Rads Research vs Another Away?

[AbbeyRoad1969]

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Just looking for some advice...

I'm a third year medical student at a lower tier allopathic med school in the Midwest. My Step 1 score was 220, GPA is 3.0. In my clinical rotations so far, I got one Honor (for psych) and mostly high passes and sat passes. I have yet to get my grade for IM and haven't taken surgery yet. I have 2 aways set up for the spring at a community program known for its teaching on the east coast and a well known university/community program (mostly community) in the midwest. My school is very weak in rads research (I've been trying to set something up for over a year with no leads). I have not done any other research besides writing up a case report during my Rads rotation (received high pass for that) that I haven't submitted anywhere yet. My goal as of right now is to ultimately go into private practice. I'm used to teaching myself and would do perfectly fine learning rads mostly through reading (i.e. more of a community program structure). I've been interested in rads for a fairly long time (going on 2 years) and have been heavily involved in our school's interest group for that amount of time.

My question is this:
I have some free months next summer. To improve my chances of matching, should I do more aways or 2 months of rads research at a big academic institution that's well known for rads research? I know something like 90% of those who apply to rads have done research. How important is research to matching in rads? If I did do some research would that hurt my chances at a community program?

Thanks in advance.

 

[yohimbine1]

A few months ago I was faced with the decision to do a couple of aways or a couple of research months. I did aways but in hindsight I would have done research, as much as I dislike it. I feel that aways in Radiology are not beneficial the way aways in other specialties are. It is hard to demonstrate one's abilities, and I felt like I was more of an annoyance over the course of the month.

On the other hand your step 1 score will hold you back, so maybe you could focus on one or two programs you really want to go to and make that known to them. I went to programs I wasn't that passionate about, and I didn't care much what they thought of me and ended up not liking either place.