Where to do aways?

[swoop]

I am going to be applying ENT in about a year. I do not have a home residency program, but have spent a day a week for a little over a year "shadowing" in our morning clinic with a little OR time. If one wants to see the wide berth of how ENT is practiced, and not necessarily trying for an audition rotation. What are the three places one should rotate through; and why if you care to elaborate? Thanks for your help.

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[Wardens]

I come from a place with a large highly-regarded program and was advised not to do aways. If I had to do it over again, I would probably choose to do one at a place with 4 or 5 residents per year (Pitt, Mass Eye&Ear, Michigan, etc.) and one at a 3 resident per year program (virginia, emory, etc.). I would have liked to see what a somewhat smaller program was like, how they managed call schedules, etc.

In your position, it's probably also important to find two letter writers in the field. It doesn't necessarily have to be written by the famous chair at the program. Large programs in particular have many well-known ENTs. Just try to get to know well two of them if you can. According to a recent article in the Laryngoscope, most applicants have all or all but one of their letters from ENTs. In such a small field it does help quite a bit to have a positive letter from someone who others know. That said, don't stress too much about not having a home program. If you do an away or two, you'll get the letters.

 

[swoop]

I was thinking more in terms of not necessarily size, but programs that are more fellowship orientated vs. ran by general ENT's.

 

[Wardens]

Yeah, that can work, too. I think if you have a major question of what it's like to live in a rural area vs. urban one, train with fellows or not, balance research or not, etc. you should do an away to see the differences. Now, I'm not sure if you're talking about programs with a lot of fellows, or about residents going into fellowships. The sense I get from interviewing and from my home porgram where there are several fellows is that fellows really don't negatively impact your training. They have potential to do so, but attendings seem pretty cogniscent about their role (though I may be deluded here). If this is what you're looking for, UNC has almost no fellows, Cincinnati has a ton. If you're curious about differences of percentage going into fellowship, this seems linearly related to size, but I'm sure there are outliers.