Research after pre-clinical but before clerkship

[Organeer]

Hi

I've heard of cases where schools have allowed medical students to take a break half way through their degree to pursue research for 1-2 years. Can anyone share any experiences about this / or know of any cases where they know other peers in the class have done this? Obviously it would entail a PI that has accepted you and you have secured funding whether from the lab or externally...Also, a case would be made as to the individual's career aspirations etc.

Posting here because the Research thread is generally a lot of undergrad research pre-medschool or grad students who havent yet gone to med

[Bcemslayer]

I think it really depends on the school. 

I can only speak to my school, but U of A will let you do a PhD between 2nd and 3rd year of med. I haven't heard of anyone taking time off to do a masters in science though - people at my school will do an MBA during med tho. 

[ZBL]

In general, I wouldn’t take time off unless it was to do a PhD through the MD/PhD program. Otherwise, save any dedicated research years for a Masters or PhD for residency, where you get paid a resident salary plus are eligible for other awards to supplement. If you want to show dedication to research as part of your medical career, then residency is where you do it if you haven’t already done an MD/PhD. Otherwise it looks like it’s done only for the sake of matching like in the US (and is not common in Canada).