Harvard. Yet undecided?

[atlasel]

Hello everyone,
I contacted to a MD PhD psychiatrist from Harvard, for 6 weeks summer internship at his lab. I am an IMG, and for me this will be the first time in the US. What I aim is to deserve a good LOR during that period, to at least have one LOR in the US. I have other strong LORs from the doctors- in my country.

The question is... I will be working at the lab most of the time, I might spend some time in clinic but It won't be counted a clinic experience. So I need your knowledge to enlighten me if this LOR will be valuable when I apply for psych programs? Even it's not counted a rotation?

Or should I go to a neurosurgery elective, and get a clinical LOR instead?
(because I couldn't find any pscyh electives)

I want it worth coming to US, because I will be crossing the Atlantic ocean.

I would appreciate any feedbacks!

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[Bartelby]

I think doing a psychiatry rotation would be more valuable than any of the above. Do you mean you couldn't find a psychiatry rotation at Harvard, or at any site you would consider?

Having a big-name researcher write you a letter is nice, but when application committees review you they care much more about predicting what kind of clinician you will be. They want someone who is professional, easy to work with, and who will make medical decisions the program can trust. People who can't achieve those things create lots of extra work for a program. The researcher can comment on how you are to work with, but cannot say anything about the most important part: how you perform clinically. The neurosurgeon can comment on some clinical skills, but neurosurgery is a much different work environment than psychiatry.

 

[atlasel]

Do you mean you couldn't find a psychiatry rotation at Harvard, or at any site you would consider?

Thank you for the opinion. Not only Harvard, I couldn't find any site I wrote to. Maybe because I couldn't contact them the right way, I don't know.

 

[medicool]

Being an IMG I can say that when programs look at your LoR they are looking at the kind of experience you had and the credentials of the writer. Many IMG friendly programs prefer clinical hands on experience which means the writer can attest to your level of communication and clinical knowledge. Programs that are not big on research will not take a big notice of research experience but it definitely will not hurt. Keep digging and contacting people for opportunities and they will show up,they did for me. I wouldn't advice neurosurgery rotations if psychiatry is what you want to do.

 

[J ROD]

You should continue to look for a clinical Psychiatry rotation

 

[splik]

presumably you are not an IMG but a med student (IMS) if you are looking at electives? when you do expect to graduate? What is your country of origin/med school? You need to get a clinical elective in psychiatry, somewhere. These are a bit more difficult to get for IMGs in the past now that many DO students are doing away rotations etc. But you should be able to find something, somewhere. However you will have a hard time finding an elective during the summer period as this is by far the most popular time for US students to do electives. I would do the 6 week summer internship, but you will need to do a clinical elective in addition. 6 weeks is not really long enough to do research of much substance.

A neurosurgery elective will be of no help to you at all. In fact, it may be harmful to you psychiatry application.

 

[atlasel]

presumably you are not an IMG but a med student (IMS) if you are looking at electives? when you do expect to graduate? What is your country of origin/med school? You need to get a clinical elective in psychiatry, somewhere. These are a bit more difficult to get for IMGs in the past now that many DO students are doing away rotations etc. But you should be able to find something, somewhere. However you will have a hard time finding an elective during the summer period as this is by far the most popular time for US students to do electives. I would do the 6 week summer internship, but you will need to do a clinical elective in addition. 6 weeks is not really long enough to do research of much substance.

A neurosurgery elective will be of no help to you at all. In fact, it may be harmful to you psychiatry application.

Yes, I am and IM(S). I am from Turkey, medical education is 6 years here. We have psychiatry rotations in 5th year. Which means I can get a strong letter based on a clinic psych experience here in Turkey. But I asked the question because, I almost read all of you entries and got the idea a strong letter from an US person will be a lot more meaningful.
During this internship, I am hoping to spend some time at the hospital as my mentor is also a clinician. So I hope to have a good impact on him- prove my communication skills, and how interested I am. So would it still be worthless that way? I mean does the mentor should mention the word 'rotation' in the letter, if he already knows me enough to recommend me for a clinic program?
A strong psych letter from my country + a neurology letter from a world top ranked UK university(I was at last summer) + a US psych letter(Harvard-nonclinical?) would be likely to do the job? (hopefully).

(Apologies for any grammar mistakes.)

 

[splik]

It's not worthless. It's not about the letters alone. It is that many/most programs require at least 8 weeks of US based electives in psychiatry and in order to give yourself the best chance of matching (it is becoming increasingly difficult for foreigners, it doesn't help that you're from Turkey, and possibly worse still if you are muslim unfortunately). Thus the research thing, while I would certainly think it could be a great experience (especially if you are a researcher and are hoping to have an academic career) will not be sufficient to meet the requirements to maximize your chances of matching, and matching well. I can see the harvard research experience as being most helpful if it leads to further opportunities for you (for example a postdoc) if you are hoping to have an academic career. If you are not planning on having an academic career, then the summer internship will be much less useful.

Also the UK letter may or may not be good. Have you seen it? Unfortunately british letters of recommended are usually terrible, because they don't know how to write references for an American audience. I wrote my own letters of recommendation so I knew they would be written well and appropriately for Americans.

 

[pisekar]

It seems like this is going to be your very first experience in the United States. My advice is not to focus on getting a recommendation letter during your rotation. Go and learn how to do research, get familiarize yourself with the collegial environment in the USA and try to make connections for your future/possible experiences. It will take some time for you to apply for residency, and to my opinion, outdated LORs are not very useful during the application process. My second advice is, try to talk with lots of people who has different experiences... For example, I had neurosurgery research experience for a year (because I couldn't find a psych one during that time). Then prior to application season, I did 2 months of observerships and had letters from those experiences. I matched to a university program in psychiatry. If you can find one, electives are the best for the application. When I was at the medical school, my medical school did not let me go to an away rotation, because they need someone to do scutwork.

 

[atlasel]

Also the UK letter may or may not be good. Have you seen it? Unfortunately British letters of recommended are usually terrible, because they don't know how to write references for an American audience.

It's not written yet, I didn't know British letters were terrible. So I'd better send the professor some letter examples.
Is where you do this 8 weeks elective important, any university hospital I could find is fine for an IMS?
thank you very much for your opinions.

It seems like this is going to be your very first experience in the United States. My advice is not to focus on getting a recommendation letter during your rotation. Go and learn how to do research, get familiarize yourself with the collegial environment in the USA and try to make connections for your future/possible experiences. It will take some time for you to apply for residency, and to my opinion, outdated LORs are not very useful during the application process. My second advice is, try to talk with lots of people who has different experiences... For example, I had neurosurgery research experience for a year (because I couldn't find a psych one during that time). Then prior to application season, I did 2 months of observerships and had letters from those experiences. I matched to a university program in psychiatry. If you can find one, electives are the best for the application. When I was at the medical school, my medical school did not let me go to an away rotation, because they need someone to do scutwork.

I read about observerships are less meaningful than electives, because they are outpatient. And I may not have the opportunity to go to US for another elective while I am still a student(next 2 years). This is actually why I am worried. But it's good to know the letters from the observership you did after graduation helped you, but also that neurosurgery research year must have been effective. If not special, did you get paid for that? Thank you very much for the advice.