Transitional Year Electives

[Isom]

I need to send in my preferences for 5 electives for my transitional year. Would you recommend taking "easier" electives, or stuff that would be helpful for ophtho? Any recommendations on what would be good to take if it's the second? Thanks.

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[Jokestr]

Wow, you have 5 electives....that will be nice.
I would recommend doing both easy electives and electives pertinent to ophtho...
Do a radiology elective early in the year....it will be easy and it will help you get some practice reading CT/MRI scans which can help you later on.
Definitely try and do an ophtho elective in the spring to refresh yourself on Slit lamp and some of the basics before you start your ophtho program.
I would also recommend doing a rheumatology elective. It should be easy and will better familiarize you with some of the auto-immune diseases frequently encountered in ophtho.
For the other two electives, pick two that will be as easy as possible so you can kick back and enjoy a couple of months before starting ophtho year.
Good luck.

 

[Mirror Form]

if you have 5 electives, you should see if you can get into 2 months of ophtho. Your program director might okay a second month of ophtho if it's in a subspecialty like ocular pathology or neuro-ophthalmology. Rheumatology is a great idea. A neurology rotation would probably be helpful too, but I'm not sure if it's worth the extra work when you could just do an easy one.

 

[rubensan]

ENT would be another good one. we are constantly co-managing patients together. i agree with the other recommendations in this thread.

if you have 5 electives, you should see if you can get into 2 months of ophtho. Your program director might okay a second month of ophtho if it's in a subspecialty like ocular pathology or neuro-ophthalmology. Rheumatology is a great idea. A neurology rotation would probably be helpful too, but I'm not sure if it's worth the extra work when you could just do an easy one.

 

[MR1]

What do you guys think about doing an infectious disease or endocrine rotation? Would they enough benefit?

Thanks

 

[rubensan]

any internal medicine rotation will benefit you! one of the reasons that i closed the above thread is because many ODs that were posting in it fail to understand that ophthalmology is a branch of medicine that treats (both medically and surgically) multi-system diseases that manifest in the eye. how will you understand grave's ophthalmopathy if you don't understand thyroid disease? how will you communicate to the diabetic patient's primary care provider what the goal HgA1C and blood pressure should be if you don't understand diabetes?
how will you manage the patient's orbital cellulitis when the lab pages you to inform you that the pt's cx is growing gram positive cocci in clusters with < 19mm Cefotoxitin diffusion test? why do we r/o ocular involvement in patients with fungemia anyhow? what i am getting at is that ophthalmology is much more than anterior stromal puncture and writing xalatan 1 gtt OU qHS when you see a C to D ratio of 0.5 OU. and speaking of glaucoma, why don't we like to start cosopt in patients with asthma? i hope this answers your question.

What do you guys think about doing an infectious disease or endocrine rotation? Would they enough benefit?

Thanks

 

[FlyingDoc]

What do you guys think about doing an infectious disease or endocrine rotation? Would they enough benefit?

Thanks

ID would be good if you are going to do your residency in a place like LA or Miami. These places are rampant with HIV, TB, and syphillis.

If you are headed to a place like Iowa where you'll see very few HIV patients... it may not be so useful.