How many dress shirts / slacks do I need for med school?

[AORiverContra]

I've been doing some clothes shopping and I was wondering how many dress shirts and slacks I should have for med school. How often do you have to dress professionally? Which colors (and how many) are good to have? Also, how many times do you wear your dress and slacks before washing (assuming I wear undershirts)

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[WheezyBaby]

Depends on what you're willing to do as far as frequency of going to a dry cleaners / ironing at home. My minimum is 12 outfits worth (2 weeks of 6 day weeks ; dry cleaners / ironing once a week), so 12 shirts, 3 pairs of pants, couple pair of shoes, +/- ties depending on your school. Also, you probably won't have to dress up much until 3rd year, and you might gain or lose a bunch of weight the first 2 years, so I'd hold off if you're preclinical

 

[mw18]

Depends on what you're willing to do as far as frequency of going to a dry cleaners / ironing at home. My minimum is 12 outfits worth (2 weeks of 6 day weeks ; dry cleaners / ironing once a week), so 12 shirts, 3 pairs of pants, couple pair of shoes, +/- ties depending on your school. Also, you probably won't have to dress up much until 3rd year, and you might gain or lose a bunch of weight the first 2 years, so I'd hold off if you're preclinical

I read your first sentence and I was like "Yep. That's what I came here to say." Then I read your second sentence and I thought you were crazy. Then I read the last part and it made me feel better. During the first two years, at my school, we may have to dress nicely two or three days a week, but that's very rare and it's usually only once. You can get by with only having a handful of shirts, pants, and ties. By third year, you'll need to branch out.

 

[mehc012]

For women, variety in the tops may matter more. If you dress up 2-3x every week (that seems to be our average for the first 2 blocks in M1, looking at the schedule...it's not set yet so that number may go up but it probably won't go down) but you're wearing the same 2 shirts every week, that's more likely to be noticed for women than guys where the shirts mostly look the same anyway. That's less a 'clean' thing and more 'boo fashion, why do you have so many silly pointless rules' thing though.

 

[420 blaze it]

I can't speak for the ladies but for guys, honestly if you have like 2 pairs of decent pants and 2 shirts and 2 ties you'll be fine. No need to go over board. Once you get into rotations you'll want more for sure

 

[mehc012]

I can't speak for the ladies but for guys, honestly if you have like 2 pairs of decent pants and 2 shirts and 2 ties you'll be fine. No need to go over board. Once you get into rotations you'll want more for sure

Trust me, while I wish it were otherwise, if you wear the same 2 shirts as a lady every time you dress up, people will notice. It basically sucks.

I did a 3mo internship program as a premed which was clearly the first time most of us had had to dress up routinely (we had activities every other weekend and hospital shifts every week). Not only did the girls learn each other's 'dressy' wardrobe pretty quickly because there was so much repeating, but you could tell a bunch of us had just stocked up on dress shirts for the program because we had the same styles, just in different colors (if you go shopping in the same season at basically any mall, you'll have the same shirts even if you get a variety).

Thinking back, I couldn't tell you a single thing about what any of the guys wore on any day...they could have reworn the same shirt for the whole 3mo for all anyone ever noticed. Except for one guy who was just understatedly classy af but I couldn't begin to tell you how.

TL;DR being a lady still sucks, buy more shirts if you dress female.

 

[Lee Ik-jun MD]

6 long sleeves and 3 pants plus 5 ties. you're golden.
like wheezybaby, i have the same number since im doing residency.
it's more than enough since i wear dark jeans on friday and scrubs on the weekend

 

[FlowLimited]

Buying clothes that offer some degree of wrinkle resistance is also helpful. You can toss things in the washer/dryer and spend a lot less time ironing or at the dry cleaner. In terms of quantity, go for 3-4 shirts and a couple pair of pants for pre-clinical years. After that, it'll be useful to have at least one week worth of clothes.

 

[psychhopefull2016]

I had 3 nice bottoms and maybe 5 nicer tops for first year (I'm a girl). Come third year your fancy pants wardrobe will need to explode. But I really didn't need to dress up more than 1-2x weekly first and second year. Now I have to have 12 days or more worth. I have more because I like shopping and hate laundry

 

[Mr. Beefy Lion]

Are khakis appropriate for bottoms or is it strictly slacks? Sorry, I'm naive

 

[psychhopefull2016]

Are khakis appropriate for bottoms or is it strictly slacks? Sorry, I'm naive

Most of the guys wear khakis

 

[Psai]

Are khakis appropriate for bottoms or is it strictly slacks? Sorry, I'm naive

I don't even know the difference

 

[psychhopefull2016]

I don't even know the difference

Fabric fanciness!