The importantance of honoring?

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How important is honoring in order to land a decent residency in internal medicine or even surgery -- interested in cardiology or surgery ...thanks

 

[USAF MD '05]

Probably not much, unless you want a super-power school. My buddy has honored like one or two things in all of school, but consistently performs well, got GREAT letters and evals and a pretty good step1 score. He is being courted by some pretty tough surgery programs. Try to stay well above average in all you do though- can't hurt, right?
Steve

 

[Jamezuva]

while honoring in general isn't a prereq....I would definitely try my hardest to honor both your medicine and surgery clerkships provided you haven't made up your mind by third year. if you want a cardiology fellowship, you are gonna need some good support....i.e. a good name from the residency you do

 

[taozi]

while honoring in general isn't a prereq....I would definitely try my hardest to honor both your medicine and surgery clerkships provided you haven't made up your mind by third year. if you want a cardiology fellowship, you are gonna need some good support....i.e. a good name from the residency you do

obviously honoring is not "essential", but I think it really helps to boost your application, especially if you have blemishes in your transcript. I don't have good grades in my 1st two years, and I managed to honor my 3rd year clerkships and they essentially wrote off my bad grades 😀

 

[theDr.]

well my med school is pass/fail ....i keep coming close but can't get that edge....plus...i think the kids that honor have the edge of TQs in my honest opinion.

 

[irlandesa]

Although you should always try your best, I HP'ed Medicine and Passed Surgery thanks to my wonderful shelf exam score in the latter (HP'ed just about everything else clinically, and almost no Honors on the H/P/F scale during the clinical years). I don't know how I will do in the match, but I ended up getting many interviews at decent IM programs (unless you only consider BWH, MGH etc. to be "decent") like BU, Brown, Yale-New Haven, Maryland, Rochester, Jefferson, Dartmouth, and Pitt. I think my Step 1 score and letters did the trick; I don't know about General Surg, but I think IM programs tend to look at the whole applicant rather than 1 or 2 clerkship grades alone.

 

[notatriagenurse]

My girlfriend going into IM honored everything, awesome STEP 1 and STEP 2, great LORs, no research but with decent extracurricular activities. She got the sexiest invites in the country.

Botttomline: Depends how competitive the programs you intend on applying to. If you don't know how competitive then leave this possibility open and still try to honor as much... it can't hurt.

 

[Firion451]

I'm going into IM and people along the interview trail have told me that high-passing medicine kept them from getting several top interviews despite having high step 1, good LORs, etc. Such students still got good interviews at "second tier" programs. So basically honoring medicine (and one's medicine sub-I) is a virtual prerequisite for a truly top-tier interview unless you're loaded down with research and have an MD/PhD.

 

[Fermi]

I'm going into IM and people along the interview trail have told me that high-passing medicine kept them from getting several top interviews despite having high step 1, good LORs, etc.

Greeeeat. That's it for me, then. Stupid shelf exam...

 

[daelroy]

I'm going into IM and people along the interview trail have told me that high-passing medicine kept them from getting several top interviews despite having high step 1, good LORs, etc. Such students still got good interviews at "second tier" programs. So basically honoring medicine (and one's medicine sub-I) is a virtual prerequisite for a truly top-tier interview unless you're loaded down with research and have an MD/PhD.

But you have to remember the only point of going into a first tier program in IM is if you want to go into academic medicine. You can still acquire fellowships by attending second tier, third and even fourth tier programs. You don't have to go to Hopkins, MGH, Duke or Mayo if your goal is to acquire a competitive fellowship and go into private practice. I'm sure you know this but a lot of confused MS1's and MS2's think they can't go into cardiology unless they do their IM at Hopkins or a top 20 program. So not true

For example, i knew someone who went to a University based/academic program. It was located in the South so it wasn't as competitive as programs on the east coast and the west coast. That person acquired a fellowship in GI.

 

[MD'05]

Regardless of what you do, always honor, always do extremely well. This is extremely important if you go to a crappy state school. Otherwise you will end up in some crappy program somewhere doing a crappy residency.