How to Plan Your Step 1 Preparations

While you are still concentrating on your medical school curriculum, annotate your comprehensive review book, such as First Aid, as you go through your course. Take an NBME practice exam 2-3 months prior to your intensive study period to establish a baseline and determine your weak areas. There are several ways to use the DIT Part 1 Questions and Video Answers that begin arriving to your dashboard in January and continue through May. These questions are open-ended questions that are focus on high yield topics for Step 1.

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Biochemistry for Step 1

Biochemistry for Step 1 is always one of those subjects that students are unsure about and not quite certain how to approach. Some students report getting very few biochemistry questions on their exam and others find their exam very heavily weighted with biochemistry, so it is an area that students have to master since there is no guarantee which type of exam they will get.

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Take Your Confidence With You to Your Interview

Be Confident: Bring your confidence with you to your interview. You do not want to come across as a person who is not confident in her skill set, knowledge level, or ability to complete training. You also want the interviewer to know that you are not afraid to be questioned, challenged, or asked to defend your medical opinions and that you can handle this with poise, grace, and a sense of humor.

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ECFMG Eligibility to Apply for Residency Training through the NRMP

To become eligible for the match through the National Resident Matching Program (NRMP), which pairs candidates with residency programs in U.S., International Medical Graduates must receive certification from the Education Commission for Foreign Medical Graduates (ECFMG) to be eligible to apply for residency training in America. Below is a summary of the licensing and educational requirements of ECFMG certification.

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Average Step 1 Score to Match in PM&R

The average minimum Step 1 score, according to the Program Directors Survey, by which interviews are typically not offered is 198. However, they also reported that students are, on average across programs, almost always offered an interview with a Step 1 score of 209. Those scores are very close, so those numbers are at first glance questionable.

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Figuring Out the Transitional, Preliminary, and Categorical Year for Residency Application

The first year of post-graduate training following medical school is called "internship." Medical school graduates in the first year of post-graduate training are called an "interns" regardless of what that first year of training consists. Your initial year could be one of the following: a Categorical Year, Transitional Year, or Preliminary Year.

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The CV for Residency Application – Additional Suggestions

This article is related to an earlier blog I posted called, Essential Information for the CV and Sample to Use. The CV included as a sample in the post is a CV that the AAMC Careers in Medicine has posted on their website, but looks very much like the CVs I have coached students through at UT. (The activities on this mock CV look like an amalgamation of a Dermatology applicant’s vitae that I worked with mixed with a few activities from another student.) We are definitely on the right track since it was seen as a CV example worth posting and this is the format and suggestions I use in advising applicants.

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Effects of Stress on Memory in Medical Students

Where Does My Stress Come From? It doesn’t take much to stress out the average human being. When we view a situation as threatening, we become anxious and stressed. In prehistoric times, when evolution developed our biological response to threats, such as large predatory cats with huge canines, we reacted with extreme perspiration, rapid heartbeat, and dry mouth. Our bodies also directed blood flow away from the brain and extremities to the major organs. These were all sensible adaptive mechanisms. Today, the nearest thing to a true threat in our environment is a speeding bus that almost hits us at an intersection...

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Career Trends From 2011 NRMP Results

In a recent report, the NRMP reported the following results as indicators of career interests among U.S. medical school seniors. Among the notable trends in the 2011 year:

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All-In or All-Out? Residency Pre-Matches a Thing of the Past: New Changes Coming to the NRMP Residency Match in 2013

In a nutshell: Under the All-in Model, independent applicants, Canadian, Caribbean, and international medical student applicants will no longer be able to secure residency positions in the U.S. prior to the formal residency match that takes place in March. Independent applicants, such as osteopathic students and graduate applicants and past allopathic medical graduate applicants, will not be privy to pre-match practices after the 2012 match year. The NRMP (National Residency Matching Program) has announced that starting in 2013, participating residency institutions will not be able to offer a portion of their positions to students prior to the match. The NRMP Board of Directors decided unanimously in favor of the All-in Policy which states that U.S. residency programs must place all positions in the NRMP match or none. This greatly changes the landscape for both international medical graduates and U.S. medical graduates competing for very valuable residency positions. (Read NRMP announcement here: http://www.nrmp.org/ )

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