Should I take the USMLE?

[MedicineMike]

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What was that part about how DOs whine too much about taking it, while MDs don't have a choice of whether to take it or not about then?

Again, not complaining, just found your initial post way too combative/inflammatory for the context of this thread...

I don't get where you are going with this. DOs do whine about taking usmle.


MS4

 

[AMEHigh]

Honestly, I'm not the best standardized test taker, so I just focused on trying to know the comlex style type of questions the best I could. I did com bank and comquest. At the time it just felt overwhelming to also do uworld.

I knew I wanted to do family or ob, so I just decided to focus on comlex since I know a lot of the community programs I was applying to would accept it.

My school didn't discourage us from taking the usmle, I just decided on my own to forgo it. I thought a poor score would reflect worse than no score.

 

[AMEHigh]

Curious Q:;

How come you decided not to do the method most people say to do which is study for USMLE since Day 1 and then just add the green book for OMM plus COMLEX bank?

Honestly, I'm not the best standardized test taker, so I just focused on trying to know the comlex style type of questions the best I could. I did com bank and comquest. At the time it just felt overwhelming to also do uworld.

I knew I wanted to do family or ob, so I just decided to focus on comlex since I know a lot of the community programs I was applying to would accept it.

My school didn't discourage us from taking the usmle, I just decided on my own to forgo it. I thought a poor score would reflect worse than no score.

 

[DermViser]

IR is indeed a safe area of radiology. And images being read by folks overseas seems to be gaining steam it seems like it's the night guys reading films in Australia. As far as liability I have no ideal. Sorry 🙁

Uh, no.

 

[DermViser]

What a crock of ****. We go to school for infinite number of years in an effort to help the general public. We go into extreme debt, especially with medical tuition going up over 300% since the 90's. Yet, as physicians, we can depend on the government to provide adequate funding to increase the # of residency spots to meet the increasing need for physicians. And now, outsourcing?? How are we supposed to pay off our 300K+ in loans??

Sorry for venting, and thank you for confirming the outsourcing. Definitely concerning and eye opening at the same time. Better to know than to go into a specialty blind. 🙂

You know that films can't be read in Australia due to liability issues, right?

 

[CopToEM]

If we stop taking it, it only hurts the advancement of DOs. ACGME program directors couldn't care less if you take usmle or not.
MS4

How do you figure it hurts advancement? I don't consider vast numbers of DO students taking the licensure exam for a completely separate licensing body an advancement. Even our dean, Dr. Stowers, the most recent past-president of the AOA, said that it's really kind of silly that grades on boards are used for residency purposes. People forget these aren't placement exams - they're licensure exams.

With that said it has been, and will continue to be, my opinion that licensure exams should be pass/fail. Allowing PDs to play numbers games to knock people out just promotes laziness. I'm sorry. Judge applicants on the bigger picture. As I've said a thousand times some of the most respected, successful, and effective physicians I know are those who struggled in med school one way or another. Low board scores aren't always a product of a poor student. Real life pops up for some folks at the most inopportune times. It's a damn shame that'll be held against them for the rest of the process.

To the OP: If a program wants you they'll take you. Period. If they're not willing to take you because you didn't take the USMLE then, honestly, you probably didn't really want to go there anyway.

 

[Makati2008]

You know that films can't be read in Australia due to liability issues, right?

m.hopkinsmedicine.org/about/crossroads/09_09_04.html

http://investing.businessweek.com/research/stocks/private/snapshot.asp?privcapId=33061727

Old article but I don't think it has changed for the better. I could be wrong so I will say to ask this in the rads forum for further clarification. Also I see they are based in the USA so could they get around issues this way? Idk.

 

[Makati2008]

How do you figure it hurts advancement? I don't consider vast numbers of DO students taking the licensure exam for a completely separate licensing body an advancement. Even our dean, Dr. Stowers, the most recent past-president of the AOA, said that it's really kind of silly that grades on boards are used for residency purposes. People forget these aren't placement exams - they're licensure exams.

With that said it has been, and will continue to be, my opinion that licensure exams should be pass/fail. Allowing PDs to play numbers games to knock people out just promotes laziness. I'm sorry. Judge applicants on the bigger picture. As I've said a thousand times some of the most respected, successful, and effective physicians I know are those who struggled in med school one way or another. Low board scores aren't always a product of a poor student. Real life pops up for some folks at the most inopportune times. It's a damn shame that'll be held against them for the rest of the process.

To the OP: If a program wants you they'll take you. Period. If they're not willing to take you because you didn't take the USMLE then, honestly, you probably didn't really want to go there anyway.

I agree with a few points in your argument but you have some problems here:

1.) Dean Stowers told us at the beginning of the process oh you don't need to take the USMLE and then as we progressed throughout school he said we need to do so. So I would err on the side of caution and take the USMLE. Also DOs can't have it both ways, if we want to be equal then we have to get rid of the comlex and replace it with the USMLE + a separate osteopathic block or keep taking two separate exams. It's the fairest ways to compare us all.

2.)The last statement is just poor advice. Not taking the USMLE will lock this person out of many quality programs. I would be careful to give that type of advice as someone who hasn't went through the match(even after I matched I would always advise to take the USMLE unless you are not doing well on the practice exams or the speciality that you choose is very comlex friendly). I will also say if you are going into EM you will see what I am talking about. Getting accepted into an acgme residency with comlex only is becoming harder as time progresses in the competitive fields.

 

[MedicineMike]

Uh, no.

This. I've noticed that some small community hospitals with ~2-3 Radiologist total, send their films out for preliminary overnight reads. This really doesn't mean much since the radiologist has to verify EVERY film the next morning and sign off on what whoever read it as. That comes with huge liability to the hospital and the radiologist for that matter. Another PP I was with looked into this hard, but couldn't pull the trigger due to liability and it really just not being worth it.

 

[IH8ColdWeath3r]

I agree with a few points in your argument but you have some problems here:

1.) Dean Stowers told us at the beginning of the process oh you don't need to take the USMLE and then as we progressed throughout school he said we need to do so. So I would err on the side of caution and take the USMLE. Also DOs can't have it both ways, if we want to be equal then we have to get rid of the comlex and replace it with the USMLE + a separate osteopathic block or keep taking two separate exams. It's the fairest ways to compare us all.

2.)The last statement is just poor advice. Not taking the USMLE will lock this person out of many quality programs. I would be careful to give that type of advice as someone who hasn't went through the match(even after I matched I would always advise to take the USMLE unless you are not doing well on the practice exams or the speciality that you choose is very comlex friendly). I will also say if you are going into EM you will see what I am talking about. Getting accepted into an acgme residency with comlex only is becoming harder as time progresses in the competitive fields.

^I agree with #2. The residency director that I scribed for 2 years got to know me pretty well and I had a good working relationship with him. Before I left for medical school, I asked him to just shoot straight with me and tell me what I could do to increase my chances of getting into their EM program, should I choose to do EM. He knew I was going to the a DO school and the first words uttered out of his mouth were, "take the USMLE and do well. I need to be able to compare apples to apples, not apples to oranges. By taking that test, you allow me to do that". He also pretty much said the pre-clinical grades don't matter at all to him, I think his exact words were "just get A's and B's, and don't fail anything".

 

[MRSAful Fate]

^I agree with #2. The residency director that I scribed for 2 years got to know me pretty well and I had a good working relationship with him. Before I left for medical school, I asked him to just shoot straight with me and tell me what I could do to increase my chances of getting into their EM program, should I choose to do EM. He knew I was going to the a DO school and the first words uttered out of his mouth were, "take the USMLE and do well. I need to be able to compare apples to apples, not apples to oranges. By taking that test, you allow me to do that". He also pretty much said the pre-clinical grades don't matter at all to him, I think his exact words were "just get A's and B's, and don't fail anything".

This echos the advice I've heard from going to several EM conferences and seeing this question answered by multiple ACGME PD's. If you are a DO and you want to get in to ACGME EM you are severely handicapping yourself if you don't take the USMLE. Take both steps and do well.

I'd be interested to see if anyone matched ACGME EM this last cycle on just the COMLEX. If they did they are very lucky. I personally know of people who went in with just a good COMLEX and ended up scrambling.

 

[Dharma]

If you don't take the USMLE and I do, and do pretty well... And it comes down to a PD selecting you or me... Chances are...

Ya know?

 

[pattr]

If you don't take the USMLE and I do, and do pretty well... And it comes down to a PD selecting you or me... Chances are...

Ya know?

Exactly. As a DO you're not just competing with the MD's... you're competing with other DO's too. I think people tend to forget that.