Step 2 required to get interviews?

[trueDJ]

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Does anyone have insight into what percentage of programs require Step 2 scores before they offer interviews? Since my schedule this fall is looking pretty cramped (like most of yours, I'm sure), I was hoping to take it in December. Will this keep me from getting a fair number of interviews? Thanks for the help!

 

[nordr]

Does anyone have insight into what percentage of programs require Step 2 scores before they offer interviews? Since my schedule this fall is looking pretty cramped (like most of yours, I'm sure), I was hoping to take it in December. Will this keep me from getting a fair number of interviews? Thanks for the help!

I didn't take Step 2 until after interview season. I don't think it matters much on the east coast. Think the west coast might be different though.

 

[ZagDoc]

None require Step 2 to offer interviews. Only one I ran into was UCSF which requires Step 2 completed prior to their rank list submission.

 

[otopico]

Step 2 is not required for interviews. The incentive to have completed step 2 prior to applying for residency is in the setting of a low(er) Step 1 score. That way hopefully you can show substantial improvement and this may give you some interviews you might have not received otherwise. If you have a high Step 1 score, I would encourage you to hold off until after interview season because you risk potentially doing worse on Step 2. Hope that helps.

 

[trueDJ]

Thanks nordr, ZagDoc, and otopico for your help. If I could ask just one more favor, would you mind taking a look at page 103 on the Program Director Survey for 2010? The graph on the lower left makes it seem like almost half of the responding program directors require step 2 for interviews. You are all in agreement about not needing these scores, so am I just drastically misinterpreting this graph, or is something else going on? Thanks again!

http://www.nrmp.org/data/resultsanddata2010.pdf

 

[ZagDoc]

Thanks nordr, ZagDoc, and otopico for your help. If I could ask just one more favor, would you mind taking a look at page 103 on the Program Director Survey for 2010? The graph on the lower left makes it seem like almost half of the responding program directors require step 2 for interviews. You are all in agreement about not needing these scores, so am I just drastically misinterpreting this graph, or is something else going on? Thanks again!

http://www.nrmp.org/data/resultsanddata2010.pdf

Think you linked the wrong pdf because it only goes to 90 something pages.

That being said, I had received all of my interview offers prior to my Step 2 scores being posted. None of them asked about or requested Step 2 status prior to interview day or on interview day (except UCSF as I said above). For the first half of my interviews my score wasn't back... no one mentioned it. For the second half of my interviews my score was back... no one mentioned it.

Is it possible I didn't get some interview offers because of lack of Step 2? I dont know, I guess its possible, I didn't read the "application requirements" for every program I applied it. But I never remember any of the other applicants on the trail mentioning it.

I think a lot of that data is specialty dependent.