General surgery for a DO?

[cryhavoc]

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-If an osteopathic student gets the same average or above MD people who get accepted into general surgery residencies get, do they have a fair shot of getting a residency?

-Additionally, on match lists I see a handful of general surgery matches for each DO school, are these students top of their class, and the few that got in, or do you think most osteopaths don't even bother applying, AND/OR just aren't interested in surgery, because of their connection to osteopathic philosophy?

Thank you. I've always been interested in being a ER doc or psych doc, but I recently been wondering about general surgery/with an eventual future in trauma surgery. It would be nice if I knew that if I scored above the average or at the average of MD accepted general surgery residences, I'd have a fair shot. Plus I figured the motivation to score so high would be great for me because even if I fail, hopefully all the extra spunk I put into getting it would have me stat wise very nice for ER or psych.

Thoughts?

 

[mk2015]

.

 

[GUH]

-If an osteopathic student gets the same average or above MD people who get accepted into general surgery residencies get, do they have a fair shot of getting a residency?

-Additionally, on match lists I see a handful of general surgery matches for each DO school, are these students top of their class, and the few that got in, or do you think most osteopaths don't even bother applying, AND/OR just aren't interested in surgery, because of their connection to osteopathic philosophy?

Thank you. I've always been interested in being a ER doc or psych doc, but I recently been wondering about general surgery/with an eventual future in trauma surgery. It would be nice if I knew that if I scored above the average or at the average of MD accepted general surgery residences, I'd have a fair shot. Plus I figured the motivation to score so high would be great for me because even if I fail, hopefully all the extra spunk I put into getting it would have me stat wise very nice for ER or psych.

Thoughts?

1) If you score better than MD's, apply broadly (not just top programs, not only in one state) and interview well, you have a very good shot. Just be aware that some surgery programs will rank you below an equally-qualified MD.

2) The osteopathic philosophy has very little to do with students not going into general surgery. There are probably a number of factors but a current resident or attending would be able to provide a better answer than I could. I will say that a minority of my classmates would even consider surgery - most would not due to personal reasons. A subset of interested students have the board scores and geographic flexibility necessary to have a very high probability of matching into it.

And of course you should aim to do well on boards.

 

[DrEnderW]

I'm assuming you mean usmle score applying acgme... And the answer is no. Equal board scores you will not have the exact same opportunity. Around 45ish match acgme GS per year, however.

Keep in mind, if you're talking about comlex scores, there are a couple hundred DO GS spots.

No, you don't have to be top of your class/ top board scores for GS. The ultra competitive surgical spots are ortho, NS, ENT, and uro. That's a couple hundred students right there.

Please realize if you can't be competitive in terms of class rank and comlex scores against DO competition, it's unlikely you'd be dominating if you had entered an MD program.

 

[Mjolner]

Please realize if you can't be competitive in terms of class rank and comlex scores against DO competition, it's unlikely you'd be dominating if you had entered an MD program.

This. Omg this. People always forget that a lot of the specialties that aren't "DO friendly" aren't specialties most of us would get if we were MDs. Blaming your lack of options come the Match on DO discrimination isn't terribly fair. Most of us weren't going to match Ortho either way.

 

[GUH]

This. Omg this. People always forget that a lot of the specialties that aren't "DO friendly" aren't specialties most of us would get if we were MDs. Blaming your lack of options come the Match on DO discrimination isn't terribly fair. Most of us weren't going to match Ortho either way.

Except when a majority of PDs in a specialty freely admit that they consider DOs differently from MDs.

 

[Drrrrrr. Celty]

This. Omg this. People always forget that a lot of the specialties that aren't "DO friendly" aren't specialties most of us would get if we were MDs. Blaming your lack of options come the Match on DO discrimination isn't terribly fair. Most of us weren't going to match Ortho either way.

Except when a majority of PDs in a specialty freely admit that they consider DOs differently from MDs.

I think there's truth in both of these statements. Plenty of DO students are flat out going to not be eligible by their 4th year because they don't have USMLE or their USMLE is on average lower than the national average ( I mean, 230 this year not considering that this is a low end number and most MD school students will be scoring above it). Likewise there will be programs that don't take DOs and PDs who simply still believe that DOs cannot be good enough or that DO school is not good enough.

 

[JustPlainBill]

No -- abandon all hope of ever doing any form of surgery/procedure based specialty if you have the letters D.O. behind your name -- you will never be good enough to do anything except perhaps be a pond-scum Family Medicine puke IFF you work hard, never sleep in medical school, get a 650+ on your COMLEX and 250+ on your USMLE and then and only then may you have a teaspoon of honey with your rice ----
This can't be a serious question? Have you even done a residency search on the number of accredited D.O. Gen Surg programs out there? With a little leg work on your part, you could email the graduate placement office at each D.O. school and determine the number of candidates that went into general surgery both allopathic and osteopathic) and where they matched -- One of my classmates matched in a NOLA program and he was in the upper half of the class but not number 1 --- we had several others go into general surgery -- heck, I was below the national average on the COMLEX and well below my class average on the COMLEX and had my MD general surgery attending offer to get me into the Mass General surgery program in spite of my board scores because I worked my butt off, admitted what I didn't know, learned quick and went balls to the wall on everything he gave me to do --- the first day I was up at 04:30 and had all of the patients on his service rounded on, notes written, therapeutic plan suggested both surgical and IM and was waiting outside his office at 0645 when he showed up -- if he offered me a chance to do something -- started with skin closure, I jumped at it and respectfully learned what I didn't know -- when he pimped me on the neck anatomy, I stated what I knew, he corrected me and I went home and grabbed Netter's -- the next day, he pimped me on the material and I had it down -- again, hustle and attitude can make up for a lot ----

I once had a question asked of me by a recruiter and they flipped out at my answer --- hypothetical question -- "It's 4th down, 25 seconds to go, 4th quarter, you're the QB and your team is on your own 5 yard line and you're down by 3, longest your kicker has ever done was 50 yards, what play do you call?" -- my answer: -- doesn't matter -- what matters is me getting the team rallied and ready to score or die trying -- I don't care about what we did in the past or what others say we can't do --- we either do this or there's nothing to go home to -- that's what'll win it ---

and that's the attitude I had in med school -- my other career was dead, I had invested way too much time, effort and money, I had a spouse and 2 small children who were depending on me to make it or I had resigned them to a life of future Wal-mart shoppers and community college -- I had nothing to go home to -- and when the Associate Dean of Medical Education looked me in the eye and told me I didn't belong there and if it was up to him, I wouldn't have been admitted -- it just made me (figuratively speaking) stack magazines, straighten pins, uncrate more mortar rounds and get the flares and claymores ready because it was gonna be a fight and I wasn't coming out of there without either a degree or in a body bag -- more than once "they" were inside the wire and it got rough --- but between determination and God, we got it done.....

Quit this "I'm a D.O. so I'm too stupid/unqualified/deck stacked against me " trash, grow a pair and go get what you want -- if you haven't figured it out by now, life isn't going to hand you anything and you won't get anywhere by listening to people tell you what you're not qualified to do -- Know you stuff, prove it, do auditions and be studly and you'll likely match -- show up as a sniveling whiner who laments their situation as a D.O. and you'll likely not get considered....

Sorry, but I get so tired of the eternal debate about what D.O.'s can and can't/are qualified/not qualified to do ---

 

[cryhavoc]

Don't apologize, I appreciate your frankness. I once had your exact attitude "screw it, I'm going to do it no matter what". Apparently admissions people and advisers don't like that attitude. They like putty. They like people to fit into boxes. They consider people who want to be a physician to be extremely realistic at all times, completely discounting willpower and hard work. I've been faking it for so long I started believing I might be incapable of things.

It is hard to balance confidence in yourself while trying to project to these admissions people you aren't "crazy". But I am a little crazy. So many people who went through what I went through would have given up ages ago on any dream, whatsoever. Only a crazy person would keep moving. They see my age and assume I'm naive, whereas my life was extremely rough and I adapted to survive and have survived. I want to be a physician, and I'm not sure which type yet.

But I gurantee, if I decide on surgery, that is what I'll become. Thank you for reminding me of that part of me.

 

[Moose A Moose]

... are these students top of their class...

Absolutely. General surgery top 20%. Sub specialties top 10%. Your board scores, whether COMLEX or USMLE, will be expected to match you GPA and class ranking.

Aside from this you need to network and show interest early on in the surgical field.

It's a long way to the top if you want to rock and roll, baby.

 

[matthewandrew]

of course.

 

[JustPlainBill]

Apparently admissions people and advisers don't like that attitude.

I hear what you're saying but remember this --- always --- Admissions pukes and advisors are in those positions for a reason -- they do well being told what to do and if it doesn't fit in their little book of directives or if it requires more brain power than a fresh cow-pie, the answer is usually ,"No" in some form or fashion -- you won't get to be a surgeon of any stripe by not showing some initiative and outside the box thinking -- when I think of surgeons, I think of ballsy, lean/mean bada$$ jungle fighter types -- yes, there are rules and standards and behavior codes but they didn't come down from Mount Sinai on tablets of stone -- Red Duke didn't get his reputation by blindly listening to administators, for sure ---

Now go kick some a$$ and get what you want --

 

[IsWhat]

No -- abandon all hope of ever doing any form of surgery/procedure based specialty if you have the letters D.O. behind your name -- you will never be good enough to do anything except perhaps be a pond-scum Family Medicine puke IFF you work hard, never sleep in medical school, get a 650+ on your COMLEX and 250+ on your USMLE and then and only then may you have a teaspoon of honey with your rice ----
This can't be a serious question? Have you even done a residency search on the number of accredited D.O. Gen Surg programs out there? With a little leg work on your part, you could email the graduate placement office at each D.O. school and determine the number of candidates that went into general surgery both allopathic and osteopathic) and where they matched -- One of my classmates matched in a NOLA program and he was in the upper half of the class but not number 1 --- we had several others go into general surgery -- heck, I was below the national average on the COMLEX and well below my class average on the COMLEX and had my MD general surgery attending offer to get me into the Mass General surgery program in spite of my board scores because I worked my butt off, admitted what I didn't know, learned quick and went balls to the wall on everything he gave me to do --- the first day I was up at 04:30 and had all of the patients on his service rounded on, notes written, therapeutic plan suggested both surgical and IM and was waiting outside his office at 0645 when he showed up -- if he offered me a chance to do something -- started with skin closure, I jumped at it and respectfully learned what I didn't know -- when he pimped me on the neck anatomy, I stated what I knew, he corrected me and I went home and grabbed Netter's -- the next day, he pimped me on the material and I had it down -- again, hustle and attitude can make up for a lot ----

I once had a question asked of me by a recruiter and they flipped out at my answer --- hypothetical question -- "It's 4th down, 25 seconds to go, 4th quarter, you're the QB and your team is on your own 5 yard line and you're down by 3, longest your kicker has ever done was 50 yards, what play do you call?" -- my answer: -- doesn't matter -- what matters is me getting the team rallied and ready to score or die trying -- I don't care about what we did in the past or what others say we can't do --- we either do this or there's nothing to go home to -- that's what'll win it ---

and that's the attitude I had in med school -- my other career was dead, I had invested way too much time, effort and money, I had a spouse and 2 small children who were depending on me to make it or I had resigned them to a life of future Wal-mart shoppers and community college -- I had nothing to go home to -- and when the Associate Dean of Medical Education looked me in the eye and told me I didn't belong there and if it was up to him, I wouldn't have been admitted -- it just made me (figuratively speaking) stack magazines, straighten pins, uncrate more mortar rounds and get the flares and claymores ready because it was gonna be a fight and I wasn't coming out of there without either a degree or in a body bag -- more than once "they" were inside the wire and it got rough --- but between determination and God, we got it done.....

Quit this "I'm a D.O. so I'm too stupid/unqualified/deck stacked against me " trash, grow a pair and go get what you want -- if you haven't figured it out by now, life isn't going to hand you anything and you won't get anywhere by listening to people tell you what you're not qualified to do -- Know you stuff, prove it, do auditions and be studly and you'll likely match -- show up as a sniveling whiner who laments their situation as a D.O. and you'll likely not get considered....

Sorry, but I get so tired of the eternal debate about what D.O.'s can and can't/are qualified/not qualified to do ---

*Standing Ovation*

 

[DavesNotHere]

No -- abandon all hope of ever doing any form of surgery/procedure based specialty if you have the letters D.O. behind your name -- you will never be good enough to do anything except perhaps be a pond-scum Family Medicine puke IFF you work hard, never sleep in medical school, get a 650+ on your COMLEX and 250+ on your USMLE and then and only then may you have a teaspoon of honey with your rice ----
This can't be a serious question? Have you even done a residency search on the number of accredited D.O. Gen Surg programs out there? With a little leg work on your part, you could email the graduate placement office at each D.O. school and determine the number of candidates that went into general surgery both allopathic and osteopathic) and where they matched -- One of my classmates matched in a NOLA program and he was in the upper half of the class but not number 1 --- we had several others go into general surgery -- heck, I was below the national average on the COMLEX and well below my class average on the COMLEX and had my MD general surgery attending offer to get me into the Mass General surgery program in spite of my board scores because I worked my butt off, admitted what I didn't know, learned quick and went balls to the wall on everything he gave me to do --- the first day I was up at 04:30 and had all of the patients on his service rounded on, notes written, therapeutic plan suggested both surgical and IM and was waiting outside his office at 0645 when he showed up -- if he offered me a chance to do something -- started with skin closure, I jumped at it and respectfully learned what I didn't know -- when he pimped me on the neck anatomy, I stated what I knew, he corrected me and I went home and grabbed Netter's -- the next day, he pimped me on the material and I had it down -- again, hustle and attitude can make up for a lot ----

I once had a question asked of me by a recruiter and they flipped out at my answer --- hypothetical question -- "It's 4th down, 25 seconds to go, 4th quarter, you're the QB and your team is on your own 5 yard line and you're down by 3, longest your kicker has ever done was 50 yards, what play do you call?" -- my answer: -- doesn't matter -- what matters is me getting the team rallied and ready to score or die trying -- I don't care about what we did in the past or what others say we can't do --- we either do this or there's nothing to go home to -- that's what'll win it ---

and that's the attitude I had in med school -- my other career was dead, I had invested way too much time, effort and money, I had a spouse and 2 small children who were depending on me to make it or I had resigned them to a life of future Wal-mart shoppers and community college -- I had nothing to go home to -- and when the Associate Dean of Medical Education looked me in the eye and told me I didn't belong there and if it was up to him, I wouldn't have been admitted -- it just made me (figuratively speaking) stack magazines, straighten pins, uncrate more mortar rounds and get the flares and claymores ready because it was gonna be a fight and I wasn't coming out of there without either a degree or in a body bag -- more than once "they" were inside the wire and it got rough --- but between determination and God, we got it done.....

Quit this "I'm a D.O. so I'm too stupid/unqualified/deck stacked against me " trash, grow a pair and go get what you want -- if you haven't figured it out by now, life isn't going to hand you anything and you won't get anywhere by listening to people tell you what you're not qualified to do -- Know you stuff, prove it, do auditions and be studly and you'll likely match -- show up as a sniveling whiner who laments their situation as a D.O. and you'll likely not get considered....

Sorry, but I get so tired of the eternal debate about what D.O.'s can and can't/are qualified/not qualified to do ---

your take no prisoners approach is awesome! so what competitive specialty did you end up going into after being offered an MGH surgery spot?

 

[68PGunner]

Don't apologize, I appreciate your frankness. I once had your exact attitude "screw it, I'm going to do it no matter what". Apparently admissions people and advisers don't like that attitude. They like putty. They like people to fit into boxes. They consider people who want to be a physician to be extremely realistic at all times, completely discounting willpower and hard work. I've been faking it for so long I started believing I might be incapable of things.

It is hard to balance confidence in yourself while trying to project to these admissions people you aren't "crazy". But I am a little crazy. So many people who went through what I went through would have given up ages ago on any dream, whatsoever. Only a crazy person would keep moving. They see my age and assume I'm naive, whereas my life was extremely rough and I adapted to survive and have survived. I want to be a physician, and I'm not sure which type yet.

But I gurantee, if I decide on surgery, that is what I'll become. Thank you for reminding me of that part of me.

Don't mistake stubbornness for sheer willpower with extreme confidence. JustPlainBill showed it through his actions. You haven't shown jack.

 

[JustPlainBill]

your take no prisoners approach is awesome! so what competitive specialty did you end up going into after being offered an MGH surgery spot?

Competitive Specialty? I went into Parenthood --- I chose my specialty based on lifestyle -- the people that I love and care about call me Daddy and Honey -- and the time we have together can't be bought and no number of caths, cool surgeries, etc will make up for that -- I had to move away from my family during med school and missed the elementary years for the most part -- but I've been there ever since -- right now, I'm a community FM doc, bringing home close to a quarter mil a year and I eat dinner with my family every night, go to the HS football games, band competitions and all that HS stuff -- since I went in a little older, I knew that in the end, work was not going to produce the satisfaction that comes from having a solid family and while money can rent you love and toys, it's not going to build the relationships that survive the hard times and that will be there when you breathe your last ---

It's very interesting --- the general surgeons who came in to talk with us (and I'm not ragging on them, just giving an example) flat out stated that they knew their grandkids better than their kids -- my general surgery attending had already divorced his wife, had a "lady friend", and was estranged from his son who lived the next burb over -- no thanks...

It's all about what's important to you ---

 

[68PGunner]

Competitive Specialty? I went into Parenthood --- I chose my specialty based on lifestyle -- the people that I love and care about call me Daddy and Honey -- and the time we have together can't be bought and no number of caths, cool surgeries, etc will make up for that -- I had to move away from my family during med school and missed the elementary years for the most part -- but I've been there ever since -- right now, I'm a community FM doc, bringing home close to a quarter mil a year and I eat dinner with my family every night, go to the HS football games, band competitions and all that HS stuff -- since I went in a little older, I knew that in the end, work was not going to produce the satisfaction that comes from having a solid family and while money can rent you love and toys, it's not going to build the relationships that survive the hard times and that will be there when you breathe your last ---

It's very interesting --- the general surgeons who came in to talk with us (and I'm not ragging on them, just giving an example) flat out stated that they knew their grandkids better than their kids -- my general surgery attending had already divorced his wife, had a "lady friend", and was estranged from his son who lived the next burb over -- no thanks...

It's all about what's important to you ---

Real talk from a champ here. I have a question for you:

Is it like virtually impossible to do surgery and have a quality family at the same time?

 

[JustPlainBill]

Real talk from a champ here. I have a question for you:

Is it like virtually impossible to do surgery and have a quality family at the same time?

I'm sure it's not -- but you have to work at it a little more -- being the spouse of a doctor takes a special person -- my wife is a very strong woman and I would be a drunk in the streets if it wasn't for her squaring me away when we first got married -- lest you think she's a domineering type, she's not -- she's a very sweet southern lady and makes our house a home -- and she is very flexible with my schedule and understands if I'm late to certain functions -- for example, when I'm on call, I can't be at the all day band competitions -- but I can be there for when my children's band is playing -- my wife is good with that and we meet up later as a family for dinner ---

I don't know how that works for surgery -- and I don't know if it's just that the examples I know of from surgery were driven workaholics anyway?

In the end, I think if I would have done this at 22 as a newlywed, it may have been different -- I was in my 40s with a prior career behind me so I already had a family, house, neurotic dog, etc --- and had already seen enough BS not to believe the hype about work/career being such a great thing -- once the "new and shiny" wears off, it gets old -- heck, I got bored by the 5th thyroidectomy on my general surgery month ---

Best advice -- consider the life you really want 5,10,15 years out of school and how you want that to look -- then go create it -- talk to a lot of docs in the field you're considered -- do the subtle checking -- are they still with their first wife? Can they name their kids? that kind of stuff....

 

[Shinobiz11]

I had a chat with a research fellow at a large name institution and he flat out told me, regardless of MD/DO, in-house students will be favored and you really have to stand out with research, publications and letters to be considered, obviously aside from competitive board scores.

 

[Cuongoff]

So an upperclassmen told me that, regarding GS, it doesn't matter that I scored above the national average for COMLEX but that I should have gotten 600+. Is that true?

 

[StevensBibi]

I had a chat with a research fellow at a large name institution and he flat out told me, regardless of MD/DO, in-house students will be favored and you really have to stand out with research, publications and letters to be considered, obviously aside from competitive board scores.

what about class rank?

 

[GUH]

So an upperclassmen told me that, regarding GS, it doesn't matter that I scored above the national average for COMLEX but that I should have gotten 600+. Is that true?

National average is in the 500-520 range. So if you get 600+ you are roughly a standard deviation above it (ie. In the top 1/6th of all osteopathic medical students).

 

[Shinobiz11]

what about class rank?

Didn't say, I've always heard it's not that important compared to the other stuff I mentioned.

 

[Mad Jack]

-If an osteopathic student gets the same average or above MD people who get accepted into general surgery residencies get, do they have a fair shot of getting a residency?

Here's the long and short of it.

Our surgical club is probably 30-40 members strong for my year alone, and last year we had only a handful of surgical matches. Basically, only 10-20% max of the people that have a strong interest in surgery end up getting a spot down the line. This is probably the result of a multitude of factors- the DO bias, students coming in with lower stats that tend to end up doing worse on the boards than they'd like, too few of them doing research compared to their MD colleagues, and who knows what else. At the end of the day, surgery is extremely competitive these days. It's unknown how many of the DO general surgery programs will survive the merger, and there are still a good number of MD surgery programs that won't touch a DO. That isn't to say it's impossible, but more to say that if you want to be a surgeon, be aware that you're going to be fighting a long uphill battle to get there, and you'd better be the best damn student you can be in every way you can manage.

 

[68PGunner]

No

Run me through a typical day in which you balance both work and family.

 

[cs24]

Our surgical club is probably 30-40 members strong for my year alone, and last year we had only a handful of surgical matches.

I would bet that most of those 40 people that sign up for surgery club during M1 don't end up applying for surgery. It's like that at most schools. Surgery sounds cool to everyone at first and then third year hits...

 

[GUH]

I would bet that most of those 40 people that sign up for surgery club during M1 don't end up applying for surgery. It's like that at most schools. Surgery sounds cool to everyone at first and then third year hits...

I joined a couple clubs as an OMS-1 exclusively because of their reputation for serving good food at lunch meetings.

 

[Shinobiz11]

I joined a couple clubs as an OMS-1 exclusively because of their reputation for serving good food at lunch meetings.

Resourcefulness.

 

[Goro]

Of all of my students who have gone into an ACGME residency, < 4% have made it into General Surgery. So, it will be very difficult.

Even with ACGME and AOA combined, it's around 3%! But most of my kids are interested in Primary Care from the get-go and self-select our school for it.

-If an osteopathic student gets the same average or above MD people who get accepted into general surgery residencies get, do they have a fair shot of getting a residency?

-Additionally, on match lists I see a handful of general surgery matches for each DO school, are these students top of their class, and the few that got in, or do you think most osteopaths don't even bother applying, AND/OR just aren't interested in surgery, because of their connection to osteopathic philosophy?

Thank you. I've always been interested in being a ER doc or psych doc, but I recently been wondering about general surgery/with an eventual future in trauma surgery. It would be nice if I knew that if I scored above the average or at the average of MD accepted general surgery residences, I'd have a fair shot. Plus I figured the motivation to score so high would be great for me because even if I fail, hopefully all the extra spunk I put into getting it would have me stat wise very nice for ER or psych.

Thoughts?

 

[RM38]

I used to be a resident at a AOA surgery program before switching fields. My match was several years ago, but you definitely did not need a 600 to match into gen surg with maybe the exception of a few hyper competitive programs. The overwhelming majority of places will look at people with average scores if the rest of their application is decent. Of course the rotation at a place is a big component as well. I wouldn't listen to many med students about that as they don't know everybody's stats applying and may only be referencing what someone from one of the super competitive places said about their specific program. Also they have never been on the other side of the recruiting process so their information is quite limited. Most people that I know from my school that graduated with me that applied gen surg matched. Most of the ones that didn't were applying allopathic and wound up matching into prelim years which I don't count since they weren't categorical and likely were going to end up doing something else. The vast majority of us did not have 600's on COMLEX and I think my average was around a 555 or so between step 1 and 2. I got something like 10 interviews and wound up at a place I did not rotate at, but is a solid program. Several other of my classmates that I know matched with lower scores than me and even one whom I think failed a class or 2, so it is certainly possible if you work hard during rotations to make a good impression. As a side note, I am a PGY-IV now, so things could have changed a bit, but probably not that much.

 

[Buck Winters]

.

 

[Moose A Moose]

If you think you'd be happy in any specialty other than surgery, don't do surgery.

Words from my school's GS PD.