Research advice

[DarkBluMage]

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Current MS2 that's interested in GS residency, ultimately peds surg. I was looking at gen surg residency programs back home to work on making myself competitive for them. I saw that the average number of research experiences for matched applicants were between 3-5 and the average number of peer-reviewed publications were between 3-7. I started getting stressed about the idea of meeting the average number. My mentor is eager to help me get research, however the thought of throwing research responsibilities on top of being a med student scares me and I'm worried about over burdening myself and it affecting my performance in school. I'm supposed to start rotations sometime in March as well since our preclinicals are only about 1.5 years and I'm not sure how much time I'll realistically be able to dedicate to it in addition to studying for shelf exams. I haven't participated in research previously and I'm not familiar with what's more realistic for a med student to get multiple papers from. I have a 8 week research block in my 4th year, but i'm not sure if that's enough time to get multiple papers. Any advice?

 

[aldol16]

School is the most important. Academics are going to make you or break you. There's a reason why averages are averages. There will be people with 0-1 publications and people with 10+. Publications will be more important if you're aiming specifically for top academic programs. Otherwise they're less important than your connections and networking, especially in GS which is not one of the competitive specialties.

 

[DarkBluMage]

School is the most important. Academics are going to make you or break you. There's a reason why averages are averages. There will be people with 0-1 publications and people with 10+. Publications will be more important if you're aiming specifically for top academic programs. Otherwise they're less important than your connections and networking, especially in GS which is not one of the competitive specialties.

Thanks for the feedback. I'm not concerned with top programs in general honestly. I just want to go back home and there are only 3 options, or 5 if I still want to be within an hour of the area. I'm only concerned with making myself competitive for the programs back home which is why my lack of research concerns me. I'll try to do aways at those programs to better my chances of matching there.

 

[aspiringcardiologa]

Focus on doing well in school. Your goal should be honors or A's in your clinical rotations, but you will need a strong foundation from preclinicals/second year. Also do well on the Step exams.
Research should not be a priority honestly. The thing is that research takes a long time and you need patience before you get a published manuscript in. Your goal should be getting an abstract at least, and a meaningful project so you can tell interviewers come residency interview time what you did and learned. That will be more profound than getting manuscripts in.
Your well-being is crucial in this time of medicine.

 

[deomnibusdubitandum]

how important are preclinical grades for something like this? Could one hypothetically slide by and merely pass all their classes without any troubles?

 

[voxveritatisetlucis]

how important are preclinical grades for something like this? Could one hypothetically slide by and merely pass all their classes without any troubles?

Most MD schools are pass fail so it doesn’t really matter as long as you pass. However, most schools aside from top ones will use preclinical grades to rank. High rank is important for things like AOA, which is probably more important than research, especially if coming from a lower school

 

[operaman]

Agree that academics need to be priority. Low step scores and low clinical grades can sink you. If you suck on the wards then the aways will sink you.

Research is important but I would take the numbers with a grain of salt. First, they are averages. Second they may include pre med work as well.

Since you have such a narrow focus of programs, you can just pub Med search all the current residents and see what was published or likely submitted by the time they applied. You can also see what was med school and what was pre med. This should give you a better sense of what to aim for.

Also keep in mind that every pub will have an abstract or presentation on the same material, so one pub may yield 3-4 lines on a CV.

It would be reasonable to start now with something small. Case reports, small chart reviews - all are easy to do and can yield a pub fairly quickly.

Ask your mentor if there are any residents who did a poster or presentation in the last couple years that they never wrote up and submitted. Offer to write up the manuscript in exchange for second author. Busy resident gets an easy CV first author stripe, and you get a pub you can knock out in a weekend. Win win. We had a student who probably got 5 or 6 pubs this way.

The other easy way to rack up pubs is if you have a skill that can be applied to multiple papers. For some this may be stats experience, coding in R or some other stats program. There was a guy a year ahead of me who learned how to query the SEER database and organize the data, so he’d help out any student that needed a quick database paper. Got 12 papers that way. In fact, SEER papers can be great fodder for students - just look up some super rare cancer relevant to your field, then write up a paper reviewing outcomes and management, review of the literature, etc.

 

[DarkBluMage]

Agree that academics need to be priority. Low step scores and low clinical grades can sink you. If you suck on the wards then the aways will sink you.

Research is important but I would take the numbers with a grain of salt. First, they are averages. Second they may include pre med work as well.

Since you have such a narrow focus of programs, you can just pub Med search all the current residents and see what was published or likely submitted by the time they applied. You can also see what was med school and what was pre med. This should give you a better sense of what to aim for.

Also keep in mind that every pub will have an abstract or presentation on the same material, so one pub may yield 3-4 lines on a CV.

It would be reasonable to start now with something small. Case reports, small chart reviews - all are easy to do and can yield a pub fairly quickly.

Ask your mentor if there are any residents who did a poster or presentation in the last couple years that they never wrote up and submitted. Offer to write up the manuscript in exchange for second author. Busy resident gets an easy CV first author stripe, and you get a pub you can knock out in a weekend. Win win. We had a student who probably got 5 or 6 pubs this way.

The other easy way to rack up pubs is if you have a skill that can be applied to multiple papers. For some this may be stats experience, coding in R or some other stats program. There was a guy a year ahead of me who learned how to query the SEER database and organize the data, so he’d help out any student that needed a quick database paper. Got 12 papers that way. In fact, SEER papers can be great fodder for students - just look up some super rare cancer relevant to your field, then write up a paper reviewing outcomes and management, review of the literature, etc.

Thanks for the insight! I’ll look into those things!