I am an undergrad in my 3rd year with a 3.4 gpa. I currently have a 14g in my ear and I honestly would like to reach and stop at 10g. Now, please understand that 14g is two sizes larger than the typical earring gauge. Google an image if you don't know what it looks like. Of course I do not plan to have anything in my ears while working; I would just like to know if having the stated hole sizes in your ears is frown upon or not.
How bad is it really to have holes in your ear as a doctor?
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My impression of med schools and physicians right now in general is that they trend heavily on the conservative (non politically) in terms of dress and appearance. The holes will draw attention.
I don't believe it's completely damning but it will put you at a disadvantage in the interview process. You may get questions about it, or worse yet you may just be silently judged by adcoms.
I don't believe it's completely damning but it will put you at a disadvantage in the interview process. You may get questions about it, or worse yet you may just be silently judged by adcoms.
R
RTC19
Ditto.
If you will read the interview threads on here, medicine as a profession really does tend towards conservative dress, to the point that even something as benign as light colored or non-matching suits is considered to be less than acceptable. It's wrong to judge people for having tattoos or gauges or anything else, but that's the way it is right now.
Good luck to you, OP.
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My experience with gauges is limited to 2 students (therefore extrapolate with caution). One student (male) was admitted without them and progressed to about 2-3 mm. When he under-matched in a residency for which he was very well qualified, there was speculation from those in his specialty that the gauges played a role. Another student (also male) has since had his ears surgically repaired so that his residency application will not be affected.
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What about dreadlocks?
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IMO, if gauges aren't acceptable, why in the WORLD would dread locks be?!
I don't know about you but I don't think that this looks too 'professional.' Nothing against futbol, but he is the first person with dreads that came to mind.
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IMO, if gauges aren't acceptable, why in the WORLD would dread locks be?!
I don't know about you but I don't think that this looks too 'professional.' Nothing against futbol, but he is the first person with dreads that came to mind.
Well Im black and its my natural hair its not much I can do about that
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First of all, I would be seriously concerned if my physician didn't have at least one hole in each ear. I can't imagine they'd be able to auscultate very well.
To answer your question, I'll pose another: If your goal is to practice medicine, why modify your body in such a way that patients might not trust your judgment?
Do you have a satisfactory answer to that? If so, mutilate yourself to your heart's desire.
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2 Chainz?
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We had an applicant with dreads who was so highly fought over that we couldn't get him with a full tuition scholarship! They were pulled back nicely, though
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That's actually one of the only answers where I could see you getting traction. That is, if this kind of body modification is truly relevant to your cultural heritage in a way that you can cite.
But I still don't think it's worth the impediment you're inevitably setting up for yourself.
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Nah I'm young and tatted so more like a chief keef
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Sosa!
You just have to weigh the risks vs. the benefits. If gauging your ears is truly that important to you culturally, more so than your potential career, then go for it. But realize you will be judged for it, so if you're not willing to take a hit to your career for them, I would advise against it.
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From what I've seen, the issue is less the patients and more the conservative people in charge of your advancement.
Also, really, mutilate?
Gauging (esp a 14g) entails neither violence nor 'serious damage'
Wanna maybe reign in the judgement a bit and use a word without such unnecessarily extreme connotations?
You can recognize and point out that OP will be judged and perhaps negatively affected without participating in that practice yourself.
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I personally think that it shows bad judgement (at least at a certain point of your life). Would I mind it? No, but many of your patients will.
Edit: LOL why would you include your GPA in this question 😀
Edit: LOL why would you include your GPA in this question 😀
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The conservative image? That bugs me. Not everyone is the same and we don't all need to conform.
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My word use was quite intentional.
I do judge people with gauges in their ears. We make thousands of judgments about the world around us each day. There's nothing inherently wrong with making a judgment.
It's not about conforming, it's about people's judgements in a subconscious level. Gauged ears are associated with a certain crowd of people, so it's natural that when someone sees another person who has gauged ears, they naturally associate them with that same crowd.
It's the same thing as when someone is walking down the street late at night and sees someone with tattoos and piercings and wearing baggy clothes walking towards them. The natural reaction is to be cautious and suspicious of that person, even though they could be completely harmless.
Judging others is favorable from an evolutionary standpoint: it's about learning from the past and applying what you learned to a present situation. Now the situation isn't always the same, and you could very well be wrongfully judging someone, but from a survival standpoint it's better to be safe than sorry.
The question becomes: do you want to deal with being subconsciously judged by others or not?
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Use my pink hair dye before interview season. Got it.
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Interesting. I've just never, ever had that knee-jerk reaction. I can't think of a group of people who, by their fashion choices, make me cautious and suspicious. At all, ever.
Sure, judgement happens...I'm well aware of that, which is perhaps why I am one of the most outwardly conservative, boring people you'll meet. I think it's a shame that we've gotten so hung up on clothing/body art as a metric for character. My reaction to seeing someone with a distinctive style is usually a bit of admiration because it takes guts to know what you like/want and openly flaunt that.
I do believe that there is something wrong with making a judgement which you know is inherently baseless.
There is plenty to judge people by if you stick only to how they interact with others, which at least has some relation to how they'll treat you. For example, while I wouldn't judge you based on your fashion choices (which likely closely mirror my own), I am absolutely judging you for making such harshly negative judgements of others based only on things like gauged ears. Knowing that, I would be concerned that you would judge me as a person for my own fashion choices, and frankly, I find that ridiculous and ignorant.
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When I am an attending I can and will do anything want. Until that time, the US government is either paying my salary or allowing me to get a loan without a co-signer. Not visible piercing, tattoos, or hair eccentricities is a small price to pay.
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Gauges are more likely to be a strike against you than not.
MD Class of 2017
MD Class of 2017
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OP hope your interviewer looks like this
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Gauges show bad judgement because it is quite well known that they will have a negative impact on your professional life. To negatively impact your future just so you can have a couple holes in your ears is pretty damn shortsighted. I have no problem with them personally, but I don't have a single friend who's managed to get a decent job since getting their ears gauged (n=4), so I generally recommend against them if someone values their career.
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Why not just plug up your gauges for interview season and wear them without the plugs any other time. I've seen plenty of people dress and look conservatively with the exception of the plugs which just look like earrings
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Even earrings on a guy can raise judgment, unfortunately.
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Long hair in general is not very professional. Think black people: dreadlocks vs. buzz, white people: long rocker hair vs. crew cut.
As an Asian though, I wonder if the man bun is un-professsional.
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...that's not a fashion choice, it's a very considerate warning label. Must be a very thoughtful, conscientious kid to forewarn people like this! 😛
O rly?!
But seriously, if I were skittish about tattoos or clothing, I would have missed out on a lot of cool stories and a lot of help from random strangers.
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I made a thread like this before I went on interviews this past year. Pretty much got the same responses. I have 2gs in both ears and I'm a male. For my first two interviews I didn't wear any jewelry. During my second interview, one of my interviewers asked me why I took out my piercings and I said that I thought it would be better to look more conservative. His response caught me off guard. He told me that I probably wouldn't want to go to a school that would reject me based on that alone. I wore my clear glass plugs for my last 3 interviews. I got accepted into all 5 of the schools where I received interview invites.
With that being said, I totally could have just gotten interviewers that didn't care... maybe I was borderline accepted and having my ears pierced nearly kept me from acceptance... or maybe it was the fact that they were all California schools, which might not be as conservative. Who knows?
I would hope that physicians who serve a diverse population would be less inclined to be judgmental, but that doesn't seem to be the case. Oh well.
With that being said, I totally could have just gotten interviewers that didn't care... maybe I was borderline accepted and having my ears pierced nearly kept me from acceptance... or maybe it was the fact that they were all California schools, which might not be as conservative. Who knows?
I would hope that physicians who serve a diverse population would be less inclined to be judgmental, but that doesn't seem to be the case. Oh well.
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Like you can see, it depends on the interviewer. It would be prudent to consider how important it is to you and what sort of an image you project with or without them on. If they are important to you, you will probably project a better impression with them on, and it may be worth it for you to keep them on. If you interview and make a great impression, it lessens the chance of your earrings coming up in conversation (unless someone is really prejudiced) and you probably won't have a problem. If you look like a cholo MS13 gangbanger off the streets, you'll have a bigger mountain to climb with that impression. If you have conservative-looking gauges, it probably won't be that bad.
