How Important is "Scholarly Concentration"?

[Mike97]

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I see that a lot of schools offer "scholarly concentration programs" such as urban med, rural med, public health, etc. When it comes to residency applications and beyond, is this something that anyone will care about? Could it hurt you if you decide on a specialty that's outside of that concentration?

For example if you apply to a "non-rural" residency, say neurosurgery, will having attended a rural health concentration be a red flag/mark against you? Thanks!

 

[Dr G Oogle]

It won’t be a mark against you if you have NSGY research, good letters and a 260 board scores. But I also don’t think they are that helpful and somewhat nebulous unless you want to do primary care in a particular setting.

 

[aldol16]

They don't care about this. It probably won't even be mentioned during your interviews. So do it and learn, but not for the sake of increasing competitiveness to residency. Unless you wrangle some publications and connections out of it.

 

[Mr.Smile12]

If the residency programs didn't care about them, med schools wouldn't offer them or develop those tracks. For the specifiic program audiences, those tracks have appeal and give your evaluators something to talk about. Otherwise, yes, don't bank on it being that big of a difference in the process.