IMG-right to waive LORs

[sport29883]

I have seen certain discussions on this forum prior to this but they are mostly concerning IMGs. LORs from international medical schools, I have heard, are read with a pinch of salt to begin with.

How much does it really matter for IMGs whether they waive their right to see their LOR or not?

Anyone have inputs on this?

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[Winged Scapula]

I have seen certain discussions on this forum prior to this but they are mostly concerning IMGs. LORs from international medical schools, I have heard, are read with a pinch of salt to begin with.

How much does it really matter for IMGs whether they waive their right to see their LOR or not?

Anyone have inputs on this?

Well, given your point about international LORs being read with a jaded eye, why would you want to do ANYTHING to add to that? Failing to waive your right to read them only gives faculty one more reason to mistrust what the letters say.

 

[sport29883]

point taken ..btw in correction to my above post, I meant "most of the threads were focused on AMGs"...hence this thread

 

[dragonfly99]

I would definitely, definitely find a way to waive your right to see the letters. Pretty much all US students do this. If you don't, people will just think you wrote the letters yourself and had the faculty person sign them, or picked and chose the letters that were the most positive out of a collection you had. It's just considered standard practice to waive the right to see the letters.

 

[medsRus]

Most PDs told me they don't care if it is waived or not. They can contact any of the references if they wish.

 

[sport29883]

I would definitely, definitely find a way to waive your right to see the letters. Pretty much all US students do this. If you don't, people will just think you wrote the letters yourself and had the faculty person sign them, or picked and chose the letters that were the most positive out of a collection you had. It's just considered standard practice to waive the right to see the letters.

Thanks! Really appreciate it. Actually my Chairman has given me an option whether I want to waive it or not. And I am hopeful that it will be good, as she knows me quite well (she was my attending for 3 months). So will waive it in the light of the abovementioned comments.

Also a point which was brought out in the post above regarding contacting the letter writer....is it a good idea to request your letter writer to include some form of contact method e.g.email ID or something towards the end?

 

[Winged Scapula]

Most PDs told me they don't care if it is waived or not. They can contact any of the references if they wish.

Perhaps, if the LOR is a US faculty member. I'll suspect if they don't care if a letter is waived its because they don't trust foreign letters anyway. A foreign letter writer is not likely to be contacted by US faculty (time differences, possible language barrier, etc.).

 

[dragonfly99]

Some PD's may not care, but definitely some of them do. I even had some people on the fellowship interview trail ask me to confirm that I'd waived my right to see all the LOR's. They want to make sure they are getting a truthful letter and that the applicant didn't get 5 or 6 letters, then weed through them to find the best ones.

 

[gutonc]

It should be pointed out that waiving your right to see your letters doesn't necessarily mean you won't see them. Two of my 5 residency letter writers emailed me a copy of their letter after they had submitted it. I had no "right" to see it but I certainly couldn't do anything about the writers sharing them with me.

 

[psychmatch]

I'm a non-U.S IMG and got all 4 US LORS. I waived 2 and did not waive the other 2. The writer mentions in the letter if its waived or not. I don't know how much of a difference it made,you know because all programs are different and they care about different things. But,if you trust the person to write a good letter for you, you should waive it!

 

[sport29883]

I'm a non-U.S IMG and got all 4 US LORS. I waived 2 and did not waive the other 2. The writer mentions in the letter if its waived or not. I don't know how much of a difference it made,you know because all programs are different and they care about different things. But,if you trust the person to write a good letter for you, you should waive it!

Thanks everyone for your comments. psychmatch, did not you have to submit a letter from the departmental chairman, which becomes an obligatory LoR from your country? I too would like to submit 4 US LoRs, but this seems to be an issue for me as many programs ask for it. is it not compulsory?

 

[psychmatch]

Hi-no,I had to only submit an MSPE/Dean's letter which is seperate from LORS. So,4 lors and MSPE except for California where I could submit only 3 lors because the 4th had to be the CA letter.

 

[sport29883]

Hi-no,I had to only submit an MSPE/Dean's letter which is seperate from LORS. So,4 lors and MSPE except for California where I could submit only 3 lors because the 4th had to be the CA letter.

Thanks..from your screenname I guess you applied for Psych..dont they need chairmans LoRs for that? In IM, I have noticed a lot of programs asking for the Chairman's letter. Its a waste of an LoR actually in that case, because they will probably not read a non-US LoR anyway..and submitting the California letter alongwith it effectively reduces the "proper" LoRs to two...I'd like to submit all US LoRs also...does anyone know if the chairmans letter is really mandatory or can you rather submit a US LoR in that place? This is esp imp for IMGs..

 

[dragonfly99]

sport,
I'm a US grad and it's been 5 years since I applied, but unless things have changed for IM...
a medicine dept. chair letter was not required. A "dean's letter" from the US medical school was required. I didn't get a medicine dept. chair's letter, than I can recall. I got a couple of faculty IM doctors, and one surgeon, plus my "dean's letter" which is really a summary of a med student's 3rd and 4th year grades and evaluations, rather than being a traditional letter of recommendation from an actual person/individual.

 

[NotAProgDirector]

Agreed that the Chair letter for IMG's is basically useless. My program requires a chair letter, but for IMG's I don't care. Not all school generate chair letters. As an IMG, I'd suggest simply not submitting a chair letter, or contact programs and see if they care. I bet most will not.

 

[psychmatch]

Nope,noone asked me for a chairman's letter and I never got one either. I called programs personally to find out criteria and stuff before applying in July and noone told me that I need it. So I think you should go ahead and use your U.S Lors.

 

[sport29883]

Agreed that the Chair letter for IMG's is basically useless. My program requires a chair letter, but for IMG's I don't care. Not all school generate chair letters. As an IMG, I'd suggest simply not submitting a chair letter, or contact programs and see if they care. I bet most will not.

Wow..I'd really like to do that..its almost a pity that I would have some US LoRs on hand and not be able to submit them..and the ones i submit arent read!

Thanks people, I think it makes sense to contact programs prior to applying to see which one they would rather like.