"nice" prelim spots?? are you kidding? even categorical interns are treated like crap. prelims are there for extra manpower so you should expect a ton of work.
with the residents I've worked with, the main difference is that the prelim interns absolutely sucked. they were lazy and generally incompetent. The categoricals (and also the gu and ortho prelims) were much harder working. I assume that if you get your work done and aren't a lazy piece of -- you'll be roughly on par with the categoricals.
I disagree.. There are many programs out there where the prelim intern and categorical interns are treated equally. Remember, they are both interns...there is little difference in "competence"..and you really can't teach someone to be "hard-working"... At my program, they get as many cases as the cat. interns...
