Gap year between Residency and Fellowship?

[Medstart108]

I have a couple of questions relating to this issue. I would love to be able to take a year or two off between residency (in IM) and fellowship to work in another country. Is it possible to take a year or two off to go work in another country as a physician between residency and fellowship? Will fellowships look down on someone who isn't applying straight out of residency?

Also, how long must the gap between residency and fellowship be before you are pretty much ruled out from consideration?

---

Members don't see this ad.

 

[Winged Scapula]

I have a couple of questions relating to this issue. I would love to be able to take a year or two off between residency (in IM) and fellowship to work in another country. Is it possible to take a year or two off to go work in another country as a physician between residency and fellowship?

Is it possible? That would depend on the country. Bear in mind that many other countries will not accept training outside of their institutions, at least not with a lengthy "apprenticeship" or repeating some part of their training schema. Best to figure out the requirements for working in a country outside of the US with US GME as its not like you can just show up and flash your US medical license and residency certificate and start working.

Will fellowships look down on someone who isn't applying straight out of residency?

Probably not, as many people spend a few years working in their residency field before applying for fellowship. In the end, if you're a competitive candidate then a year or two wouldn't matter.

Also, how long must the gap between residency and fellowship be before you are pretty much ruled out from consideration?

I'm not sure there's an answer to this question although I can imagine if you were not working in the US medical system, some concern might be loss of skills relevant to our population and way of healthcare, should you take several years away.

 

[Top Gun]

Probably not, as many people spend a few years working in their residency field before applying for fellowship. In the end, if you're a competitive candidate then a year or two wouldn't matter.

Not sure about this. Last year, when I interviewed for nephro fellowship, I had many interviewers ask me why I had waited a year to apply after graduating from residency. One interviewer told me candidates who applied later rather than upon residency graduation were less desirable, because many programs took that as a sign of insufficient commitment to the specialty or something.

 

[AStark]

I have a couple of questions relating to this issue. I would love to be able to take a year or two off between residency (in IM) and fellowship to work in another country. Is it possible to take a year or two off to go work in another country as a physician between residency and fellowship? Will fellowships look down on someone who isn't applying straight out of residency?

Also, how long must the gap between residency and fellowship be before you are pretty much ruled out from consideration?

In the case of IM residencies in Canada this would be quite unusual. I'm sure it would be possible, but there's a reason why the IM subspecialty match is called the "R-4 match". It's not unheard of for residents to complete the full 4 years of IM before entering heavier subspecialties like Critical Care, but it's not really typical.

Similarly, since Canadian programs all require 4 years of training for certification in IM, you wouldn't be able to take a year until after those 4 years.

Finally, if you read the eligibility criterial for each school, you'll see that, in general, fully licensed physicians are NOT eligible for the subspecialty match in the first iteration.