DO Applying for FM Residency in NW

[WestCoDO]

Hello everyone,

I am a third year starting to schedule auditions for my fourth year, and picking residencies to apply to in Family Medicine. I wish to go back to the NW, ideally Oregon, but am open to Washington and Idaho as well. I am a National Health Service Corps scholar, so I will have to practice in an underserved community when I graduate. Therefore, I'm looking for a program that will offer me a diverse experience, as well as connect me with the community of family docs around the NW so that I can secure employment after graduating that meets NHSC requirements. I am having trouble picking programs, and having a very hard time assessing my competitiveness for ACGME programs. I am a DO student from Western University of Health Sciences, scored 233 on USMLE Step 1, have gotten a mix of pass and honors in my preclinical years and mostly high pass in my third year. I was the president of my school's chapter of American College of Osteopathic Family Physicians and of course a member of AAFP (we didn't have a regular FMIG). Here are a list of the programs I'm looking into:

Family Medicine Residency of Idaho
OHSU Family Medicine Portland
Providence Health & Services/Hood River Rural Program Hood River
Cascades East Rural Family Medicine, Klamath Falls
Samaritan Health Services Family Medicine, Corvallis
University of Washington Family Medicine Residency Program
PeaceHealth Southwest Washington
Swedish First Hill / Cherry Hill, Seattle
Group Health Cooperative Program, Seattle
Family Medicine Spokane
PNWU-COM/Skagit Valley Hospital Family Practice
Tacoma Family Medicine

Can anyone offer insight into which of these they have looked into and liked, and just as important, give me some insight into how competitive each of these residencies are? Do I have a shot at most of these, or are some of them out of my league? Thank you for your help.

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[TeamZissou]

You can likely have your pick. Those are some very different residencies though, try to figure out what you want in one... Community vs Academic, OB heavy, inpatient heavy, etc

Look into The Wright Center national FM residency

Ill comment further after Monday....

 

[cabinbuilder]

Hood River is way down South near the California border. I just know the location.

I have been to Klamath Falls. It is way out of the way and not easy to get to/from so if you expect to be travelling to Portland to "get away" on the weekends - it isn't going to happen. I applied for an Attending job there once. The hospital is beautiful and all the staff and residents seemed very happy in the work place. The directors are very personable and I fell comfortable with them.

Corvallis is associated with the new DO school in Lebanon, OR. It is rural enough to give you diversity but close to the city if you like.

As an attending, I have had NOTHING but issues with OHSU and have stopped referring patient's to them due to inability for folks to get appts in a timely manner. I feel it's too large to be personable and the patients get lost in the politics. That's just my perception from working in rural areas around Oregon trying to get patient's seen. I have never been there personally.

 

[primadonna22274]

Hood River isn't south at all. It's about an hour and fifteen minutes east of Portland on I-84.

 

[cabinbuilder]

Hood River isn't south at all. It's about an hour and fifteen minutes east of Portland on I-84.

Oops, I was thinking of Rogue River.

 

[WestCoDO]

These programs are very different, and while I have been researching them, it is hard to get a feel for what they are like without actually visiting them (fingers crossed that I'll get a chance to do that!). Any input would be helpful, as well as how friendly these programs are to DO's. @cabinbuilder , the rotation in Corvallis is associated with my school's Oregon campus, College of Osteopathic Medicine of the Pacific - NW. This is probably one of the few DO programs I am applying to due to the lack of DO programs in the NW. Part of the reason why I want to assess my competitiveness is due to the way the DO match works. If I rank the Corvallis program and they select me, I will be pulled from the ACGME match. The DO match occurs prior to the ACGME match, and any students participating in both match programs are prioritized towards the DO match. Therefore, unless I fall in love with the Corvallis program, I might forgo ranking it because it will exclude me from having a chance at matching to the other programs.

 

[cabinbuilder]

I don't know anything about the Corvallis program. Honestly, you want to match. No residency is perfect. Scrambling is a real bitch. I know since I had to do it myself.

 

[primadonna22274]

I know the PD of the Corvallis FM program as we used to work in the same community (Corvallis). We spoke about it a couple years ago and it sounds like she has built a solid program. I didn't apply since I moved to SC several years ago and really had limited funds for residency apps and even more limited travel $$ so really only looked within a 3-4 hr driving radius of my home here but if I had still been in the NW I would have checked it out. That said, I totally understand the risk in being dropped from NRMP if you match NMS so I didn't apply to NMS at all.

 

[VenturaResident]

You can likely have your pick. Those are some very different residencies though, try to figure out what you want in one... Community vs Academic, OB heavy, inpatient heavy, etc

Look into The Wright Center national FM residency

Ill comment further after Monday....

Most people wind up matching in their top 3 in FM statistically, so things will likely work out in the end, but I wouldn't go so far as to say that you necessarily have your pick with those programs. Swedish programs, for instance, I think routinely get 700+ applications per year. Lots of people picking but not necessarily getting. That's not to discourage you, but just to say that they are popular programs. They'll want to know that your training is solid and that you are a good fit for the program. If that's true, then your chances are likely high!

 

[TeamZissou]

Most people wind up matching in their top 3 in FM statistically, so things will likely work out in the end, but I wouldn't go so far as to say that you necessarily have your pick with those programs. Swedish programs, for instance, I think routinely get 700+ applications per year. Lots of people picking but not necessarily getting. That's not to discourage you, but just to say that they are popular programs. They'll want to know that your training is solid and that you are a good fit for the program. If that's true, then your chances are likely high!

You're correct. I should rephrase that to include the assumptions you go all out to get that pick ie audition there, etc

That said, the DO match already debunked many of my preconceived notions...

 

[VenturaResident]

You're correct. I should rephrase that to include the assumptions you go all out to get that pick ie audition there, etc
.

Audition rotations are a great way to see if you are a good fit for a particular program. Probably the best way. We had some students audition here who were so awesome and such good fits that when their names came up in ranking decision meetings spontaneous cheers erupted - literally. And there were people who auditioned here this year, like every year, who we may have considered more and ranked more highly if they'd only been visiting for a one day interview, but the fact that we spent a month with them made it clear that they are not at all a good fit for this program and we won't be ranking them at all. Anyone who does an audition rotation here will get an interview here, but in some cases that is only a formality because we've already decided that it's not going to work out and that they're going to get voted off the island. So absolutely they help determine fit, and if the fit is right, the student will have strong advocates among faculty and residents. But if the fit isn't there, not even an audition rotation is going to change things.

 

[cabinbuilder]

Audition rotations are a great way to see if you are a good fit for a particular program. Probably the best way. We had some students audition here who were so awesome and such good fits that when their names came up in ranking decision meetings spontaneous cheers erupted - literally. And there were people who auditioned here this year, like every year, who we may have considered more and ranked more highly if they'd only been visiting for a one day interview, but the fact that we spent a month with them made it clear that they are not at all a good fit for this program and we won't be ranking them at all. Anyone who does an audition rotation here will get an interview here, but in some cases that is only a formality because we've already decided that it's not going to work out and that they're going to get voted off the island. So absolutely they help determine fit, and if the fit is right, the student will have strong advocates among faculty and residents. But if the fit isn't there, not even an audition rotation is going to change things.

How true this is. We had a student rotate with us and he was so annoying that my attending told me that my job was to make him disappear and keep him out of the ICU. I was chief at the time so my student's job was to keep that guy from being irritating to ANYONE while I was in clinic. Nightmare. He turned around and applied to our residency program. The entire crew shouted HELL NO!!!

 

[TeamZissou]

Audition rotations are a great way to see if you are a good fit for a particular program. Probably the best way. We had some students audition here who were so awesome and such good fits that when their names came up in ranking decision meetings spontaneous cheers erupted - literally. And there were people who auditioned here this year, like every year, who we may have considered more and ranked more highly if they'd only been visiting for a one day interview, but the fact that we spent a month with them made it clear that they are not at all a good fit for this program and we won't be ranking them at all. Anyone who does an audition rotation here will get an interview here, but in some cases that is only a formality because we've already decided that it's not going to work out and that they're going to get voted off the island. So absolutely they help determine fit, and if the fit is right, the student will have strong advocates among faculty and residents. But if the fit isn't there, not even an audition rotation is going to change things.

Agreed, I suppose my point is if you play your cards right, are a normal human being, and put forth effort I think most of the programs the OP mentioned are well within reach.

 

[WestCoDO]

Haha, I like to think that I'm a normal human being. I will definitely be doing some audition rotations, however even from the stories you all have told, it seems that it more often than not has more of a risk of leaving a bad impression than a good one. I seem to hear more stories of "that person was terrible" rather than "we really liked that person." Either way, I am getting the feeling that everyone's general consensus is that as long as I apply to most/all of those programs, I will probably match. So none of those programs are out of my reach? I was told that UW, OHSU, and Spokane are VERY hard programs to get into especially for a DO.

 

[DrMidlife]

I was told that UW, OHSU, and Spokane are VERY hard programs to get into especially for a DO.

You can get better info by spending some time on the websites for your programs of interest. There's abundant detail on current residents and their backgrounds.