Transition Year Question

[buggirl]

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Guys- I have a question. I am a wife of a forth year med student. He is beginning to get his stuff together for applications and we are discussing where to live/apply. The question is do you apply for a transitional year only, do you apply to the rad programs and they place you in a transional year, or do you apply to both. We of course don't want to move twice in two years!!! Thanks for all your help!

Lori

 

[Jim Picotte]

You generally apply to both a PGY-1 "Preliminary" spot (transtional year, prelim med or prelim surgery) AND a PGY-2 "Advanced" radiology spot. There are a handful of radiology programs that are considered "Categorical" in that if you match with those specific programs, they give you the transitional year in the same hospital. Most radiology programs require you to find your own transitional spot. Luckily there are numerous prelim medicine or transitional programs in comparisson to radiology programs so it's usually not a problem to end up in the same place for both. I didn't want to move twice either and what you do is that when you submit the match list you'll have a primary list and supplemental list so you can typically get both positions within the same city. I explained this in detail a couple years ago on how this works and when I have more time and match gets closer I'll type it up again or someone else can. But for now, don't worry too much it won't be a problem. If your husband is competitive for radiology, then finding a prelim/transitional spot will be no problem.

 

[buggirl]

Thank you Jim for getting back to me. I look forward to your further post! We are both just happy it is finally fourth year!!!!!!

Lori (this guy is really cute!)