Rotation Lottery Systems/Rules

[julianneimseis]

I am at a newer medical school and there are currently no rules in place for our third year rotations. All students enter a lottery system and if you are "lucky" you have to move to another city. When I interviewed at other schools some had rules in place surrounding there lottery system for third year clinical rotations. The reason I am asking, I am trying to help form a standardized system at our school to help the future classes be a little less stressed and have our lottery go a lot smoother.

Does your school have rules in place?
If yes, what types of rules are in place?

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[mmmcdowe]

I am at a newer medical school and there are currently no rules in place for our third year rotations. All students enter a lottery system and if you are "lucky" you have to move to another city. When I interviewed at other schools some had rules in place surrounding there lottery system for third year clinical rotations. The reason I am asking, I am trying to help form a standardized system at our school to help the future classes be a little less stressed and have our lottery go a lot smoother.

Does your school have rules in place?
If yes, what types of rules are in place?

We had 10 different orders that we could choose from, and the lottery was just used to see who got to pick their order first. Most people got their top choice and everyone got their top 3. As far as rotating off campus, the rule was that you wouldn't have to do more than 2, and if you had significant circumstances they wouldn't make you rotate elsewhere (i.e. children).

 

[gudog]

We had 10 different orders that we could choose from, and the lottery was just used to see who got to pick their order first. Most people got their top choice and everyone got their top 3. As far as rotating off campus, the rule was that you wouldn't have to do more than 2, and if you had significant circumstances they wouldn't make you rotate elsewhere (i.e. children).

We had a similar lottery, but we all chipped one dollar into a pot, and the person who's name got drawn last (meaning he had no choice but took what was left) won the money

 

[Bacchus]

We had a similar lottery, but we all chipped one dollar into a pot, and the person who's name got drawn last (meaning he had no choice but took what was left) won the money

This sounds like PCOM. My class didn't do this and I think we set an unfortunate precedent, haha.

 

[Bacchus]

I am at a newer medical school and there are currently no rules in place for our third year rotations. All students enter a lottery system and if you are "lucky" you have to move to another city. When I interviewed at other schools some had rules in place surrounding there lottery system for third year clinical rotations. The reason I am asking, I am trying to help form a standardized system at our school to help the future classes be a little less stressed and have our lottery go a lot smoother.

Does your school have rules in place?
If yes, what types of rules are in place?

PCOM has 12 groups that rotate which specialty they are on. Within those groups there are 20-21 people. There is a matrix/point system used to determine in the group who goes to which site.

 

[justdoit31]

For campus we got to put our top 2 (of 3 campuses) and if we had a specific reason. Those with more legit reasons (spouses job, kids, family needs, etc) got first consideration then it went via availablility and acceptance date to school (we knew campus before starting MSI)- there was a jeopardy system near end of MS2 if people wanted to change.

For MS3 rotations we have 6 rotations each are 8 weeks. We have 2 blocks (Surg, FM, and Peds) (IM, Ob/GYN, Psych)- so we got to pick which we prefered in fall and spring and then could request an order or partners and list any reasons why you preferred that order (ie I wanted Peds in Jan/Feb for RSV season)... our student services director then worked to put the schedule down. For MS4 it's similar- you submit a schedule that you prefer and then they assign you rotations and if you need to make changes they try to work with you.

 

[Siggy]

At my school it's a match type process for rotation tracks. Our rotations are split into 3 month blocks with 3 four week rotations (except OB and Peds which are 6 weeks) in each block. We rank as many tracks as we want and then a computer goes through the tracks assigning tracks to individuals. The way the algorithm works is that on the first pass it randomly selects a student who ranked that track number one. Then it repeats with the unmatched tracks, unmatched students who ranked those tracks 2nd. Repeat until everyone matched. If there's someone who didn't match into anything (ran out of ranked tracks), then they're randomly put into a remaining track.

Following the lottery we have a week to trade tracks, then a week to trade blocks (block 2 always contains IM, FP, surg, but the order and locations may be different) between blocks), then we can trade individual rotation sites. unfortunately all of the rotation site trades are 1 for 1, so if you're FP, surg, IM and I'm surg, FP, IM, we can't trade surge and FP even though the trade is balanced.

Our 4th block is elective/OMM/vacation and we can swap elective month and vacation month at will.

One final note, the order is always 1->2->3->4, but the tracks will hop on at different places, so a group of tracks goes 1-2-3-4, then other group of tracks goes 2-3-4-1, 3-4-1-2, and 4-1-2-3.

 

[Socrates25]

I am at a newer medical school and there are currently no rules in place for our third year rotations. All students enter a lottery system and if you are "lucky" you have to move to another city. When I interviewed at other schools some had rules in place surrounding there lottery system for third year clinical rotations. The reason I am asking, I am trying to help form a standardized system at our school to help the future classes be a little less stressed and have our lottery go a lot smoother.

Does your school have rules in place?
If yes, what types of rules are in place?

Med schools dont have any business opening unless they can provide 100% of clinical training on-site. If you want to go off campus, that should be encouraged, but if a school cant fit all their rotations on-site, it means they are a weak substandard program.

Unfortunately, both the DO and MD accreditation organizations have essentially ignored this for some time, and as a result we've got a plethora of "Joe Bob's Country Medical School" opening in ****hole cities with low populations who cant support clinical training.

Welcome to the Burger King era of medical schools.

 

[Bacchus]

So every school should have its own hospital able to accommodate 2 years worth of students? Is that what you're saying?