Thanks! Yea I have a ton of time to study (been sleeping a lot and doing UWorld for a month now). I still have 5 months to study at my own pace. I feel that, that extra time will make up for the lack of on-the-job knowledge. At least that's my theory.
Wow not having to pay or it is even better! My main concern is to not have that lurking in the back of my mind and wanted to take it while everything is fresh.
I basically didn't do anything from Match day til graduation bc I took electives that didn't require my physical presence during interview season and got credit for them. Our school gave generous time off for interviews.
That was a good month!My school was the same. Once we got past third year, it was cruise control to graduation. Other than two required rotations, the rest of fourth year was essentially elective time. Sure, there was the stress of interviews, but I had a lot more enjoyment on rotations I was actually interested in.
Woah! How were you able to manage that? I know that some residency programs will pay for Step 3 or study materials but I thought that you actually had to start residency before that.
Keep in mind this was almost a decade ago. But the residency program I went to would cover step 3. I asked them if they would reimburse me if I took it before I got there and they said yes… simple as that.
The main issue is scheduling it because you can't get your scheduling permit until you graduate, and it's a tight turn around to find an open date before you start residency orientation.
Good point! I would hope that it would be fairly easy to schedule Step 3 early in your intern year. Or is scheduling Step 3 difficult to do in intern year? I would really appreciate hearing residents'/program directors' insights/experiences on this.
Program dependent. I took mine in February while I was on my newborn rotation--there was another intern on with me, so we just covered the whole list when the other was out. Many of my co-residents took it during ED because the scheduling worked out okay. The interns at my current institution take it during one of their elective months. Programs are usually accommodating bc you need it to get licensed. But I wouldn't plan on taking it during an inpatient rotation bc 1) you won't have time to study and 2) it puts extra work on your co-residents if you're out. You should get your schedule within a month after match day, so you'll have a sense of when you can take it then. The chiefs or other program leadership can usually help find time to schedule as well.
I had 10 weeks off for interviews then came back to two extremely chill outpatient rotations. I'm talking half day with no weekends and basically just shadowing. The last three months we basically have residency bookcamp which is a ton of zoom lectures and activities. I am already halfway through UWorld for step 3. I'm really loving this right now, not gonna lie.
Wish I would have had that! First 6 months of intern year suuuuuuucked for me because most of the last 6 months of 4th year was shadowing outpatient specialty docs and not using my brain much. It took some time to reacclimate myself to 80 hour work weeks and taking ownership of medical decision making.
Hello ak_ps
