Type of research most beneficial for app

[eklope2000]

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Research experience seems to be very important for applying to residency in certain specialties and at top academic programs. What type of research is most desirable for an applicant? Basic science research? Clinical research? "Translational" research?

How important is it for the research to relate to your chosen specialty in medicine? Would widely-applicable basic science research be the best bet for a medical student to pursue who wasn't sure yet about specialty?

For the most competitive programs, how much research have successful candidates conducted?

How favorably is time taken off for research (like between MS2 and MS3) viewed?

 

[PTCA]

Research experience seems to be very important for applying to residency in certain specialties and at top academic programs. What type of research is most desirable for an applicant? Basic science research? Clinical research? "Translational" research?

BUMP 😕 (just this one question though)
also, how bout fellowships?

 

[GenSurg]

IMO, any research will be beneficial and look good on an application, especially research with publications.

If you are looking at doing residency at a top notch research oriented residency, I think that basic science research would be the best. Certain fields also seem to be more into basic science research, such as ENT. Most specialties and institutions don't require experience in research, but I don't think it can hurt and may help get interviews at some of the big name places.

I did a couple clinical projects and and a basic science project. It would be hard to get into basic science work unless you start between your 1st and 2nd year to school, or earlier. If starting later, a case control chart review can be fairly easy to do during a not so busy month or two.

http://www.freeiPods.com/?r=20049323

 

[eklope2000]

Thanks for the advice Gensurg 🙂

 

[tigershark]

Basic science >>> clinical, in general it is much harder to get basic science research published so it carries more weight

 

[PTCA]

Many thanks,
Excellent responses

If I may push my luck a little bit further.
Regarding the preference to Basic science.
Could someone elaborate a bit on WHY this is the case? (Besides the fact that it is obviously more demanding)
I mean, they are considering you for clinical duties, right?
So,how is your lab experience (no matter how demanding it is in terms of skill and commitment) going to help them? Would you be expected to contribute in their labs as well, during residency? Wouldn’t that compromise your clinical training?
Do they value your lab research experience counting on you as a researcher during residency or is it just impressive because it makes you seem ‘smart’ and ‘academically oriented’?

Don't get me wrong,I am glad its this way (the project that i am working on is basic-translational, but I really think that i would hate going back into a lab during residency.)
So is a basic research background still preferable for programs over a clinical research background even if you are planning to focus on your clinical training (and perhaps on some 'on the job' clinical research) during residency?

 

[Gfunk6]

I think the reason that basic research > clinical research as far as residency applications go is due to the nature of the clinical research one can do as a medical student.

Most likely students can publish case reports or perhaps a chart review. Contributing meaningfully to Phase I/II/III double-blind, randomized multi-center clinical trials (the epitome of clinical research) is very difficult to do as a medical student.

However a bright med student (given time and some luck) can produce a basic research article similar to that of a graduate student. Since the student has to generate the data for such research de novo rather than using existing data (e.g. chart review) is one reason it is more highly prized.