International Medical Student USCE requirements for Neurology

[dafesa]

Hi, I’m an international medical student about to start my last year. Currently I’ve not made my STEP 1 and I’ve read about the importance of USCE. I know my options are limited, but from what I’ve read, clinical electives available for me are 3000-5000 each month. Honestly that’s a lot of money for me.



I’ve read that you do clinical electives and observerships mainly for LORs.

Is it wise to do just one clinical elective in Neurology (my desired specialty) and bring other LORs from my home country?

Is there any value if I do some observerships in other specialties?

Do I require Clinical electives? Should I just get by using observerships considering the cost of them?



Thank you all for your advice

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[sinemet1]

My personal opinion. Unless you are above average student. Do not do USCE. Average students do okish in their electives and receive average LORs. While if you do well in your steps and use the time and money to do research for one year you can get good experience, some publications and possible LOR and showing deep interest in neurology.
Focus on high scores and do research in Neurology especially in big places.

 

[dafesa]

My personal opinion. Unless you are above average student. Do not do USCE. Average students do okish in their electives and receive average LORs. While if you do well in your steps and use the time and money to do research for one year you can get good experience, some publications and possible LOR and showing deep interest in neurology.
Focus on high scores and do research in Neurology especially in big places.

Thank you so much for your reply! It looks really interesting and a good path to follow. However, I'm wondering if programs may discard my application considering that I wouldn't have USCE, or maybe too little USCE