MD co ‘20 Residency Panic Thread

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Giovanotto said:
What's the consensus on pre-interview dinners?

I did one and I'm already over it. Bunch of people awkwardly sitting around a table forcing themselves to ask questions that they'll then ask again at the interview day lunch. It's horrendous, and unnecessary. How much is not going to them going to hurt me?
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I don't even care if it's awkward or terrible, I'm going to eat as much food on company dime as I can after all the money spent on this process
 
Hey all can I get some input. I am a DO applicant applying IM. I applied to >100 programs and received invites from 9% of those programs and rejections from about 4-5 programs in total (I anticipate most rejections will be silent though), but I have not received West Coast interviews including programs that my school matches multiple people into every year. I'm wondering if anyone has any input on whether the fact that my Step 2 was released and sent to programs about 1 week prior to MSPE going out is contributing to my lower than expected yield of interviews or if its just my DO status. I'm an above average applicant particularly for said programs. I received most of my interviews surrounding the first week of MSPE coming out and many of the programs I have received interviews from I applied to after ERAS release (september 15). Its been an excruciatingly quiet for the past 10 days.
 
sharkbyte said:
I don't even care if it's awkward or terrible, I'm going to eat as much food on company dime as I can after all the money spent on this process
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Exactly.
my first interview is Tuesday. You bet your ass as long as they don’t say no booze at the dinner I’m going to have a nice cocktail. Make it worthwhile.
 
Just had my first interview and also received my 12th interview invite! The first one seems to always be the hardest, but I didn’t feel it went that bad actually, and one of the interviewers even said he was impressed by my performance (and my Step score!)

I heard that once you hit 12 your chances of matching are >90%. Is that still true this year?
 
isleep2late said:
Just had my first interview and also received my 12th interview invite! The first one seems to always be the hardest, but I didn’t feel it went that bad actually, and one of the interviewers even said he was impressed by my performance (and my Step score!)

I heard that once you hit 12 your chances of matching are >90%. Is that still true this year?
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You can find find actual data by looking of the charting outcomes for your specialty. For instance, for peds the match chance at 6.5 ranks is >90%.

Good news about your first interview!
 
isleep2late said:
Just had my first interview and also received my 12th interview invite! The first one seems to always be the hardest, but I didn’t feel it went that bad actually, and one of the interviewers even said he was impressed by my performance (and my Step score!)

I heard that once you hit 12 your chances of matching are >90%. Is that still true this year?
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Congrats on hitting 12! If you are an allopathic US senior, your chances to match with ROL of 12 is like...99%. So safe to say you are very safe!
 
Giovanotto said:
What's the consensus on pre-interview dinners?

I did one and I'm already over it. Bunch of people awkwardly sitting around a table forcing themselves to ask questions that they'll then ask again at the interview day lunch. It's horrendous, and unnecessary. How much is not going to them going to hurt me?
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That might be a sign to not go to that program if the residents cannot socially handle themselves by having basic conversations. The two meals I have attended have been fun with everyone conversing and telling stories. Maybe it is field specific? I'd imagine some fields attract less sociable nerds.
 
samac said:
Exactly.
my first interview is Tuesday. You bet your ass as long as they don’t say no booze at the dinner I’m going to have a nice cocktail. Make it worthwhile.
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I don’t know man. If literally 0 residents are drinking and you decide to get a cocktail it is a bad bad look. For reference, I haven’t seen any drinking at any pre-interview dinners so far even though it was kosher to have alcohol.
 
Epilepsy365 said:
I hope they ban it as well. But like in game theory, if everyone is cheating by sending LOI, you’re going to end up being the loser if you are not cyber puckering these programs.
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Eh, I don't think sending LOIs is really "cheating", it's still entirely up to the program to invite you and they have no obligation to. I think it's more so that any LOIs beyond places where you have ties or genuine interest in aspects of a program (that you can back up with experiences) are fake and insincere
 
NecFasc92 said:
I don’t know man. If literally 0 residents are drinking and you decide to get a cocktail it is a bad bad look. For reference, I haven’t seen any drinking at any pre-interview dinners so far even though it was kosher to have alcohol.
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Almost everyone has drank one drink at every dinner I’ve been to
 
NecFasc92 said:
I’m jealous. I wanted some nice wine with my salad each time.. ugh!

My point still stands, though, you don’t wanna be the only one drinking..
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Ive only been to two dinners so far, but the one nobody drank at all. The second the resident ordered a beer so I got a glass of red wine to go with my steak lol
 
NecFasc92 said:
I don’t know man. If literally 0 residents are drinking and you decide to get a cocktail it is a bad bad look. For reference, I haven’t seen any drinking at any pre-interview dinners so far even though it was kosher to have alcohol.
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I mean if they tell me not to order certain things I won’t. But if they don’t I’m all in. If they dislike me for it it’s probably not a program I’d be happy at.
(big talk here for someone with 4 interviews)
 
Does anyone know about RUMCSI - Richmond University Internal medicine program? Is there anything that is great/stands out about them?
 
For real though.. if im told im a great fit for a program by the PD, should i take this seriously ?
 
ciestar said:
For real though.. if im told im a great fit for a program by the PD, should i take this seriously ?
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No. Programs gain nothing from being open and honest about your fit. Conversely, by convincing every applicant to rank them highly, they ensure filling all of their positions. I'm not saying every PD is lying to you... just appreciate the compliment and dont read too much into it.
 
studentdocftw said:
No. Programs gain nothing from being open and honest about your fit. Conversely, by convincing every applicant to rank them highly, they ensure filling all of their positions. I'm not saying every PD is lying to you... just appreciate the compliment and dont read too much into it.
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And it's not necessarily a lie. PDs/interviewers could say this to every interviewee and mean every word of it, but they still have to stratify applicants when it comes time for rank lists.
 
darknecrosforte said:
Just the general "Dear PD, I can't imagine how stressful it is to deal with reading over 1000 apps and I don't mean to be a pain. BUT - reason #1 and reason #2 - pls notice me senpai" ?
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lol, nice to find another league player in a place like this
 
Got my first rejection late last night. Quite frankly it’s gave me relief to know my application didn’t somehow disappear into thin air.
 
How r the DR people doing? Im freaking out cause only sitting on a couple.
 
CoomassieBlue57 said:
That might be a sign to not go to that program if the residents cannot socially handle themselves by having basic conversations. The two meals I have attended have been fun with everyone conversing and telling stories. Maybe it is field specific? I'd imagine some fields attract less sociable nerds.
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Lol what? At baseline, sitting at a table with a bunch of nervous strangers who you will be in a very real sense competing against, the day before a nerve wrecking event, is not going to be a great time. Not buying your rosy depiction at all. It's not the program's fault, except for maybe even hosting such an event in the first place.

Edit: sitting at a dinner table with 10 strangers, a few of which are judging your moves, even if you have like 1/100 anxiety is not going to be a great time. So again, not buying it.
 
gabroojawan said:
How r the DR people doing? Im freaking out cause only sitting on a couple.
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Sitting on an okay amount, but honestly haven’t heard back from like 90% of the places I’ve applied to. Don’t know if that means they’re still reviewing, or if that means I’m on a waitlist and will get invited if others cancel or what.
 
Giovanotto said:
Lol what? At baseline, sitting at a table with a bunch of nervous strangers who you will be in a very real sense competing against, the day before a nerve wrecking event, is not going to be a great time. Not buying your rosy depiction at all. It's not the program's fault, except for maybe even hosting such an event in the first place.

Edit: sitting at a dinner table with 10 strangers, a few of which are judging your moves, even if you have like 1/100 anxiety is not going to be a great time. So again, not buying it.
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The two ive been to were quite enjoyable. Met some cool people. What’s nice is in when you run into these same people again on the interview trail and know them a bit. Calms my nerves a bit.
 
Epilepsy365 said:
I kid you not. At my current location, I know the residents and the chief very well. They literally show me their reports of the interviewees to the PD.
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ciestar said:
The two ive been to were quite enjoyable. Met some cool people. What’s nice is in when you run into these same people again on the interview trail and know them a bit. Calms my nerves a bit.
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I will agree with you there, I've met a few familiar faces who I rotated with during aways at these dinners. That I enjoy'd, but you can't exactly spend the entire night catching up with them.
 
Giovanotto said:
I will agree with you there, I've met a few familiar faces who I rotated with during aways at these dinners. That I enjoy'd, but you can't exactly spend the entire night catching up with them.
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True.

Maybe im just heavily food motivated but im cool with dealing with some potential awkwardness for 1.5-2 hours and get a good, free meal
 
I think just bite the bullet and do the dinner. It's not worth taking the (small?) risk of hurting your rank when you've worked your tail off to get a seat at the table so to speak.
 
Giovanotto said:
Lol what? At baseline, sitting at a table with a bunch of nervous strangers who you will be in a very real sense competing against, the day before a nerve wrecking event, is not going to be a great time. Not buying your rosy depiction at all. It's not the program's fault, except for maybe even hosting such an event in the first place.

Edit: sitting at a dinner table with 10 strangers, a few of which are judging your moves, even if you have like 1/100 anxiety is not going to be a great time. So again, not buying it.
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Think what you will but I've had a great time at the two dinners I've been on so far. Idk why anyone would have a reason to lie on an anonymous forum. I really do think it may be specialty/individual personality dependent.
 
vernhart said:
Think what you will but I've had a great time at the two dinners I've been on so far. Idk why anyone would have a reason to lie on an anonymous forum. I really do think it may be specialty/individual personality dependent.
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Im also going FM and “fit” is a huge part of your ranking. You WANT these current residents to like you.
 
jurisburger said:
I think just bite the bullet and do the dinner. It's not worth taking the (small?) risk of hurting your rank when you've worked your tail off to get a seat at the table so to speak.
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If you can you probably should. But if you can't, then so be it. There are a few programs who've emailed us to tell us that not going to the interviews will not negatively affect us.
 
vernhart said:
Think what you will but I've had a great time at the two dinners I've been on so far. Idk why anyone would have a reason to lie on an anonymous forum. I really do think it may be specialty/individual personality dependent.
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Ditto. The best way to approach your interview is to be yourself. My senior gave me that advice before the interview trail.

If the place doesn't like the real you, chances are that you're going to be miserable there anyway. 4-5 years is a long time to fake trying to get along with people. You either like them or not. No bs in between.
 
Giovanotto said:
If you can you probably should. But if you can't, then so be it. There are a few programs who've emailed us to tell us that not going to the interviews will not negatively affect us.
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LOL. They lied. Going to the dinner is a part of showing interest in the program. Programs aren't going to rank you high if they feel that you're just interviewing there as a backup.
 
Epilepsy365 said:
LOL. They lied. Going to the dinner is a part of showing interest in the program. Programs aren't going to rank you high if they feel that you're just interviewing there as a backup.
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How about this. I'll be the guinea pig for you. I'm missing probably half of my dinners. If I match at one of those I'll be sure to report back.

Ps. I don't think all programs are as insecure as you make them out to be.
 
Giovanotto said:
How about this. I'll be the guinea pig for you. I'm missing probably half of my dinners. If I match at one of those I'll be sure to report back.

Ps. I don't think all programs are as insecure as you make them out to be.
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N=1, but the PD at my school says that dinners are VERY important for ranking applicants. They take resident input seriously, and the only way they get to know you is with the dinner. They won’t tell you that though since then you’ll act stiff and weird and boring. That’s just one program though. Others may just see if you’re a normal person, etc.
 
CidHighwind said:
N=1, but the PD at my school says that dinners are VERY important for ranking applicants. They take resident input seriously, and the only way they get to know you is with the dinner. They won’t tell you that though since then you’ll act stiff and weird and boring. That’s just one program though. Others may just see if you’re a normal person, etc.
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Ok but what if you’re not a normal person
 
Giovanotto said:
Lol what? At baseline, sitting at a table with a bunch of nervous strangers who you will be in a very real sense competing against, the day before a nerve wrecking event, is not going to be a great time. Not buying your rosy depiction at all. It's not the program's fault, except for maybe even hosting such an event in the first place.

Edit: sitting at a dinner table with 10 strangers, a few of which are judging your moves, even if you have like 1/100 anxiety is not going to be a great time. So again, not buying it.
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But sitting at a table with 5 others for a "lower"-tier university psych program with 2 residents and talking about the video games you all play while marveling at the random thick-accent IMG talking about his 2 years of extremely specific bench research at a top 4 NIH funded place and interjecting stories that smell of pseudologia fantastica is pretty fun. Made the next day funnier when pretty much every faculty member highlighted community focus and that while research is available and supported, it is not necessary at all. Outside of these really weird outliers, it was easy to at least have a smooth conversation unrelated to the application process, even when I or others had noticeable sympathetic over-activation.

From the 2 places I've interviewed at, it seemed that it is unlikely they could even take any notes on applicants except to generally highlight a "whoa that guy/gal was really weird/inappropriate/etc." I dunno if they use a numerical system to roughly rank or score dinner attendees individually or within the group, but could be a decent way to differentiate applicants further. My fav place so far forgoes the dinner and splurges on the lunch with dessert so you can food coma after the interviews finish. They still put you in a swanky hotel so they're not really being cheap; they apparently say that not everyone flies in early enough to attend dinners and that dinners run the risk of messing with interviewees' sleep or prep before the real deal.
 
Some of the resident feedbacks from the dinner include:

1) That person is quiet and seem disinterested. Why is he or she even here?
2) That person just literally pimped me during dinner
3) Not very sociable and interactive. Don't know much about that person
4) That person is just weird
5) I like that person. Seem cool and will fit well with the program
 
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