MPH before or after residency?

[Spazz]

I'm a 3rd year med student and I decided I want an MPH before doing a family med residency. My school offers the combined MD/MPH but it's too late for me to apply. For those MD/MPH's out there, can you suggest which of the following would be the best options (that I can think of at least) --

-do a 1 yr program after graduation, before residency
-or after residency, before starting practice
-or, after starting practice for X years

I feel I missed the ball on this, cuz it seems kinda tough to work in the MPH after school, without losing momentum from 4th year to residency or within your practice. appreciate any insights!

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[Doctor Grim]

I basically was in your situation not too long ago. But this is my 0.02.

Get your MD and finish your residency in FM. Then...option one....

Find a research fellowship that will also get you a MPH degree and there are plenty of them if you look hard. And many of the degrees are from reputable institutions.

If you do that, you get paid for the fellowship and you don't have to worry about tuition.

Option two, you can find a fellowship that you'd like to do...at an University program..unpon completing it, you can "try" to get funding to get you to stay on board as a faculty member and at that time you can also pursue your MPH, for free, at that institution.

Option three, find a preventive medicine residency program after FM (normally two more yrs). You get a MPH plus you will be eligible for another board. And you get paid...

I'm about to finish my residency in FM and I'm committed for a fellowhsip next yr.....

 

[youngin]

I was previously told from someone else taking an additional year between med graduation and residency will hurt your chances matching unless that year is specifically for research for your desired specialty. But I don't know for sure so anybody else's input would be helpful.

I don't find the MPH worthwhile.

 

[Spazz]

Thanks for your input -- I didn't know you could get funding through that way.

Could I ask some more q's? How competitive are these fellowships? Should I try to match into an academic or university-affiliated program, and do a significant amount of research during residency? I'm specifically interested in community health and care for underserved populations.

Are these usually 2-yr fellowships? I'm concerned that I'd lose some clinical skills going back to school right after residency -- do you plan to work in some patient care during your fellowship?

Thanks !

 

[Doctor Grim]

The competiveness of the fellowship depends a lot on the program itself and its location. In general, sports med is pretty competitive. Geriatrics is less competitive (the ones based out of a FM program) but it can be very competitive if it were based out of an well-known university within the department of internal medicine.

If you perform well on your in service exams, get good recom letters, and pass your Step 3 on your first try, you should not have any problems getting into a good fellowship program.

If you want fellowship at a reputable institution, you would probably want to do your residency training at an university program or an university-affiliated program. But you'd also have to take into consideration whether it'd opposed or non-opposed.

For me, I couldn't care less about OB and I don't want to do OB so once I got my RRC required numbers I went on hiatus. I liked complementary and alternative medicine, preventive medicine, geriatrics so then I tried to do as much in relation to those.

Now, in answering your question, if you get into a research fellowship, you won't have to worry about your clinical skills becoming rusty. First they're paying you and you have an opportunity to earn your degree. So your time will be split among seeing patients in an ambulatory setting (most likely), teaching responsibilities to medical students or residents, and taking classes and doing research.

Quite a few fellowship programs in geriatrics are one yr clinical training plus optional 2-3 yrs research. So if you can secure funding, then you will be able to get a position at the institution where you will be trained and then pursue a MPH or MSCR degree as a 2 or 3rd yr fellow....

Good thing about being a Family physician is that you will have a lot of options...

Hope this helps...