Letters of Recommendation

[Cager21]

Is there an unwritten rule regarding who should write the 3 letters of rec? I am planning on having 1 ophthalmology, 1 medicine, and 1 surgery letter. Is this okay? Or do program directors/admission committees generally expect at least 2 ophtho letters? I am asking because I am pretty sure the surgery and internal medicine letters are going to be strong letters because they are from attendings I worked with extensively who know me well. The ophtho letter will be from my PD which I presume will be a good letter. I can get another ophtho letter but it may not be as equivalent in strength as my med or surgery letter. So should I compromise strength of letter for subject? Anyone have any input? I've been searching the web and asking residents but there doesn't seem to be a clear answer. Would appreciate any input.

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[Cager21]

no thoughts?

 

[Radonkulous]

In a way I have a similar question. I feel that a few of my core rotation attendings can better evaluate my clinical abilities than an ophtho attending I simply shadowed. And will it be ok if I have no ophtho letter and instead have a third letter from a research mentor who I worked closely with for several years in an unrelated field?

Essentially, I feel there are others who can better evaluate me as I decided on ophtho pretty late in the game.

 

[Bernoull]

In a way I have a similar question. I feel that a few of my core rotation attendings can better evaluate my clinical abilities than an ophtho attending I simply shadowed. And will it be ok if I have no ophtho letter and instead have a third letter from a research mentor who I worked closely with for several years in an unrelated field?

Essentially, I feel there are others who can better evaluate me as I decided on ophtho pretty late in the game.

No, u'll need at least 1 ophtho letter. That's pretty clear.

What's unclear is whether 2 ophtho & 1 non-Ophtho LORs is preferrable to 1 Ophtho and 2 non-Ophtho LORs (assuming that both non-ophthos are pretty strong letters).

I'm interested in the OP's question too, if someone can chime in...

 

[ophthope]

The instructions on the SFMatch website are in this PDF.

The pertinent section is on page 3 and says:

"Three (3) ORIGINAL letters of reference are required for review by the programs. No more, no less. It is recommended that residency applicants provide one letter from a core rotation."

Notice that it doesn't say "at least one letter from a core rotation" it just says "one letter from a core rotation." It's expected that the other two letters will be Ophthalmology letters. If you do anything other than 2 Ophtho and 1 Core then you're going outside of the expected. You're not going to find much advice on the situation you're asking about because the advice is to go by the book: 2 Ophtho, 1 Core. If you can't get those or you think you're better off with 2 stronger non-ophtho letters then do whatever you feel is best, but the advice you're going to get from people is to follow the instructions on the SFMatch website.

 

[Bernoull]

Awesome! Thanks for clearing this up!

 

[usmlesuccess]

does anyone know how we submit the letters? Do we just have the writers give us a sealed copy or send it to the med school? Also, do we need a cover sheet for the ophtho letter? Or do we use the same cover sheet as the eras one?

 

[ophthope]

does anyone know how we submit the letters? Do we just have the writers give us a sealed copy or send it to the med school? Also, do we need a cover sheet for the ophtho letter? Or do we use the same cover sheet as the eras one?

Quoted from the instructions from SFMatch that I posted above:

Three (3) ORIGINAL letters of reference are required for review by the programs. No more, no less. It is recommended that residency applicants provide one letter from a core rotation. If you have requested a confidential letter, please indicate so on your CAS application form and ask the author to return the letter to you in a sealed envelope. DO NOT open the sealed envelopes. Nonconfidential letters can be included in your application open faced.

Just follow the instructions. No cover letter, just send the letters in sealed envelopes and once you can get into CAS you will put the names of your letter writers in the application that way. You 'submit' them by sending them in with the rest of your application packet. There is literally a checklist on page 9 of the instructions to make sure you include everything that is necessary in the packet. Leave them sealed, don't send any 'nonconfidential' letters because it looks suspicious.

I'm not sure if perhaps there is some confusion about the application. You will be mailing in a packet of supporting documents to CAS (Medical school transcript, letters of reference, USMLE score reports, etc). The rest of your application (through the SF Match's Central Application Service aka CAS) will be completed online; personal statement, research, extracurriculars, etc. The reference letters get mailed in with the supporting documents.

 

[kwel]

Are you guys getting your letter writers to write separate letters for the ERAS app? I don't mean completely different letters, but slightly different so that it pertains more to your prelim year. Or is it generally appropriate to submit my ophtho-oriented letters for my PGY-1 app?

 

[ophthope]

I submitted the exact same letters and am under the impression that most people do as well. Prelims and TYs expect this.

 

[shemarty]

I'm going to use different letters for ophtho and prelim.

For ophtho I'm using 2 ophtho (1 research, 1 clinical from 4th year) and a neuro or surgery letter from 3rd year.

For prelim I'm using 3rd year neuro, 3rd year surgery, 4th year medicine sub-I, and the medicine chair letter.

I was advised to not use research letters for prelim if you can help it, since prelims care more about your clinical strengths. But a research letter does show that you're motivated and can follow through with projects, which is obviously a good trait for intern year.