season and I wouldn't recommend it. Although everyone understood why I was missing days, I felt that I missed enough key opportunities to meet and foster strong relationships with staff to dissuade others from doing this. I was also kind of burned out at this point as well. Traveling all over sucks.

 

[BassDominator]

It's probably not a good idea.... I think it looks pretty bad to be taking time off during an away elective to go on interviews.

 

[Pinky]

I know some people who did away electives at the program they ranked #1 in February, when rank-lists were being made. It seemed to help them as they made good impressions and eventually matched at those programs.

 

[BassDominator]

Good point, Pinky.

For some of the more competitive programs, you might need the elective to get an interview. This was definitely the case for Einstein folks applying to Cornell in recent years.

 

[Skrubz]

While we are at it, did anyone match at a place at which they did not do an external, and only visited on interview day?

I did. I was originally going to do an away rotation at Davis during January but ended up dropping it because I realized that I needed the time to interview instead (15 California interviews in 3 weeks). I ended up relying on the strength of my application and my interviews (though I'll admit I had my personal neurotic doubts at times whether either was good enough).

 

[Catfish John]

Good stuff you guys, thanks.

Did you have interviews scheduled pretty heavy in Nov-Dec. or did things not really start cooking until after the new year?

 

[BassDominator]

I would say December/January are the busy months. You might have a few interviews in November if you get your application done early, but a lot of programs don't offer interviews until the dean's letter goes out on November 1. Very few programs interview in February.

 

[Skrubz]

I agree. Most interviews come during December/January, though it varies by region. Chicago programs start sending out invites in October; I interviewed in Chicago (all 5 major university programs) in November. California tends to be later, as I didn't get invites until November and interviewed in January. I'm not sure about other regions.