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What if you apply for a residency but don't get accepted anywhere? Can you reapply? Can you apply to multiple specialties? What happens? Are you screwed for life?
What if you don't get a residency?
- Thread starter surgeonhopeful
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This happens to about 5% of MD students. Data tables for last year are here: http://www.nrmp.org/data/datatables2012.pdf
If this happens to you, then you scramble in the SOAP for an unfilled position.
If that doesn't get you a residency, then you can try again the next year.
Lots of info here: http://www.nrmp.org/
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How do you try again next year? Can you just reapply like you were a regular medical student? Can you switch residencies?
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If you don't get a residency in the match, you scramble for an unfilled position. Then, if you don't find a position in the scramble you will try again next year. Each year out of med school though you have a significantly lower chance of getting a residency. If you ultimately do not get a residency position, you will still have the MD/DO attached to your name, but you legally can not practice medicine. SO.... you will have to become a mid-high level drug dealer to pay off your loan debt, you can go back to school for an MBA and sell pharmaceuticals/medical equipment, or, you can work in a research lab provided you get hired.
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I knew some people who didn't match. Generally they scramble in to something.
A lot of general surgery programs have undesignated/prelim spots for pgy-1 and pgy-2. While nearly anyone can get at least a pgy-1 undesignated position it does not necessarily lead anywhere.
More likely, someone who doesn't match needs to lower their sights.
A lot of general surgery programs have undesignated/prelim spots for pgy-1 and pgy-2. While nearly anyone can get at least a pgy-1 undesignated position it does not necessarily lead anywhere.
More likely, someone who doesn't match needs to lower their sights.
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Moving to pre-allo.
As others have said, if you don't match you scramble via the SOAP. Generally, if you're a US grad and you're a reasonable person, you can find SOMETHING via the SOAP, even if it's a prelim year. Then you reapply the next year, probably setting your sights a little lower. For some of the particularly competitive specialties (ie derm, rad onc, certain surgical subspecialties), some applicants will apply to a "backup specialty" that they're more confident they can match into and would be happy about going into if they don't get their top choice.
As others have said, if you don't match you scramble via the SOAP. Generally, if you're a US grad and you're a reasonable person, you can find SOMETHING via the SOAP, even if it's a prelim year. Then you reapply the next year, probably setting your sights a little lower. For some of the particularly competitive specialties (ie derm, rad onc, certain surgical subspecialties), some applicants will apply to a "backup specialty" that they're more confident they can match into and would be happy about going into if they don't get their top choice.
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What is a preliminary year? Just an internship without a specialty?
Correct me if I'm wrong, but there are three types of internship: 1) Surgery; 2) Internal Medicine; 3) Pediatrics.
Is that right?
Correct me if I'm wrong, but there are three types of internship: 1) Surgery; 2) Internal Medicine; 3) Pediatrics.
Is that right?
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Aren't there a lot of unfilled FM spots every year? It seems like someone could at least get into one of those rather than not doing anything, right?
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Fewer than in years past. The idea that FM is where all of the people who couldn't get into something else is changing swiftly.
Furthermore, you should only do it if it's what you actually want to do. If you just do a prelim year, then you can re-apply for the match the following year for the specialty you were actually aiming for (or your second choice, or third, or whatever you choose to set your sights on at that point). If you accept a spot in FM, you've got to actually complete the multiple-year program, and at that point it may be difficult to re-enter the match being so many years removed from school.
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Uh... no. While a lot of residencies require a preliminary or a transitional year (Ophthalmology, Radiology, Anesthesiology, Urology, Neurology, etc), many do not. You can be an intern in Anesthesia (some programs are categorical and have you rotate through everything from medicine to peds to OB), OB/GYN, Emergency Medicine, Psychiatry, Family Medicine, etc.
As for what a prelim year is... programs vary, but generally they rotate through all the different specialties, or all the specialties within surgery/medicine; sometimes they are considered the same as the categorical medicine or surgery interns, just don't go on to the second year of that specialty.
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Gotcha, thanks.
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Primary Care, there is no way you could not get into one of those; scramble is another option.
Even top schools can have people who don't match. One can have very high step scores, excellent grades and still not match into the desired field if one has a bad personality/poor interviewing skills. In such a case the home school might find a prelim position for the student. I have known it to happen.
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Are Step scores equivalent to the MCAT when applying for residency?
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From what I hear, no, because Step 1 scores are weighted so heavily, where as MCAT is equally weighted to GPA (most of the time)
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If you take off a year after MS for research and don't apply that year, when you do apply are you marked as being a first time applicant?
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In terms of being the equalizing factor with regard to inter-school differences in education and evaluation methods, Step 1 scores act as an objective measure of proficiency similar to the MCAT.
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I don't really know, but I think in general people who go to more "competitive" med schools will generally be more likely to be interested in more competitive specialties. So even if on paper the step scores at the more competitive/prestigious school are higher, their match percentage might be similar to a lower-tier simply because the students there are more likely to have their sights set high (this is all conjecture and guessing, of course).
I wouldn't under-sell the importance of third year clerkship grades. The pre-clinical grades, and thus possibly the overall GPA, may indeed be meaningless, but your grades in the core clerkships like Internal Medicine, Surgery, etc are definitely important. The amount of weight given to the Step score and various other factors also varies by specialty.
Additionally, the interview matters a lot.
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I think premeds and some med students don't have a clear understanding of how step scores (and clinical grades to a certain extent) are used.
PDs usually use step scores as an initial filter to cut down hundreds or thousands of applications to a more manageable #. For example, for radiology, a mid tier program might have 600 applicants for 70 interview slots for 11 positions. Therefore, a PD might filter step 1 at 240, which might lower the list to 300 applicants. Maybe then they'd filter it for 3 clinical honors which would trim the list to 200. From there, they'd pick 70 people as their initial interview bolus, and maybe 50 accept, and of those, perhaps 10 cancel pre-interview. Now they can either offer the next couple from the filtered list, or look back through the people who didn't meet the initial cut. Therefore, step certainly matters in the pre-interview stage, but less in an absolute sense than a narrowing the list sense, although it may play a role in who gets an interview from the filtered list.
After the interview, the PD and selection committee will put each candidate on the projector for a few minutes and they'll discuss them, not for that long, though. At that point, step will matter, but probably not as much as pre-interview.
PDs usually use step scores as an initial filter to cut down hundreds or thousands of applications to a more manageable #. For example, for radiology, a mid tier program might have 600 applicants for 70 interview slots for 11 positions. Therefore, a PD might filter step 1 at 240, which might lower the list to 300 applicants. Maybe then they'd filter it for 3 clinical honors which would trim the list to 200. From there, they'd pick 70 people as their initial interview bolus, and maybe 50 accept, and of those, perhaps 10 cancel pre-interview. Now they can either offer the next couple from the filtered list, or look back through the people who didn't meet the initial cut. Therefore, step certainly matters in the pre-interview stage, but less in an absolute sense than a narrowing the list sense, although it may play a role in who gets an interview from the filtered list.
After the interview, the PD and selection committee will put each candidate on the projector for a few minutes and they'll discuss them, not for that long, though. At that point, step will matter, but probably not as much as pre-interview.
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You would be a first time applicant nut your application would show that you are a year removed from graduating. That's not really a positive in most cases.
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All I understand is that some internships are attached to a residency and some are not.
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Meh, people are not explaining things well.
Residency can be categorized into 3 distinct categories. Categorical, Prelim and transitional.
Categorical - Multi-year programs, intention is to be trained in that specialty. They run from 3 to 7 years in length. This is the goal of every graduating MD.
Prelim - Single year, single discipline contract. No guarantee of entry into a longer track. This category is filled with two groups. First, people that did not match into a categorical position and scrambled in. Second, people who have a guaranteed PGY-2 position in a categorical program, but need a year of intern experience before starting. These are predominately either surgery or medicine based.
Transitional - Similar to prelim, but slightly different. Instead of being single disciplined, it is a little more like your 3rd year of medical school. You rotate through surgery, IM, peds, ob/gyn etc. It is like a prelim year a single year contract and is populated largely by people who have a guaranteed PGY-2 position and need a filler PGY-1 year.
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Thank you. That was a very well articulated description.
