WAMC: residency following failed class

[doc.Junior]

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I'm wondering if anyone could comment on how psychiatry views a failed class in M1 (particularly early on, vs late in the year).

I realize that, aside from red flags, there's beneficial application factors including school prestige, clinical, Step 2, LORs, research artifacts, advanced degrees, and (maybe?) away rotation success and mission statement.

Would love it if anyone could comment on forecast for someone rebounding from a failed class. I've been told psych may be more forgiving of this given that the field encourages learning from psychological hardships, especially if it's prior to clinical rotations. Wondering how that scans to you esteemed folks, and where that would fall on the spectrum of one being able to 'scrape by somewhere' to 'you can still go anywhere with reasonable other stats'. Anecdotes welcome 🙂

Thanks!

 

[TexasPhysician]

Many programs automatically screen out a single failure. That said, psych is more forgiving on average. A single failure doesn’t eliminate all hope of being a psychiatrist. Finishing strong will be important.

 

[splik]

This information is usually buried in the transcript/MSPE and in the quick glance a lot of people won't even notice it. Obviously, it is better to have passed everything but only things like Step failures, repeating years, prolonged LOAs, disciplinary actions, and clerkship rotation failures are red flags. I would consider this a yellow flag. In the past there have been people matching at even top programs with a class failure. There have to be other redeeming features in your application that wash away your sins of course.

 

[Celexa]

This information is usually buried in the transcript/MSPE and in the quick glance a lot of people won't even notice it. Obviously, it is better to have passed everything but only things like Step failures, repeating years, prolonged LOAs, disciplinary actions, and clerkship rotation failures are red flags. I would consider this a yellow flag. In the past there have been people matching at even top programs with a class failure. There have to be other redeeming features in your application that wash away your sins of course.

This is why only people currently involved in the residency application process should give advice. There is a checkbox in ERAS for failed coursework, and programs can and do use it to filter out applicants completely. 'Buried in the mspe' it might be, but thats not what matters anymore.

That being said--only recently has psychiatry become competitive and many people believe very strongly in holistic review of applicants, and the decision makers still contain a lot of people with bruises on their own academic histories. Pre-clinical failure is not a fatal flaw to an application the way a step or clerkship failure often is. It can be overcome if the clinical parts of your application are strong.

It will likely be a good idea to dual apply with family med as a backup, and it will be critical to be smart in targeting programs and using signals, but matching psych is still very possible.

I am currently faculty at a medical school and one of the formal residency advisers for our dept.

 

[Stagg737]

This is why only people currently involved in the residency application process should give advice. There is a checkbox in ERAS for failed coursework, and programs can and do use it to filter out applicants completely. 'Buried in the mspe' it might be, but thats not what matters anymore.

That being said--only recently has psychiatry become competitive and many people believe very strongly in holistic review of applicants, and the decision makers still contain a lot of people with bruises on their own academic histories. Pre-clinical failure is not a fatal flaw to an application the way a step or clerkship failure often is. It can be overcome if the clinical parts of your application are strong.

It will likely be a good idea to dual apply with family med as a backup, and it will be critical to be smart in targeting programs and using signals, but matching psych is still very possible.

I am currently faculty at a medical school and one of the formal residency advisers for our dept.

While I agree with this, Splik's sentiment that a pre-clinical failure isn't a death knell in psychiatry is still valid. Sure, the highly competitive programs may use any excuse to screen out applicants for minor problems, but many programs will not. Applying wisely is recommended for everyone, but especially those with less than ideal apps.

Also faculty at a med school/residency program, though not a formal advisor myself.

 

[Taddy Mason]

While I agree with this, Splik's sentiment that a pre-clinical failure isn't a death knell in psychiatry is still valid. Sure, the highly competitive programs may use any excuse to screen out applicants for minor problems, but many programs will not. Applying wisely is recommended for everyone, but especially those with less than ideal apps.

Also faculty at a med school/residency program, though not a formal advisor myself.

Yeah, although it’s been 2 years since I served on a resident selection committee (still involved in med student education though) I was on the selection committee for two east coast academic programs for 4 years and we didn’t filter by preclinical failures. Variability in MSPEs and how schools define what constitutes a pre-clinical failure further obfuscates this. At my school (US MD) you could “fail” multiple blocks but the only way you’d be able to tell on the MSPE is if it led to a summer remediation or dropping down a class.

 

[comp1]

Fails are relatively rare. There's a high social promotion throughout medical education. That said, there are still similarly relatively uncompetitive psychiatric residencies out there who don't check this unfortunate filter box. It's also not super productive to put much energy into worrying about this. Pick a geographic area you'd like to live in for the rest of your life and apply everywhere within it.

 

[Celexa]

While I agree with this, Splik's sentiment that a pre-clinical failure isn't a death knell in psychiatry is still valid. Sure, the highly competitive programs may use any excuse to screen out applicants for minor problems, but many programs will not. Applying wisely is recommended for everyone, but especially those with less than ideal apps.

Also faculty at a med school/residency program, though not a formal advisor myself.

Sure, and obviously I agree as well. I have successfully advised students who matched with preclincial failures. But it does have a MAJOR impact on the application cycle, in terms of both interview offers and ranking. Im not saying I agree with it. I fall very much on the side of not caring about preclinical years if the clinical parts of the application are strong. But theres no hiding or glossing over a course failure of any type in the current ERAS application.