I have several questions about EM:
1) What if any was the impact of applying to EM as a DO? As in, did you perceive any biases on interviews, rotations, etc.?
2) Overall, did you feel that your 3rd and 4th year rotations were solid? Any negatives or pros that were either specific to your school or DO education in general?
3) Do you like OMT? Time sink, or valuable information? Have you applied it yet in residency?
4) When did you realize or think you were going to go for EM? What's the best thing and worst thing about the specialty so far for you?
5) If you could do it all over again, would you go for medicine? Would you try harder to go for MD?
6) Did you do any research while in med school either specific to EM or in general?
7) How much does it suck to take COMLEX and then--if you did that is--USMLE? It seems most students take them essentially in the same week...
8) I am anxious about attending my medical school (LECOM-SH) especially since my MCAT was below average, while everything else was strong. I am worried I won't excel, be bottom 10% of the class, and just not meet my own expectations that I have of myself. Did you go through such moments in medical school, did they come up in pre-clinical or more clinical years?
9) What is one thing you would do different in medical school, either related to how you studied, interacted with friends, or whatever--that one thing that you now realize would have helped in your learning?
Thanks for answering any of these questions--I appreciate your time very much!!!
1. I was loved even more? EM is a comically pro-DO field. While I'm not going to say every academic center in the US has a recent DO graduate, I will assume that every academic center in the US has either a recent DO graduate or DOs on faculty. The most elite training places in the field (Denver, UCLA, Cook County, Bellevue) are famous for taking tons of DOs. It was totally fine. Im sure Harvard or Sinai probably didnt take my app quite as seriously, but EM isnt like some of the other fields - research isn't that big and the residencies that are research-heavy are good places but they arent the elite places and many 'less brand name' places are widely considered better than the 'name brand' ones that are research oriented
2. I felt my 3rd and 4th year rotations were great (assuming this is in reference to EM). My school required a month of EM in 3rd year and gave me a month elective to do EM again right at the end of my 3rd year. Then 4th year I had tons of elective time. I was able to rotate pretty much anywhere I wanted without difficulty and was welcomed at major EM places to rotate with them, just had to do a little bit of legwork. So the pro-specific to my school was requiring that EM rotation in 3rd year, I think having one under my belt (even though it was at a non-residency place), made everyone else take my request to rotate with them more seriously.
3. OMT? Not my thing. I keep my skills slightly sharp by using it on my family, but except for making their aches and pains feel good I rarely use it in practice. The one use I have for it in practice is in with something I learned from a DO urologist who uses some of the OMT skills he learned to differentiate kidney mediated pain from msk back pain. Useful for the ER doctor since mid back pain is not totally uncommon and ruling out kidney stone on everyone with mid-back pain is a real pain. (A negative bedside ultrasound isnt enough to convince me there is no stone, but a normal bedside u/s and omt findings suggestive of msk origin is).
4. I have a very complex history of chasing two different fields. I always wanted EM from day 1 medical school, but during my 3rd year I became enamored with urology as well. So I chased both and took what came my way in the end. Best thing about my field is just about everything... it is a perfect fit for my personality, it never bores me, and it makes me feel like Im a "real" doctor and saving lives. It also gives me the lifestyle I want... I dont care about nights vs days and holidays, I care about the fact that more than half the month Im home to spend time with my future wife and family. That free time (and the very nice income that comes with it) locked this field up for me as a great choice. What do I dislike? People who dont know medicine asking me repeatedly "okay... but what is your
speciality" and having to tell them that EM is a specialty.
5. You bet your f***ing ass Id do medicine again. And no I wouldnt try harder for MD. I got into MD schools. I didnt go by choice. Now my choice was driven by geography, I had strong family reasons to stay nearby and seriously was worried about things/people in my family when i went off to medical school. I didnt have any MD choices in the NY tristate region, but I totally had allopathic acceptances if I was willing go to to a different time zone. But leaving the area was a last ditch option for me and I happily chose DO in a location I wanted over MD where I didnt want to be.
6. I had one published article (in urology), and three national presentations (In quality improvement unrelated to any field) prior to applying for residency. I now have four published articles (three in urology, one in EM), and five national presentation (all five in quality improvement unrelated to any specific field).
7. Didnt suck at all. Took the USMLE first every time. Just studied for it as hard as humanly possible and then took the COMLEX about two weeks later. Basically took a week off after the USMLE to flood my brain with celebratory alcohol and then took 4 or 5 days to review OMM before taking the COMLEX. If you studied for the USMLE you are more than prepared for the COMLEX with just a little bit of OMM prep. People who say they arent similar tests are nitpicking. If you know the stuff you know the stuff, saying "oh bbut theyre written ever so slightly differently and blah blah blah" is sort of a cop out when the difference is that the COMLEX questions are generally easier except when they are completely random as hell (and nothing youre going to do will prep you for the random as hell questions).
8. Everyone has imposter syndrome. I was one of the better students in my graudating class and I had crippling imposter syndrome. You'll sit around and have panic attacks being convinced that everyone else knows everything better than you. 1) If you dont feel this way then you have no business being in medicine because that fear should drive you to work harder and 2) most people feel the exact same way about you whenever you get a question right that they didnt feel confident about. Just push yourself harder all the time. Im never going to be someone to tell you to lose yourself and lose track of a regular lifestyle from studying so much, but the day you become complacent (rather than saying "I need to get out and be social, for my own social/mental health") is the day you're doing your future patients a disservice. Wherever you are when you hit that peak level of performance is where you'll be. and thats fine.
9. ummmmmmmmmm. I'd have utilized the really cutting edge study materials out there more. Podcasts and live lectures and great lecturers. I was a "read the book. study the power point. do whatever questions were easily available. discuss with other students. repeat ad nauseum" studier. It worked well, especially the part where I did practice questions.... but I never took advantage of lectures and podcasts and (slightly harder to find) questions that are put together by some of these world class lecturers. I do this now as a resident and benefit immensely from it.
