Should I submit the LOR?

[Faizankhan]

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Hi to everyone.
I graduated from Pakistani medical college. I did an elective in IM at a big university based program. During the elective i had the oppurtunity to work with an american doctor as well as a Pakistani doctor( did his medical school from Pakistan). So I got LORs from both the doctors. So my question is whether should I submit both my LORs to the ERAS considering the fact that the one of them came from a pakistani doctor and is considerabely better than the one I got from the US doctor. Can it even backfire on me that I may have gotten the letter on the basis of personal relations?

By the way I always think that the letter from the person who did his medical school and entire training in US carries more weightage than someone who did his pg training in the US. Do you guys agree with that?

 

[Law2Doc]

By the way I always think that the letter from the person who did his medical school and entire training in US carries more weightage than someone who did his pg training in the US. Do you guys agree with that?

Absolutely. The person is recommending you for a US residency so his view of how you'll do is only useful if he knows what a US residency entails firsthand.

 

[Winged Scapula]

I don't know that its important if the letter writer went to medical school in the US vs abroad. What letter writers should have is a good grasp of what it takes to be a US resident physician which presumably any foreign grad who did his GME here would have in just as much detail as the AMG.

 

[dragonfly99]

I think if the two faculty have equal rank (i.e. both are associate professors, or both are community physicians, or both are assistant professor level) then I would submit the one from the Pakistani doctor, if it is more positive. Where he went to med school isn't that relevant if he did residency here in the US. If one doctor did residency at Harvard and one did residency at some unknown community program, that would be important too. What you want is a positive letter, and one that shows that the person knows you, and then after that what is most important is what is the rank of the person writing the letter, and whether or not the person who receives the recommendation (i.e. program director wherever you apply) happens to know the person. Letters from someone they know carry more weight than a letter from a guy they don't know.

And there is no stigma to having gotten a letter through a "personal relationship" as long as the person has worked with you in the hospital/clinically. Not sure what you meant by that. If the person only recommended you because you have the same country of origin, and you didn't work with him, that would be different.

I would check and see where these guys did residency (and fellowship, if they did one). Residencies often like applicants who are recommended by someone they know, or someone who did residency or fellowship at their institution. Just an idea...I don't even know if you applied to any of the hospitals where these 2 docs did their training.