Urgently need advice-gone on neuro interviews but gaining interest in PM&R

[sameer]

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I'm an offcycle fall 2008 graduate from a U.S. medical school who took the year off to try to take more time and study for my step 2 and reapply for ophthalmology. I didn't get the score I needed and didn't match ophtho and after talking to numerous PD's it looks like ophtho will not happen for me. I also had applied for neurology because of the possibility of doing a neuro ophthalmology fellowship and have gone on 7 neurology interviews. The problem I'm having is that I'm not convinced that I like general neuro and you have to do that for 3 years before even thinking about fellowships.

I have also always had an interest in rehab and sports medicine but haven't had the chance to ever do a rotation in physiatry. The more I read about it the more I'm interested in it. My question is if I don't rank neuro and do PM&R electives in my intern year and end up liking it, is it a long shot to find an open PM&R residency spot? It looks like there hardly have been any open spots throughout the year based on what I've noticed on residentswap.org. The other option would be to shadow physiatrists for this month in both outpatient and inpatient settings (I don't have malpractice insurance because I've already graduated and can't touch patients) and try to get a letter by scramble day. Would I have a chance to scramble into any weak PM&R programs without a true PM&R elective and also on average how many PM&R spots have been available for scramble the last couple years? My stats- bottom third of my med school class, Step 1 82, Step 2 85, US med school, strong rec letters (medicine, neuro, surgery). All advice is greatly appreciated.

 

[PMR 4 MSK]

If you wait until after going into neuro, you'd either have to scamble, go outside the match, or repeat/wait a year. PM&R matches for PGY-2 when you are a MS-4 - so matches are for 2 years later.

If you scramble this year, you'd be better off having a LOR from PM&R, but at that point, they are taking warm bodies. Some programs don't fill - look at NMRP data from previous years to see how many on ave.

 

[ml2001]

Some programs do offer PGY2 spots that start at the same time the PGY1 spots start, but these spots are outside the match. For instance, I'm currently doing prelim medicine and have prematched into a PGY2 spot that is going to start this coming July. I didn't apply to any advanced specialities last year as I was undecided at that point. I attended the PM&R interviews in Dec/2008 while doing my prelim year and accepted the prematch when it was offered. So, I will be starting PGY2 in July/2009 right after I'm done with PGY1. Plz lemme know if you have any questions...

-ML