Non-SLOE Group Letter

[Perfect Hair Day]

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Aloha folks 🙂
I will be rotating for two weeks in a Pediatric ED elective at my school; I have done the rotation before, but it is a rotation that may be taken for up to four weeks. I've also volunteered in the Pedi ED and come in on holidays to help out and see patients, shadow, etc. Anyway, the rotation is sponsored by Division of Pediatrics, not Dept. of EM, so there are no sub-specialty SLOEs written. I've worked with all of the attendings several times, and I've gotten a recommendation letter from one of them in the past for a scholarship. I'm wondering if, since personal LORs don't carry very much weight, would a letter signed-off by all of the attendings (there's about 6 or 7) from the Pedi ED carry more stock than an individual LOR?
Thanks,
PHD

 

[surely]

Aloha folks 🙂
I will be rotating for two weeks in a Pediatric ED elective at my school; I have done the rotation before, but it is a rotation that may be taken for up to four weeks. I've also volunteered in the Pedi ED and come in on holidays to help out and see patients, shadow, etc. Anyway, the rotation is sponsored by Division of Pediatrics, not Dept. of EM, so there are no sub-specialty SLOEs written. I've worked with all of the attendings several times, and I've gotten a recommendation letter from one of them in the past for a scholarship. I'm wondering if, since personal LORs don't carry very much weight, would a letter signed-off by all of the attendings (there's about 6 or 7) from the Pedi ED carry more stock than an individual LOR?
Thanks,
PHD

I think you know this, but just so we're on the same page: In addition to this letter, you want at least 2 SLOEs (typically home + away). Some people get 3 SLOEs (home + away x2).

You can have up to 4 letters total, and no one expects all of them to be SLOEs, so it's totally okay for the final one to be written by an individual ED doc - it carries less weight than a SLOE, sure, but is still commonly accepted as a "bonus" letter. A group letter probably doesn't add much advantage over an individual ED doc's word and is uncommon from what I've heard (in that no one has suggested it on SDN as far I can recall).

What you want is to just pick one ED doc and have him/her write you the letter. Ideally, pick someone who is EM trained with a PEM fellowship (as opposed to peds trained + PEM fellowship), as his/her name might be more recognizable to LOR writers and he/she has a better idea of what it's like to perform well in an EM residency.

As it so happens, my 4th letter was written by an EM-trained doc who did a fellowship in peds (other letters were all SLOEs). Wasn't an issue.

 

[Perfect Hair Day]

I think you know this, but just so we're on the same page: In addition to this letter, you want at least 2 SLOEs (typically home + away). Some people get 3 SLOEs (home + away x2).

You can have up to 4 letters total, and no one expects all of them to be SLOEs, so it's totally okay for the final one to be written by an individual ED doc - it carries less weight than a SLOE, sure, but is still commonly accepted as a "bonus" letter. A group letter probably doesn't add much advantage over an individual ED doc's word and is uncommon from what I've heard (in that no one has suggested it on SDN as far I can recall).

What you want is to just pick one ED doc and have him/her write you the letter. Ideally, pick someone who is EM trained with a PEM fellowship (as opposed to peds trained + PEM fellowship), as his/her name might be more recognizable to LOR writers and he/she has a better idea of what it's like to perform well in an EM residency.

As it so happens, my 4th letter was written by an EM-trained doc who did a fellowship in peds (other letters were all SLOEs). Wasn't an issue.

Hi, thanks. Yep! I'm doing two EM rotations so two SLOEs. #3 and #4 will be a combination of Pedi ED letter and possibly a chair letter or PD letter from my dual-degree. Will stick with a regular old individual LOR in that case. Thanks 🙂