I have done 2 years of general surgery residency and I am thinking of switching to a neurology residency. Is this something that is possible? In my two years I've done 4 months in the ICU, but no internal medicine months. I'm also on a research year now and have my program's support so could probably spend my last 3 months (April-June) on Int Med if I requested.
It has been done. In my program, a resident senior to me did it.
As a DO, I had to meet both the AOA and ACGME rules whenever I did my internship. Here is essentially what I did.
1 month gen surg
1 month vasc surg
1 month ICU
2 months internal medicine
1 month pediatrics
1 month ER
1 month OB/GYN
1 month Family Medicine
1 month rheumatology
1 month infectious disease
1 month neurology service
1 month of CCU
My colleague did esentially an internal medicine year except that he had to do 1 month of ped and one month of ER, so I assume that are required.
I believe that my CCU, rheumatology, ID, and Neurology counted as "internal medicine" rotations.
I could be wrong, but I think that if you do six blocks of "internal medicine" with a month of peds and a month of ER, you are good to go.
Likely, at the end of the day, they will make you probably do an internship
🙁
Now, I know that what I am about to say next might cause a few people to pick up a tomato and start throwing, but I feel that I was exposed to a good amount of "internal medicine" on my surgery rotations, but sorry, still does not count
🙁
Ask a neurology program director and see what they have to tell you about it.
I really would not switch if I were you! I personally like neurology but lately I have just become a dumping ground. Then again, a few surgeons I know sometimes get into heavy critical care interests, so maybe a future in neurocritical care is for you?
Not to be negative, I do like neurology, but it is disappointing to jump through hoops to get botox for a patient with chronic migraine and get paid next to nothing for it while I watch pain medicine docs do an epidural on patients with normal L-spine MRIs and get paid four figures.
