Do research for 6+ months before medical school starts?

[Yaa Yeet]

I got into MD school and will start in august 2025. I currently work 35 hours a week as a scribe and I am thinking about quitting and was wondering if it would be a good idea to replace those 35 hours a week with research instead? Id be doing research up until med school starts where I will take a few months break to get into the groove of studying and then go back into research again.

Is it worth it to do research before medical school in regards to boosting my residency application or does research before MS1 not really mean anything?
Thank you!

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[pablo213]

I would definitely do this if money isn't an issue and you don't care too much about taking a vacation. The grind for research in med school is real if you want to do anything competitive. I've been reaching out to a bunch of people to get started ASAP m1 but I really wish I had started sooner.

 

[Doctoscope]

I'd absolutely do it IF you know you'll get something concrete out of it. I had ~8 months to chill before med school, and as nice as the time off was I do regret not having done research during the time.

 

[stew_md]

The residency arms race is real.

 

[voxveritatisetlucis]

Depends if it’s lab work or clinical. For lab work you probably won’t get anything

 

[Yaa Yeet]

I would definitely do this if money isn't an issue and you don't care too much about taking a vacation. The grind for research in med school is real if you want to do anything competitive. I've been reaching out to a bunch of people to get started ASAP m1 but I really wish I had started sooner.

you're still very early though as an M1 and it is only October too. I heard most people don't do research until after their first year?

 

[Yaa Yeet]

Depends if it’s lab work or clinical. For lab work you probably won’t get anything

I thought clinic work would take longer to publish than lab work? sorry i'm very new to the details of research in med school

 

[voxveritatisetlucis]

Lab work takes way longer and most of the time doesn’t even get published. Waste of time unless you’re doing a PhD

 

[pablo213]

you're still very early though as an M1 and it is only October too. I heard most people don't do research until after their first year?

I've seen a lot of people online say the same thing and that's why I wasn't too worried waiting for med school to start. Trust me bro if you're at all interested in something competitive start now. Now that I'm in med school I've learned how bad it really is. Nearly all the upperclassmen at my school gunning for nsg are planning on taking a research year. That includes people that started grinding research first semester M1.

There is something to be said for taking it somewhat easy until you have your first exam once you're actually in med school, but you can still start reaching out during this period since it takes some time to get onboarded and stuff. To your 2nd point, if you decide on a less competitive specialty then waiting for M2 is prolly fine, but that's way too late for something like plastics or nsg unless you have a ton of pubs coming into med school or don't mind taking a research year(s).

 

[AJS59]

I got into MD school and will start in august 2025. I currently work 35 hours a week as a scribe and I am thinking about quitting and was wondering if it would be a good idea to replace those 35 hours a week with research instead? Id be doing research up until med school starts where I will take a few months break to get into the groove of studying and then go back into research again.

Is it worth it to do research before medical school in regards to boosting my residency application or does research before MS1 not really mean anything?
Thank you!

Research is research is research. That's why my 1 pub in organic chemistry will eventually make its way to my future ERAS...hoping to supplement with more relevant pubs ofc.

That being said, you probably don't know what it is you want to do right now (and that is okay, you really shouldn't be deciding that before med school anyways). If research appeals to you in general, sure, but if the scribe job pays more take advantage of that. Unless you'd be joining a very productive lab or group, or doing something not in basic sciences, the odds you would be able to produce anything significant in 6 months is low.

An alternative consideration: Why not quit your scribe job and go do something fun? For better or for worse, these 6 months are the most free you will be from now until attendinghood. If there are places you want to travel to or bucket list items you want to do, go do them now. Not everything needs to be about an arms race for residency.

TL;Dr do it if you want to, just remember you might be either disadvantaging yourself pay wise OR losing out on the opportunity to do something meaningful with your time. You only live life once, it's not all about getting to the next finish line.

 

[operaman]

Would definitely quit the scribe job unless it pays really well. It served its purpose.

Research a bit tougher. It’s only worth it if it potentially leads to something meaningful. For you at this stage that might be:

1) publication
2) connections
3) lab experience (if you’re seriously considering a research career and want to explore this a bit more)

Will assume since you’re asking the question at all that #3 doesn’t apply. You’re thinking mainly a clinical career path and you want a strong residency app.

Would help a ton to have some idea what you want to do. If you’d be working at your future medical school, doing something in a department where you want to build connections wouldn’t be a bad idea. Even better if it’s PI who churns out pubs.

In a nutshell- worth it if you can see how it leads to pubs/connections. Not worth it just for “experience” unless you’re trying to decide whether to do a phd or something.

Don’t forget to take time and enjoy life a bit. An under-discussed part of success in medicine is managing your own burnout. A big part of that is making plenty of time to enjoy life outside medicine, so try and find a balance.

 

[lioneljohn]

Congrats on getting into med school! That’s awesome!

As for what advice I would give you is to just pick what you enjoy more and what aligns with your goals. Trust me, when you get old you will be greatfull that you picked what you liked

 

[Dral]

A lot of folks do research between M1 and M2 (probably your last summer "off" before retirement).

How close are you to the med school where you will matriculate? If close, it would be great to do research with someone there that you could continue into med school.

 

[Yaa Yeet]

I've seen a lot of people online say the same thing and that's why I wasn't too worried waiting for med school to start. Trust me bro if you're at all interested in something competitive start now. Now that I'm in med school I've learned how bad it really is. Nearly all the upperclassmen at my school gunning for nsg are planning on taking a research year. That includes people that started grinding research first semester M1.

There is something to be said for taking it somewhat easy until you have your first exam once you're actually in med school, but you can still start reaching out during this period since it takes some time to get onboarded and stuff. To your 2nd point, if you decide on a less competitive specialty then waiting for M2 is prolly fine, but that's way too late for something like plastics or nsg unless you have a ton of pubs coming into med school or don't mind taking a research year(s).

thank you for the advice! do you have a recommendation for what type of lab to join if I wanted to get published within 6 months? I was thinking about not doing reserach for the first 2 months of med school to get used to the work load and having a pub before taking that break would be great

 

[pablo213]

thank you for the advice! do you have a recommendation for what type of lab to join if I wanted to get published within 6 months? I was thinking about not doing reserach for the first 2 months of med school to get used to the work load and having a pub before taking that break would be great

If you're not 100% set on a specialty, something like cancer research or disparities research can be decent since it crosses specialties. Specialty specific would be ideal and clinical research if you only have 6 months. You could get lucky with bench research if you join the right lab and be included in a few pubs but I think It would be riskier. You'd have to be onboarded and trained on specific techniques and then do enough work to be included in the pub. Unlikely they would be willing to do that if they know you'd be gone in 6 months.

 

[pablo213]

question about this - how should we go about this in the case (my situation atm) that we don't know where we'll get A's to until like March or what not?

just cold email clinical research labs like we did in ug for basic science, then start learning from there and hope it'll go computational? what if in this scenario, the med school I end up at is halfway across the country or something? would it be an easy transition?

thanks for sticking around forums giving advice even after getting in 😀

Happy to help. This is a little trickier, but it can still done. I would see if there's anybody doing clinical or computational research near you and reach out to those folks first. If that fails, you can try cold emailing labs or people you're interested in working with at really any medical school. You'll likely have a very low yield of responses in all honesty until you can say you're an incoming med student at XYZ school at which point it may improve. I'm working on a few projects rn and there's med students from a few different places reaching out, so I don't think it's that uncommon.

For stuff like chart review, it may also be time consuming to get access to EHRs, trainings, etc especially if you're not at that institution. But certainly reviews or dry lab stuff could be within reach. Once you know where you're going for med school, you can choose to continue working on the projects which should be doable since they lend themselves to online format or you can kinda cut ties (amicably of course).

 

[pablo213]

sounds good thanks. I'll read more on forums about how to computationally work on clinical research and pump out 20 whatever pubs like others seem to do. I'm still used to the basic research minset of 1 pub in 2 years being great

Honestly even if you don't get any pubs rn, learning languages like Python or R will be pretty fruitful for you if you like the computational dry lab stuff. Those skills seem to be in pretty high demand

 

[AJS59]

Gotcha yea I'd assume it's the same data science packages/scikit type stuff from undergrad? I'm mostly confused by how someone gets 20-30 pubs by ERAS. Like how is that possible assuming no research year? How is it so common?

For many students it is not as common as you think. My understanding (please correct me if I'm wrong) is those 20-30 "publications" include peer-reviewed publications, abstracts, conference posters, etc. So it is possible to get several items out of the same project.

No one accumulates that many publications alone, unless they either have a strong research background prior to medical school, take a gap year during medical school, are doing an MD/PhD, or lack the physiological need for sleep.

 

[pablo213]

Gotcha yea I'd assume it's the same data science packages/scikit type stuff from undergrad? I'm mostly confused by how someone gets 20-30 pubs by ERAS. Like how is that possible assuming no research year? How is it so common?

Being on multiple projects at the same time for sure. Also if you have a close group of friends you can help on each other's pubs and increase your count even further. Most of those 20-30 are not first author pubs

 

[Yaa Yeet]

Being on multiple projects at the same time for sure. Also if you have a close group of friends you can help on each other's pubs and increase your count even further. Most of those 20-30 are not first author pubs

how do u recommend I get into clinical research so i can publish more? Online, idk who to email because it's hard to tell who is involved in lab work or clinical work and based on the comment someone else made, clinical research publishes more so i wanna do that. Thank you for responding and helping us out pablo

 

[Redpancreas]

I’m just going to put an end to this. No. Don’t do research.

You don’t just “do research”. It requires a mentor/skills/IRBs if it’s a patient study. Sure, you could acquire those two things in your spare time with large databases or writing a review that don’t need an IRB, but it’d probably be a better idea to just go to the gym, watch a Netflix series, go out more, learn a language/travel. What you do in these next few months isn’t going to move the needle a bit on your residency prospects.

Edit: if you know you want XYZ competitive thing and you find a structured opportunity for that, go ahead and apply. You could also reach out to faculty mentors to see if you could get involved in their projects. Offer to lit search write and see what they give you.

 

[Redpancreas]

well ofc it wouldn't just be some solo research on an open database or something. it'd be with a PI/mentors/etc like usual (I assume

You could apply for structured opportunities. I still highly recommend you focus your time elsewhere.

Reading through OPs questions and progression, they don’t really have a plan. Hence, I would say just chill @Yaa Yeet

 

[Redpancreas]

Don't get me wrong I agree with taking a break and improving on other aspects like lifting etc but surely it's ok if there's time for it all?

I mean, I guess…but it’s easier said than done.

 

[pablo213]

how do u recommend I get into clinical research so i can publish more? Online, idk who to email because it's hard to tell who is involved in lab work or clinical work and based on the comment someone else made, clinical research publishes more so i wanna do that. Thank you for responding and helping us out pablo

Gotta decide on a field you're interested in and then start looking up people near you. The type of research they do will be evident through their Google scholar and what not. Make sure they publish a lot every year and that students (undergrad or med students) are part of some of those pubs.