Prelim Rank Order Question

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aredoubleyou

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Can you rank the prelim years (for the three year programs of course) specific for each anesthesia program? For example If I had applied to a Los Angeles program and a Atlanta anesthesia program, and three prelim spots in LA, and three in Atlanta, could I rank my three LA prelim spots specific to me being accepted in LA and vise versa for Atlanta. That way if I ended up in Atlanta, my top three prelim spots would be in Atlanta and not in LA. It would really bite to have to move twice and I really don't want to stay for an extra chicago winter.

I've heard form a few residents who went through ERAS last year or the year before various answers (mostly being "I think so," or "I don't think so") - so what better place to clear up confusion and get a reliable answer than on the internet!
 
"Can you rank the prelim years (for the three year programs of course) specific for each anesthesia program? For example If I had applied to a Los Angeles program and a Atlanta anesthesia program, and three prelim spots in LA, and three in Atlanta, could I rank my three LA prelim spots specific to me being accepted in LA and vise versa for Atlanta."

--Yes, you can do exactly what you suggested. I'm a current transitional resident and just went through this. You will create a rank list of primary programs and then you will have a secondary rank list for each of those programs (each secondary list can be different).

Example:
Primary Rank List: Rank #1. New York 3 year program, Rank # 2. Cali 3 year program, Rank # 3. Ohio 4 year Categorical program

Secondary Rank List for primary program ranked #1 above: Rank #1 New york Transitional, Rank #2 New York prelim Medicine, Rank #3 Ohio transitional, Rank #4 Cali transitional, etc.

Secondary Rank List for primary program ranked #2 above: Rank #1 Cali Transitional, RAnk #2 Cali prelim med, Rank #3 Cali prelim surg, Rank #4 Ohio transitional, Rank #5 New York Transitional, etc.

There would be no secondary rank list for the program you ranked #3 on your primary rank list since it is a 4 year categorical program which includes the base year.
 
Thanks! Thats very helpful deciding which prelim years outside of chicago I should apply to. By the way - anyone know if you apply to a three year program and the internal med (or whatever) prelim position at the same university do they try to schedule you on the same day or consecutive or days, or are they both pretty much independent of each other?
 
When I applied to prelim med and transitional at the same program, the interview invites came separately. It was up to me to try to contact the programs to schedule the interviews on the same weekend.

If you've already scheduled one interview with prelim med, just politely ask the other department (transitional for example) if they have any openings for that same weekend/next day/etc. If they don't have an opening that lines up with your scheduled prelim med interview, ask them which dates are available and tell them that you are trying to make travel arrangements and that you will call them back momentarily. Then call your medicine prelim program and very politely ask them if it would be possible in any way to change your date to one that lines up with the available dates that the transitional programs is offering. Just be courteous and apologize for the inconvenience. I had to do this, and it wasn't a problem at all.
 
Just reread your second question...

The simple answer is that yes...sometimes when you apply to a 3 year position and a 1 year position at the same place they may be coordinated by the programs. I didn't find this to be the case for prelim med (but some places may do it), but it happened quite a bit when I applied to transitional and 3 year programs at the same place. In fact some of the 3 year program interviews counted as the transitional interviews, and I didn't have to show up for separate transitional interviews at all. I just had to click both 3 year and transitional boxes on Eras to be considered for both. I hope that answers your question. Let me know if it doesn't.
 
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