Grades in medical school

[HIghbury]

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Out of curiosity, what is the minimum grade to get into residency like surgery,Emergency medicine, ENT... ?What is the percentage score or grade? This is not including the USMLE score of course. Thank you

 

[Wizard of Oz]

Out of curiosity, what is the minimum grade to get into residency like surgery,Emergency medicine, ENT... ?What is the percentage score or grade? This is not including the USMLE score of course. Thank you

No such thing. Most schools don't have traditional grades. Other than that, there is no standard for "percentage" between schools.

You're stuck with USMLE as your discriminator between applicants with a class rank indicator such as AOA playing some role. ORL is very competative, EM somewhat, surgery moderate.

I will also note that there is no such thing as a "minimum" anything other than to say that you have to pass your boards and your classes. Of course the better you do, the better you will look to program directors, but it's not like "Oh you can't do this specialty because you got a C in 2006."

 

[tenaciousB]

I'm a first-year and am no expert on the subject but I've been told over and over that third-year grades are very important, especially medicine and surgery. I can't speak for every school but most seem to incorporate the A-E (or Honors, high pass, pass, etc.) system for clerkship grades, while preclinicals can sometimes be pass/fail or honors/pass/fail. The clerkships are also where you can get LORs, and subjective evaluations by your attendings also play a large part in your grades, rather than relying only on exams. Altogether the clerkship grades are important because of the grade spreads and because they better demonstrate your future skill as a doctor than rote memorization (of stuff you may never need to know again).

I've heard a mix of things about first- and second-year grades. Some attendings who are involved in competitive residency selection have even said they don't care at all about them. Step 1 of the boards, which tests on first and second-year material, is an objective comparison of preclinical performance between students everywhere, and is much more important. On the other hand, AOA is heavily based on class rank so first and second year grades play a factor in whether you'll be selected. I can't say how they're weighted compared to clerkships, my guess would be less but each school probably does something different. Anybody out there please correct me if I got some of this stuff wrong. I'd like to know for my own benefit too. Thanks.

 

[Wizard of Oz]

There is going to be some variation in opinion between schools. In Big 12 country where I live, it's typical to just have one medical school in a state. In those cases, if an applicant is simply trying to stay at the same school for residency, then it is reasonable to assume that program directors can use all of the above for comparing applicants if they prefer to fill with home-grown talent.

However, whenever you have a pool of applicants from several different schools, there's no way to compare students by any sort of grading system. This is not only because what schools call the grades are different. There are just too many ways to represent content. My school has a year-long pharm class and a year-long pathophysiology course in year 2--2 "grades" to represent a third of your GPA for the year each. I'm not sure why they do it that way, but I suspect it keeps people from failing.

They will use the LOR's and research experience, sure, and MS 3 is definitely the most important year.

 

[jdh71]

Grades - more properly good grades, oustanding grades are like giving yourself options. They will open doors at places where no one knows you and you give you the chance to be known. You don't have to always have the greatest grades for competitive specialties if you're willing to put in time personally with those folks. For instance, you have average grades but want ortho, well one way to help yourself is spend all waking time with your ortho folks at your school as well as being aggressive about outside electives at middle tier programs who will give a guy a shot because they like him (many top tier prorams and I mean top tier programs across the board of scpecialties - are elitist and snobbish - and tend to take only their elitist and snobbish counterparts from medical school). Also research, especially if you get published, if great to make up for lack of 10% grades.

 

[mikedc813]

Grades - more properly good grades, oustanding grades are like giving yourself options. They will open doors at places where no one knows you and you give you the chance to be known. You don't have to always have the greatest grades for competitive specialties if you're willing to put in time personally with those folks. For instance, you have average grades but want ortho, well one way to help yourself is spend all waking time with your ortho folks at your school as well as being aggressive about outside electives at middle tier programs who will give a guy a shot because they like him (many top tier prorams and I mean top tier programs across the board of scpecialties - are elitist and snobbish - and tend to take only their elitist and snobbish counterparts from medical school). Also research, especially if you get published, if great to make up for lack of 10% grades.

I agree with this. Grades and Step 1 scores will definitely be looked at by residency programs, but it's hard to say what the "minimum" is for each program. Some do have cut-offs (for example at USF, I have been told by the chairman of the ENT department that the cut-off is a 225 Step 1 score), but some don't have cut-offs.

If you want to get into a competitive program you also really should spend a lot of time with the faculty outside of school. Let them see that you will work well with them. That will get you one step ahead of the rest of the applicants.