Fellowship question

[Dral]

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So I've heard differing opinions on the topic of doing fellowships at the same location as residency training.

I'm looking at residency programs and my initial impression is to look at programs with fellowship positions in fields I'm interested in, but some have told me a lot of people go to a different institution for fellowships. Any opinions?

 

[yaah]

Benefits and drawbacks to both. Doing residency at the program with the fellowship has benefits for getting the fellowship (even if you don't get the internal one, you have people there who are knowledgable in the area and can be good references, work on projects with you, etc). There are benefits to fellowship training in a different system, but I don't think it really matters that much. A lot of it depends on how hard you work.

 

[Dral]

The whole 'who you know vs what you know' I guess is the gist of the question, and from what you say, the 'what you know' is more important. That's what I would have liked to hear. Cool.

 

[yaah]

Well, the "what you know" is more important after the fellowship (although if you're looking for an academic career who you know is also important). But in terms of landing the fellowship, it's often more about who you know in many cases, or who you are. It's not generally about your knowledge as it is about your experience in the specialty and interest in it.

 

[ih8biochem]

Though I typically don't disagree with yaaah, but I'm gonna go out on a limb on this one. It seems as though academic institutions are always actively recruiting whereas with community operations, you always hear about how they don't ever advertise. Rather, a phone call made to PD's/chair's asking "who'd ya got?" Who you know matters more for community practice.

As for the fellowship question, I'd say that in my limited experience, I've come across several struggling 3rd/4th years trying to land a dermpath fellowship because their institution doesn't offer it. I've also talked to dermpath fellowship directors and their sentiment has always been go with the known entity. Sure, they prefer internal candidates. Who you know matters more but I've seen this ONLY with dermpath.

 

[Magnolia Dash]

I've just finished my internship in Burma.
I want to be a pathologist (histopathology).
Should I attempt USMLE or FRCP?
Please let me know the pathways to be a histopathologist.
How should I prepare?

 

[yaah]

Though I typically don't disagree with yaaah, but I'm gonna go out on a limb on this one. It seems as though academic institutions are always actively recruiting whereas with community operations, you always hear about how they don't ever advertise. Rather, a phone call made to PD's/chair's asking "who'd ya got?" Who you know matters more for community practice.

As for the fellowship question, I'd say that in my limited experience, I've come across several struggling 3rd/4th years trying to land a dermpath fellowship because their institution doesn't offer it. I've also talked to dermpath fellowship directors and their sentiment has always been go with the known entity. Sure, they prefer internal candidates. Who you know matters more but I've seen this ONLY with dermpath.

As to your latter point, I agree with that too. Although there are programs that prefer not to take internal candidates, or at the very least do not give any real preference to internal candidates. I would say it doesn't matter only with dermpath, it's just more acute there because there is more competition. GI path I would say is similar. Many less competitive fellowships also end up filling with internal candidates if there is one, it's just that there often isn't one. When something is as competitive as dermpath in a residency class of 4-5 people there is almost inevitably going to be at least one person who is interested.

As to your first point, I agree with you. Maybe mine was unclear - I was talking more about fellowships than post fellowship jobs. Academic positions generally do advertise and recruit, as many of them are required to when they fill an open position. But the personal recruitment also happens with academic jobs - it's just that it happens in conjunction with other recruitment strategies.

 

[trent05]

If you are interested in a competitive fellowship (GI, Derm, GU) then I would highly recommend going to a place that has it. It made a world of difference for me and a friend of mine at a different program (for the reasons that Yaah stated).

 

[Dral]

Thanks for the responses...very helpful. I've been checking out websites of some of the places that offer more fellowship options. If I end up in a Path residency ('bout 80% leaning in that direction currently) I am actually considering Derm but also interested in Neuro, Cyto, Surg, maybe Molecular if I decide to stay in academia and go research heavy.

I don't want to be too quick to decide on an area to specialize in, but I'm trying to think ahead as well in terms of possibilities. Thanks again.