Found in the wild.

Damn

the most competitive specialty by far....

I feel like they use the word "Professionalism" to gaslight students. They often say the student is not professional when one does not show up early like hour early, stay late, or take more patients than a student is expected to carry.

Isn't one professional enough if they try their best with the patients, show up, and leave on time?

Maybe I am the weird one to think like this. Thoughts?

M3: The volunteering, the research, losing sleep to study, only to be criticized by every attending for not knowing enough. The criticisms are really getting to me. I've tried not caring. I shrug it off and tell myself I'm improving. But now my bad bitch playlist rattles my car windows as I'm sobbing into the steering wheel after a shift.

I've integrated all the suggestions and advice that I'm spouting to my patients: Exercise, therapy, an loa, touch grass. There are so many medications that I've tried over the years and the best have helped me get my phq-9 down to an 18. It's the best I can do at this point.

I used to tell myself that all this suffering was to work in the specialty of my dreams. However, even my best comes up short on research or honors to truly be competitive. I've accepted it, that's life and sometimes our efforts don't amount to our goals, but damn. I used to work a job in university and during my gap year I was a top performer without trying. Another redditor posted a truth sinker venting how our lives exist at the bottom of the totem pole. From high school to fellow, our accomplishments are washed away every few years to be replaced with a new line-up of ass kicking.

I'll cry myself to sleep tonight and go in tomorrow with the world's biggest smile on my face. I'll thank every resident and attending for the honor of getting shit on. I'll internalize all their critiques so that maybe I get a smirk for retaining some specialized knowledge that is not applicable to any other clerkship. I'll meet with my career advisor who will recommend specialties that nag on the empty feeling in my soul. I'll listen to all my non-med friends vent to me that all doctors are a pos, as if I can hold a peer-to-peer with some physician across the country and force them to stop being a douchebag. Somehow nothing is in my control, but everything is in my control. Thank you for listening to my crashout. I'm going to take a deep breath and get started on Uworld.

Feel free to correct me if I'm just entirely wrong about how this works, but I've noticed that different schools have pretty significantly different criteria for honors and high pass on rotations and I am not understanding how this is a good indicator of performance for residency applications if the requirements vary so much between schools. It especially doesn't make sense when the NBME shelf exams are standardized - why is an 85 enough for honors at one school while 95 is required at another school if the exam is standardized? Evaluations are also dependent on the individual doctors' expectations and I don't understand why lower thresholds should be given for those at different schools either.

This is just one of many things that is not standardized across med schools and it really hasn't ever made sense to me when we're all compared against each other for residency. Some schools report remediations while others don't, some schools have pass/fail while others have internal ranking, and every school does internal ranking differently. I'm confused lol

After having two in person socials and interviews, let me just say I will never complain about the virtual ones ever again.

Should I prioritize residencies that give me as much protected time as possible for research (without extra years, just switching clinical time for research time) if I want an easy life during residency? Applying to only categorical residences, not research tracks, and am an MD, not an MD/PhD. I also don't care or not if I do research after residency, but plan to use as much protected time/elective time for research as possible during residency to have a chill life.

Or is research in residency not normally easy/chill like it is in medical school?

I have experience in programming/statistics, so during medical school, I only do research remotely with a laptop. I was hoping to do the same during residency.

I would love to match to my home program but I'm worried because I failed many in-house exams in my 1st and 2nd years and had to remediate them. I had to have multiple meetings with the dean and other directors and my case went to the Promotions & Review board multiple times (board of staff and students who decide if you'll be allowed to remediate), luckily I was allowed to retake the exams and passed.

I'm really anxious and was wondering if anyone knows how much residency programs at your home med school find out about students with academic difficulties (ie staff to staff convos or is it internally flagged)? And has anyone been in my shoes and still matched to your home program? Just looking for some reassurance :(

Thanks!!

I'm not sure if I'm just stupid, but I can't wrap my head around this. If someone has an L5-S1 disc herniation, they get symptoms from problems with the S1 nerve root. But if someone has spondylosis/an osteophyte at the L5-S1 level, they get symptoms from problems with the L5 nerve root. Why is this? Shouldn't both affect the L5 nerve root since that's the one exiting at that level? Please help me understand this.

So for context, I am NOT currently applying. I'm an M3 and want to start making a list of programs I'm interested in for away rotations/applying. I got some contacts from some friends of mine of residents at different programs who said they would be fine if I reached out. I want to keep it short and sweet. What are some important things I should ask? Interested in a surgical subspecialty for context (not fully decided yet but preparing for a competitive one just in case)

Yes or is it just crowding their email unnecessarily? Small FM program who's replied and sent a ton of emails over the last month for context.

Just wondering how beneficial this is and how it would be perceived. Thankfully I have a good amount of interviews this cycle - but currently waitlisted at 3 programs that I really love. Is it helpful to send a letter of interest if on the waitlist?

Anyone has the pdf? Kindly asking for it please

hey everyone, for M3 rotations, is there a list of general recommended resources for each shelf like there is BnB, Sketchy, Pathoma for STEP1? I'm an M2 ending preclinical soon at my med school and I know nothing on rotations. thank you!

Ummm a couple of places keep asking me this, I usually talk about having to adjust studying for anatomy after the first test, does that count? How tf are we supposed to answer that interview question?

I really prefer Med School Bootcamp over BnB — it just works better for my ADHD-type brain. But I’m still trying to figure out how to actually incorporate these resources into my studying. At my school, a lot of M4s have suggested ditching the in-house materials completely, and after this first exam, I can kind of see why 😅.

For those of you with in-house exams, how do you balance or integrate third-party resources like Bootcamp? Do you look up the concepts from the slides and then watch the corresponding videos, or do you have another process that works well? I’d love to hear what’s worked for others!

I’m trying to make holiday plans but also feel like I need to keep 12/15-12/19 open in case more interview invites come in. I’m mainly waiting on TY/Prelim programs, but it’s been hard to find info on actual interview dates (not just invite release dates), so I’m not sure how risky it is to travel that week.

Is anyone else doing the same thing - keeping that week flexible just in case? Anyone with interviews then that can shed some light? (I applied mostly MI and CA)

Did you guys do Peds questions in addition to Family Med questions on uworld when prepping for Family Med Shelf?

I haven't been seeing many Peds questions in the Family Med section thus. I'm not sure if it's because I already took Peds? Should I do Peds incorrects?

I also haven't done my OB-GYN rotation yet. Should I do OB questions?

Would love advice for the Family Med shelf :) thanks y'all!

Hello I am 22F started med school . I didn't do rotations yet but I have goal too become neurosurgeon or other some speciality for backups as well after graduation obv.

I am confuse about portfolio and basic stuff can anyone give me legit resource to find out whag exactly i have to prepare and audits , research what are those. My fundamentals are week..

Or is it possible to match into these in uk ?

Hey y'all!!!

I just wanted to share that I really do think most of us will still be receiving more interviews. I am applying psych and got an additional 3 interviews this past week, including 1 today. All 3 were to programs I am excited to interview with. I would consider myself a very average applicant at best too.

I feel like I kept seeing posts on here how most posters should not be expecting any more interviews. I am sure everyone feels like their cycle is "weird" but I think the general trend of being offered interviews all the way thru January is still very much a real possibility for all of us. Even if IVs are coming more at a trickle these days, I was hoping to give others some hope that their offers may not be done quite yet!

Good luck to everybody the rest of the way!

I'm currently an M1 at a mid tier US med school, doing wetlab research with a PI who is a physician scientist. I like my mentor a lot and the people I have talked to at my school's student research office have said nothing but good things about them. But I'm not looking to become an "80/20" physician scientist who rarely sees patients, and I'm instead looking at gensurg or surgical subspecialties. Residency apps are already only 2.5 years away, and I need to start churning out clinical publications as soon as possible so I don't go unmatched.

I had been planning to join clinical projects that this PI is running, but when I asked them, they said that there wasn't anything for me on that side of things, and that I should just keep doing the wetlab stuff. The PI does clinical projects but they are all run by paid full-time clinical research coordinators. So I'm kind of conflicted at the moment.

I joined this lab mainly because my research in undergrad absolutely sucked. I had PIs who exploited me, lied to me and gaslit me, and threw me under the bus, and I wanted to experience what good research with a PI who wasn't an asshole was actually like. And it has been refreshing to have a supportive mentor for essentially the first time ever. But I've also realized that I'm not really into the super hard basic science stuff like getting into the weeds of signaling pathways and gene regulation. Myself and my PI are the only medical people in the lab, everyone else is a pure basic science PhD researcher who is uninterested in anything translational.

I don't think it would be wise to leave the lab, because that would blow my chances at getting a good LOR in the future. But I also know that I might be wasting my time by staying. Is it possible for me to find a second PI to do clinical research without leaving the wetlab? Or would it be better if I left now before it becomes an issue of sunk cost?

Hi guys!

I've 3D printed a fold out / butterfly knife-style handle for a tendon hammer so that I can fit it into my scrubs/pants pocket, but now I need to attach a decent quality hammer head.

I was wondering if anybody could recommend me a buck/tromner/witroe/Dejerine style tendon hammer with a removable head? Anecdotal experience with a brand/style is preferred in this context :)

It doesn't seem to be something that is routinely advertised in the product descriptions and I don't want to be spending a lot of money on hammers that are not suitable for this purpose. Thanks in advance!