Remaining gap year, bioinformatics training vs. clinical research?

[Cheeezcake]

I am trying to decide between a Summer Biomedical Informatics internship at WashU or joining a clinical research project with a "big name" surgeon (not sure if that's important) here at my undergrad.

I begin medical school in August and am looking for a new way to be productive other than serving tables again. I am strongly interested in public health and feel that some official bioinformatics training would prove very useful in the future (its also paid).

I also happen to know the head surgeon in a highly ranked department and he invited me to come work with him. He's constantly pushing papers out and chances are good that I can find my way onto at least one if I choose to work with his team (I already have one pub). I have only done bench research in undergrad. Also, it might be a good networking opportunity, since he seems to be pretty well known and seems as if he has endless connections on the east and west coast. The only drawback is that I have little interest in his specialty, cardiothoracic surgery.

What would be more beneficial to me as I begin medical school, and eventually apply to residency?

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[deleted1011020]

I am trying to decide between a Summer Biomedical Informatics internship at WashU or joining a clinical research project with a "big name" surgeon (not sure if that's important) here at my undergrad.

I begin medical school in August and am looking for a new way to be productive other than serving tables again. I am strongly interested in public health and feel that some official bioinformatics training would prove very useful in the future (its also paid).

I also happen to know the head surgeon in a highly ranked department and he invited me to come work with him. He's constantly pushing papers out and chances are good that I can find my way onto at least one if I choose to work with his team (I already have one pub). I have only done bench research in undergrad. Also, it might be a good networking opportunity, since he seems to be pretty well known and seems as if he has endless connections on the east and west coast. The only drawback is that I have little interest in his specialty, cardiothoracic surgery.

What would be more beneficial to me as I begin medical school, and eventually apply to residency?

If you'd want to do the clinical informatics fellowship along with some bioinformatics research during medical school I'd go with the bioinformatics opportunity.

 

[Select All That Apply]

@cheeezcake Biomedical informatics especially for a summer internship position will likely fall into an introductory intern research type role for WashU. There is a discrepancy with conflating biomedical informatics with bioinformatics, however with your interest in public health you are likely to benefit from a program that gives you an opportunity in the former, more so than the latter.

 

[DNAJB6]

If you are confident you will get another publication out of it, I would go that route. Long term publications will matter more. Maybe some of the adcoms will chime in, but I think residency programs look favorably upon research and publications of any kind even in different fields. I doubt you'll get much from a bioinformatics boot camp you couldn't find elsewhere later. If you are interested in research, you could always do a part time MSCI once you're an attending or during fellowship if you need statistics/bioinformatics training. WashU actually has a good MSCI program with biomedical informatics should that interest you later.

 

[Cheeezcake]

@cheeezcake Biomedical informatics especially for a summer internship position will likely fall into an introductory intern research type role for WashU. There is a discrepancy with conflating biomedical informatics with bioinformatics, however with your interest in public health you are likely to benefit from a program that gives you an opportunity in the former, more so than the latter.

If you are confident you will get another publication out of it, I would go that route. Long term publications will matter more. Maybe some of the adcoms will chime in, but I think residency programs look favorably upon research and publications of any kind even in different fields. I doubt you'll get much from a bioinformatics boot camp you couldn't find elsewhere later. If you are interested in research, you could always do a part time MSCI once you're an attending or during fellowship if you need statistics/bioinformatics training. WashU actually has a good MSCI program with biomedical informatics should that interest you later.

Thanks guys/gals!