When to match

[linuxgrl]

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So I'm currently an MS3. I took the first semester of MS3 off to have a baby. Even having taken that time off, I can graduate in June 2010 with enough credits, or if I take some time off to study for Step 2 and for interviews and stuff and graduate in August.

The question is, what do I do about the match? If I try and match in 2010, I won't have as many electives and AI's as everyone else. Probably won't have Step 2 either, which I'm going to need. If I try and match in 2011, then I'll have almost a whole year to kill...

So I suppose I already know what the answer is - I should match in 2011 because I'll have a more competitive application, plus I'll have more time with the baby while she's still little, before I enter residency and never see her again. But I just wanted to throw this out there and see what other options I have, if there are any.

Did I mention I'm very unsure of what specialty I want to go into? Yeah, I suppose that complicates matters somewhat!

 

[Law2Doc]

So I'm currently an MS3. I took the first semester of MS3 off to have a baby. Even having taken that time off, I can graduate in June 2010 with enough credits, or if I take some time off to study for Step 2 and for interviews and stuff and graduate in August.

The question is, what do I do about the match? If I try and match in 2010, I won't have as many electives and AI's as everyone else. Probably won't have Step 2 either, which I'm going to need. If I try and match in 2011, then I'll have almost a whole year to kill...

So I suppose I already know what the answer is - I should match in 2011 because I'll have a more competitive application, plus I'll have more time with the baby while she's still little, before I enter residency and never see her again. But I just wanted to throw this out there and see what other options I have, if there are any.

Did I mention I'm very unsure of what specialty I want to go into? Yeah, I suppose that complicates matters somewhat!

You need to go sit down with folks at your school. There are people at all US med schools whose job it is to advise people in exactly your situation. But FWIW, I suspect they will tell you to do the later match, when you are more competitive and hopefully have actually picked a target specialty.

 

[Blesbok]

Why are you taking a whole semester off?

It isn't going to help your application to take an entire year off...