Residency Inquiry

[DermDOcGenZ]

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I am an average medical student at a top DO school, my class rank is quite literally 51/136. I am apart of 2 club boards and member of 3 others ( I know this is fluff) and have two publications to my name, with a separate poster presentation. I am not an anatomy TA but I do train EMS and other medical students in tourniquets. I never failed a class but am a B/C student since we are not pass fail. I want to know if it is ideally my step 2 score that determines my residency. Having said this, I am very easy going person and personality wise, I got it. I am interested in PM&R, ER, vascular surg, or surgery. I want to know how competitive it really is, given that I am a mid DO. What can I do to better my chances on paper? If i get the interview I guarantee I will get the spot, but what can I do now to help secure my spot down the line? I already have great professor recommendations from neurosurgeon, ER trauma doc and vascular surgeon ready for my application and rotations. As I become a rising M2, I would love advice.

 

[Sidus1011]

There is no such thing as a top DO school and vast majority of programs do not care about preclinical class standing. No one cares about clubs unless you actually do something with them, not just another coffee meet up or setting up a residency info session. Vascular surgery will require you to be literally perfect on paper, but the other ones are attainable with good board scores and some research. Nobody cares about professor recommendations unless you do an actual rotation with them and they can see your clinical acumen, and you will probably have limited elective free time in third year to get all three of those before ERAS is due.

The most high yield things to do right now is to continue racking up research, continue doing what you find meaningful like the EMS thing, and shadow to figure out what you want to do with your life. Reading this is data and properly interpreting it is also important:

Match Data

Core to the NRMP’s mission is the development and distribution of data reports and publications that inform national conversations about the transition to residency and advance understanding of the…

www.nrmp.org

 

[DermDOcGenZ]

There is no such thing as a top DO school and vast majority of programs do not care about preclinical class standing. No one cares about clubs unless you actually do something with them, not just another coffee meet up or setting up a residency info session. Vascular surgery will require you to be literally perfect on paper, but the other ones are attainable with good board scores and some research. Nobody cares about professor recommendations unless you do an actual rotation with them and they can see your clinical acumen, and you will probably have limited elective free time in third year to get all three of those before ERAS is due.

The most high yield things to do right now is to continue racking up research, continue doing what you find meaningful like the EMS thing, and shadow to figure out what you want to do with your life. Reading this is data and properly interpreting it is also important:

Match Data

Core to the NRMP’s mission is the development and distribution of data reports and publications that inform national conversations about the transition to residency and advance understanding of the…

www.nrmp.org

Top DO as in original 5, but I really value your input. As for the recommendations, they offered third year clinical spots for me in their specialties with their partners to get working members recommendations. I will continue to do Research and grow from here. Thank you for taking the time and letting me know how to improve!! As for the clubs, it was more so for fluff to show I partook in school community. Should my step 2 be high enough, would vascular still be in the cards? My third year I have four elective rotations and fourth year I have eight electives.

 

[Just D.O. it]

Top DO as in original 5,

Still doesnt really matter. Generally DO school = DO school regardless. The only real exception is TCOM that I know of.

I would not count on an integrated vascular match even if you feel perfect on paper. Only a literal handful of DO students have ever matched that. Better to invest harder into a general surgery. Vascular surgery fellowships are not that competitive, so if youre an unproblematic resident at a mid or even midlow tier gensurg, you will be fine.

 

[Sidus1011]

Getting a high enough score on Step 2 for integrated vascular is easier said than done, and majority of applicants who match that are absolutely elite- multiple higher impact level publications in the field of vascular itself.

You have a good amount of elective time third year, I’d recommend that after shadowing and figuring out a bit more what you like that you use those to get letters of rec in your field of interest rather than jumping to 4 completely different specialties.

 

[Goro]

I am an average medical student at a top DO school, my class rank is quite literally 51/136. I am apart of 2 club boards and member of 3 others ( I know this is fluff) and have two publications to my name, with a separate poster presentation. I am not an anatomy TA but I do train EMS and other medical students in tourniquets. I never failed a class but am a B/C student since we are not pass fail. I want to know if it is ideally my step 2 score that determines my residency. Having said this, I am very easy going person and personality wise, I got it. I am interested in PM&R, ER, vascular surg, or surgery. I want to know how competitive it really is, given that I am a mid DO. What can I do to better my chances on paper? If i get the interview I guarantee I will get the spot, but what can I do now to help secure my spot down the line? I already have great professor recommendations from neurosurgeon, ER trauma doc and vascular surgeon ready for my application and rotations. As I become a rising M2, I would love advice.

Vascular surgery is hard for MDs, much less DOs. I suggest writing that one off.

PM&R is good, EM will be easy and Gen Surg is doable. Start networking.

If i get the interview I guarantee I will get the spot,
Lose this hubris.

 

[DermDOcGenZ]

Vascular surgery is hard for MDs, much less DOs. I suggest writing that one off.

PM&R is good, EM will be easy and Gen Surg is doable. Start networking.

If i get the interview I guarantee I will get the spot,
Lose this hubris.

Did you see the DO match for it, 13 applied and 8 of them got it. I was thinking of dual applying at the end of my fourth year. Having PM&R or ER as a backup. I would also apply to different hospital systems as their programs differ and there is not a conflict on interest applying to the same hospital system. On another note, I really appreciate your input and will try to be more humble. Though I interviewed at 11 (5 md and 6 DO) medical schools and got accepted to all of them. I chose DO for the full-ride scholarship. Thank you for your time writing on my post 🙂

 

[Dr_Jan_I_Tor]

Did you see the DO match for it, 13 applied and 8 of them got it. I was thinking of dual applying at the end of my fourth year. Having PM&R or ER as a backup. I would also apply to different hospital systems as their programs differ and there is not a conflict on interest applying to the same hospital system. On another note, I really appreciate your input and will try to be more humble. Though I interviewed at 11 (5 md and 6 DO) medical schools and got accepted to all of them. I chose DO for the full-ride scholarship. Thank you for your time writing on my post 🙂

Can you do math? 8/13 is about 62%. That is a horrible match rate.

Agree to lose the hubris, yikes.

 

[Ho0v-man]

I’m sure there are anecdotes of success, but typically surgical subs don’t go to stone cold average DO students, which you seem to be by your own admission. I mean it’s still early and you can turn it around, but your classmates who will match super competitively have been grinding much harder than you. If this is limit to your bandwidth, that’s okay, but you need to be realistic about what that can get you.

I am an average medical student at a top DO school, my class rank is quite literally 51/136. I am apart of 2 club boards and member of 3 others ( I know this is fluff) and have two publications to my name, with a separate poster presentation. I am not an anatomy TA but I do train EMS and other medical students in tourniquets. I never failed a class but am a B/C student since we are not pass fail. I want to know if it is ideally my step 2 score that determines my residency. Having said this, I am very easy going person and personality wise, I got it. I am interested in PM&R, ER, vascular surg, or surgery. I want to know how competitive it really is, given that I am a mid DO. What can I do to better my chances on paper? If i get the interview I guarantee I will get the spot, but what can I do now to help secure my spot down the line? I already have great professor recommendations from neurosurgeon, ER trauma doc and vascular surgeon ready for my application and rotations. As I become a rising M2, I would love advice.

You can probably get a courtesy interview from an elective in VS. But if you don’t have the app, you might not even make the rank list at all. I’ve personally seen students delude themselves into thinking the courtesy for a surgical sub meant something despite having an FM/IM level app.

 

[j4pac]

Can you do math? 8/13 is about 62%. That is a horrible match rate.

Agree to lose the hubris, yikes.

That doesn’t even include the selection bias. DOs don’t apply to VS unless they are rockstars. I agree that the likelihood of an average DO matching to VS is remote…at best.

OP…PM&R is in play. Our match rate isn’t great for DOs (roughly 70%), but we are very DO friendly. The problem is that we have a ton of applicants so mathematically not every DO is going to get a spot. We are no longer a less competitive residency.

 

[NotAProgDirector]

Not yet mentioned, dual applying is much more difficult than it sounds. Applying to two specialties is easy -- you get letters for both, write a PS for both, and then spend twice as much money applying. Being a competitive applicant to two fields is almost impossible.

If you want to be competitive for VS (for example), you'll need multiple away rotations / SubI's, and likely a productive research year. If you do all that, applying to EM is going to be a challenge -- it will be difficult to get SLOE's, and when programs see all this VS research and VS rotations, EM programs may decide you are not really interested. Especially at "better" programs.

 

[DOVinciRobot]

Forget i5 vascular. Surgical subspecialty spots do not go to stone cold average DOs. Your best bet is to pull a 250/600 Step 2/Level 2 and then audition your butt off for general surgery and then do a vascular fellowship (they aren’t that competitive). If you score lower than that I would target mainly former DO surgery programs.

 

[mbdriver]

Did you see the DO match for it, 13 applied and 8 of them got it. I was thinking of dual applying at the end of my fourth year. Having PM&R or ER as a backup. I would also apply to different hospital systems as their programs differ and there is not a conflict on interest applying to the same hospital system. On another note, I really appreciate your input and will try to be more humble. Though I interviewed at 11 (5 md and 6 DO) medical schools and got accepted to all of them. I chose DO for the full-ride scholarship. Thank you for your time writing on my post 🙂

According to ERAS application statistics, 25 DOs applied to integrated vascular surgery programs. Of that 25, 13 went on to rank integrated vascular surgery programs, which is what the NRMP data tells us. So, the match rate for DOs who applied and matched is 32%. The match rate for DOs who ranked and matched is 61.5%. Neither of which is especially good. And this was a year when a larger number of DOs than usual matched into integrated vascular surgery.