Question about the "Medical-Preliminary" residency

[254706]

Hey guys,

I was hoping someone could explain the "Medical-Preliminary" residency to me. I was looking at the 2009 match lists for some schools and I noticed one of the schools I'm interested in has around 30 students that matched into Medical-Preliminary. I tried doing some research online, but I couldn't find anything that clearly explained what this program was all about. The way I understand it, Med-P is a one-year internal medicine program after which students reapply for other residency positions... is this about right? If so, is there a particular reason the student would join Med-P instead of trying for his second residency from the get-go?

I apologize if these are questions that have already been discussed before. I tried searching online but honestly couldn't find a clear answer. Thanks for your help.

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[Law2Doc]

...The way I understand it, Med-P is a one-year internal medicine program after which students reapply for other residency positions... is this about right? If so, is there a particular reason the student would join Med-P instead of trying for his second residency from the get-go?

I apologize if these are questions that have already been discussed before. I tried searching online but honestly couldn't find a clear answer. Thanks for your help.

Close. (And yes this question has been asked many times). A preliminary year is an initial residency year (aka the "intern" year), generally done in internal medicine or surgery. A number of "advanced" specialties require people to do a prelim year (or a transitional year) first before going on into those "advanced" specialties (because of the notion that you should learn how to be a generalist doctor first before specializing). So anyone going into eg a ROAD specialty, rad onc, PM&R, or neurology is going to be doing a prelim year. They won't usually be reapplying during that year -- you match into both the prelm year and the advanced specialty in the same match. So, for example, the dude going into anesthesiology will interview for and rank both anesthesiology and preliminary medicine (or surgery) programs and will ideally match into both in the same match. But since prelim programs significantly outnumber advanced specialties or categorical specialties, a lot of people who can't get what they want do take prelim programs (IMGs often do this) and hope that after a year they can match into an advanced or categorical program. So many prelim programs are filled in the scramble, or many people who apply to the necessary prelim plus a competitive advanced field end up just getting the prelim. So a prelim may simply be a required stepping stone for someone already matched into the subsequent 3-5 years, or it may be a fall-back position for someone who didn't get something else and is hoping it will open doors.