How important are clinical sites?

[Plutonium]

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Hi guys.

There's a lot of information out there advising students to look at match lists, step 1 scores, and research opportunities when choosing between medical schools. These are things that are considered important and significant in terms of helping you match into a competitive specialty, but how important are clinical sites in general? For example, a school that has their own hospital vs one that does not. Or another example is a school that has most of their clinical sites at small private hospitals throughout the city vs a school that has their clinicals at bigger more well known hospitals.

For someone who wants to match into a competitive residency, are having good clinical locations beneficial (in terms of matching, networking, becoming the best doctor you can be, etc.) or does it not make much of a difference?

Thanks!

 

[WingedOx]

What Tired said...

Plus, even then you never know quite what you're going to end up with. My hospital's primary site is a seriously kickass educational experience that prepares our students WAY better than I was coming here from another institution, but we also send students to community sites that are questionable (to put it generously). For the residents it doesn't matter that said place is affiliated with us, since it's just 8 weeks and is kind of a vacation of light work and easy workdays, but for the students, the fact that such a place is the only exposure they will get in our specialty is cringe-worthy.

The (very) informal rule is that the majority of your MS3/4 years should be spent at a place where patients are essentially never transferred out of for higher level of care.

 

[Plutonium]

Thanks you guys. I suspected this was the case. However, I never see it being considered or talked about much.