Riskbreaker

I would say it's very true that there is a lot of self-selection among medical students. Competitiveness has gone up a smidge in recent years for truly unknown reasons, but applicants who make it to the interview tend to make themselves competitive by nature. Honestly, neurosurgery is certainly interesting with a lot of amazing surgeries and cool moments, but I have not seen another specialty so deftly chew out interested M1 and M2's. There were 10-12 interested in my first year class, and 2 at graduation who actually matched. In residency, we get multiple interested students, and we enjoy bringing them to clinic and the OR, or getting them involved in projects. However, once they hit M3 and experience actual clinical rotations, that usually does them in. So, yes, do some shadowing and get a sense of the field. However, it's not until your elective/selective when you're on service and you realize what the lifestyle and patient population is actually like. This is generally true of many surgical specialties. General things you can do to make yourself competitive, really for any surgical specialty, is be a nice normal human. Show interest, show up on time, work hard. It's always good to get involved in a project, get an abstract or publication. It doesn't make a difference if you're applying for neurosurgery and have 2 publications in general surgery; it's the fact that you participated in a project and were able to see it to completion. We don't care about how many clubs you were a part of, or if you were class president. The fact that you climb mountains may be interesting to bring up in an interview, but having a laundry list of extracurriculars isn't an asset (to be fair, it's not detrimental). Pretty much everything rides on your electives and how you act and come across. It is literally, only about the Golden Rule: treat others with respect as you wish to be treated. You'd be surprised, amazed even, at how often that gets overlooked, and how often it tanks an applicant's chances. Finally, there are no Canadian neurosurgery jobs. Literally. And it's not going to get any better. That is an inordinate time investment (residency + 1 or 2 fellowships + MSc or PhD) to gamble a career on.

Might as well update the list: Accepted Albany: Spanishfly (I: 02/07, A: 05/21) Albert Einstein College of Medicine: THX (I: 10/6, A:1/15), parachutes (I: 2/17, A: 5/18) Case Western: bobo (I: 12/3, Hold: 12/17, A: 1/29) Columbia: token (I: 12/10, A: 3/5) EVMS: Dayne67 (I: 2/19, A: 5/18) Georgetown: Riskbreaker (I: 11/21, W: 02/06, A: 05/21) Jefferson: Classic (I: 1/21, A: 3/25), schnauzr (I:3/18, A:4/2) MCW: Classic Michigan State University: ED527 (I:12/4, A:1/13) Mount Sinai School of Medicine: zztop (A: 05/18) New York University: mca (I:10/21, A:12/22), token (I:11/07, A:12/23), zztop (I: 12/05: WL: 03/02 A: 05/18), Northwestern: Typical Premed (I:2/3, A:3/17) Rosalind Franklin: Monster (I:9/29, A: 10/29), zztop (I:9/29, A: 11/19), kalia (I: 10/24, A: 3/16), parachutes (I: 02/23, A: 03/16), Tan008 (I:9/27, A:10/27) Saint Louis University: bobo (I: 10/7, A: 10/30), Classic (I: 9/22, A: 11/13) SUNY Upstate: bobo (I: 10/20, A: 11/10), parachutes (I: 11/18, A: 12/11) Tulane: Freshprince416 (I: 9/29, A: 10/15) UMaryland: Spanishfly (I: 01/07, A: 02/17) Vanderbilt: token (I: 11/11, A: 12/20) flamesfan (I:1/23, A:3/9) VCU: Classic (I: 9/16, A: 10/15) Wake Forest: Classic (I: Oct, A: May) Wayne State: In_Valid (I: 9/05, A: 10/22), Flame219 (I: 9/30, A: 10/22), Freshprince416 (I: 9/18, A: 10/22), zztop (I: 10/13, A: 10/22), Monster (I: 9/22, A: 10/22), parachutes (I: 11/17, A: 11/26), ED527 (I: 12/3, A: 12/17), Dayne67 (I: 12/12, A: 2/25), The Journey Man (I: 9/15, A: 10/22), Riskbreaker (I: 10/13, A: 11/26(?))