What are my chances?

kristin5792
Sun, 16 Sep 2012 14:43:21 +0000

It might be too early to have your sights set on rads or anaestheisa. I say might because there are certainly some students who have an absolute calling for one field or whatever, and they know what they’re going to do before they go to med school, and their interests don’t change one lick during med school, and they actually end up in those residencies. In my experience though, the likelihood of you sticking with your pre-med school specialty choice is pretty low. Most people don’t solidify their choices until 3rd or 4th year, so you don’t need to go into it with the idea of coming out rads or anaesthesia. You have plenty of time to decide and it’s not a big deal if you change your mind.

Re: competitive residencies. A word of caution there would be that someone who is not involved with that field probably cannot adequately analyze a match list. The reason is that there’s a huge variety of factors–top programs, top schools, top departments, etc…and while one school might be the best for ortho, its rads program might be nowhere near as good. So, you probably aren’t in a position to judge match lists (but perhaps you have connections to people who are in such a position).

I certainly can’t argue with the logic that you would want to prepare yourself well to get into the best residency possible, and that perhaps an element of getting into the best residency is getting into the best med school possible, and that few people would disagree that the schools you originally listed are among the best.

My advice would be to encourage you to find the school that’s best for you, and realize that it may not be an elite school. The reason I think it’s important to find the school that’s best for you is because med school kinda sucks. It’s absolutely draining at times, and it’s a real rude awakening to no longer be the best in your class or the smartest among your friends. The volume of work is pretty stressful, and balancing your new life is pretty challenging in my opinion (and I’ve been told my time-management skills are fantastic).

I chose these elements to highlight the difference a great environment can make in your medical education–because if you have a program that fits your style, find friends who are kind and care about you, and overall are in a supportive environment, then med school (despite its drawbacks) will be AWESOME. I interviewed at 3 top 20ish schools, and it was surprising to me how different each of them felt from the others and how I really didn’t see myself surviving at one of them. I ended up at a program that fits me to a T, and I couldn’t be happier.

So the take home point is…keep an open mind and make it your mission to find a school that’s perfect for you, rather than gain admission to the most elite school you can. But that’s just me.