LOR dilemma. Please advise.

[greendiamond]

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I'm a 4th year US allopathic student applying for anesthesia. I decided on my specialty late (early September). Was waffling b/w anesthesia and family. I have no anesthesia LOR's.

Back in July, I asked a family medicine doc for an LOR. I told him that I was interested in family but "still not really sure" about what specialty I would choose. He took forever getting my LOR in, and I had three other good ones, so I didn't worry about it. I went ahead and assigned him in my ERAS, though.

I got 8 interviews + 1 rejection from September until 2 wks ago. In the last 2 wks, I got 0 interviews + 5 rejections. The only thing that has changed about my app in the last 2 wks is that his letter finally came in. I just had my first interview this week and one of the interviewers asked, "So you must be a late decision...your letter makes it sound that way." These 2 things make me think that he wrote my letter talking about how I was going into family. I realize this is completely my fault for not asking him to make my letter specialty non specific, but the question is what do I do now:

1)Deassign the letter in my ERAS. How will this show up on the program's end?
2)Call/email the programs and ask them to deassign/disregard it.
3)Do nothing and hope for the best and hope to explain it well in the interviews I already have.

Thanks in advance for any help you can give.

 

[Law2Doc]

I'm a 4th year US allopathic student applying for anesthesia. I decided on my specialty late (early September). Was waffling b/w anesthesia and family. I have no anesthesia LOR's.

Back in July, I asked a family medicine doc for an LOR. I told him that I was interested in family but "still not really sure" about what specialty I would choose. He took forever getting my LOR in, and I had three other good ones, so I didn't worry about it. I went ahead and assigned him in my ERAS, though.

I got 8 interviews + 1 rejection from September until 2 wks ago. In the last 2 wks, I got 0 interviews + 5 rejections. The only thing that has changed about my app in the last 2 wks is that his letter finally came in. I just had my first interview this week and one of the interviewers asked, "So you must be a late decision...your letter makes it sound that way." These 2 things make me think that he wrote my letter talking about how I was going into family. I realize this is completely my fault for not asking him to make my letter specialty non specific, but the question is what do I do now:

1)Deassign the letter in my ERAS. How will this show up on the program's end?
2)Call/email the programs and ask them to deassign/disregard it.
3)Do nothing and hope for the best and hope to explain it well in the interviews I already have.

Thanks in advance for any help you can give.

I wouldn't de-assign anything or highlight the letter by calling the schools. I mean, you don't know what the letter says, and you waived your rights to know. If it is damaging, the damage is done -- don't dwell on it. The lack of interviews over the last couple of weeks is pretty normal -- as you get close to the Nov 1 MSPE release date, lots of schools hold off on interviews until it comes in, so that explains the slowdown in interviews. The next couple of weeks should be telling.

 

[John Deere Gree]

I wouldn't worry much about it. You have 8 interviews (granted more is always better), so you are doing all right. Like the above poster said, it's a slow time for interviews. It should pick up in the next few weeks since the MPSE letters will be read (finally!!!).

At your interview you will probalby get asked why the late change in mind, just have a canned answer for it. Make sure you express your conviction for anesthesia in your response.

Even if you deassign a LOR, the program directors will see it if they downloaded it already.

I think you will be fine as long as you can explain why you want to go into anesthesia with conviction and enthusiasm.

 

[dragonfly99]

I agree with the above, except that I think if you have more than 3 letter total (2 + Dean's letter) then I would deassign the family practice one. Some places (probably most or all) will still have it because they already downloaded it, though. You better be ready to explain why you changed this late in the year...but I think it's good that you changed if that's what you truly want to do. You should work on getting an anesthesiology LOR if you still can. Can you get one in November? It won't be early enough to help you get interviews, but it could be early enough to help with the decision/match if you hurry up.

 

[greendiamond]

Thanks everyone. I appreciate the input.

I can't really decide which is the lesser evil... allowing a family promoted letter to remain in my file or deassign the letter and have them see that I deassigned it?

I'm leaning toward deassigning it because if even if they look at it to pull it out of the file, they will know why I deassigned it, but if I just leave it there, they might think I am crazy for letting that kind of letter be in my file and reject me based on that alone.

Any other votes?

 

[Law2Doc]

I'm leaning toward deassigning it because if even if they look at it to pull it out of the file, they will know why I deassigned it, but if I just leave it there, they might think I am crazy for letting that kind of letter be in my file and reject me based on that alone.

Um, I don't think they are going to "pull it out of the file". (If I were an adcom, I sure wouldn't). If they already downloaded it (which should be true at most programs), they are going to keep it. You don't get to put the genie back in the bottle by deassigning.