Locums in year before fellowship?

[PGYforever]

Hey all I am a R3 on the east coast who is delaying fellowship for a year to sync up with my wife. I had originally planned to stay in house at my residency as a nocturnist while continuing my research which I think has a chance to be quite productive during the gap year. Turns out the nocturnist job there is not nearly what it had been billed as - poor pay as well as much higher minimum number of shifts than I would want to work.

Is there any reason that fellowship applications would look down on hospitalist/nocturnist locum tenens during my application year? I feel like the flexibility and likely higher pay would work much better with interviews and research. Other side benefit could be allowing me to take a month or two to travel before starting fellowship if I've made enough money. Basically just dont want to hurt my fellowship match by doing this.

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[gutonc]

I don't think anyone will look down on it, assuming you're able to continue your research as you think you can. But that's likely to be the biggest issue, being able to work locums/nocturnist and also continue your research. I tried nocturnist work for a few months while I was still working in the lab and it was a complete failure for me. YMMV of course.