How competitive are Ped & Internal Med?

[Scholastica]

I'm a first-year med student who doesn't know much about the CaRMS application process or the comepetitiveness of each specialty. Although I'm not sure what I want to specialize in, I'm fairly interested in pediatrics & internal medicine. Can somebody please tell me how competitive these programs are?

 

Thanks!

[summervirus]

Hi, I was also interested in both peds and IM as a student. I ended up applying to both. I'm now in IM although I know that I was also ranked high enough by at least one peds program to get in had I chosen to.

 

It's hard to comment on how competitive a specialty is because it changes from year to year, and from location to location. But, as a general trend, it seems that the more competitive specialties are often the subspecialty surgeries (such as ophthamology, urology, orthopedics, ENT). Often primary/secondary care specialties (such as family medicine, peds, IM, psychiatry) are less competitive. I believe that IM has the second largest number of spots available second to FM (and proportionally less applicants:spots than some of the more competitive specialties).

 

If you're not picky about spending residency in a particular location, and you're a decent student that others can get along with, and don't have any failures recorded on your transcript, it's highly likely that you'll be able to get into a peds or IM residency, I think.

 

Peds and IM are often popular because you'll be able to choose a number of different paths to subspecialize in later if you want such as cardiology, GI, nephrology, oncology, hematology, etc. Alternatively, you can also choose to be a generalist and practice in general pediatrics or general internal medicine.

[Kirsteen]

Hi there,

 

Regarding this wee statement, "...and you're a decent student that others can get along with...", during the CaRMS process is this factor largely assessed via the ITER reports within your MSPR (Medical Student Performance Record) and your interview?

 

In short, I've heard that clerkship ITER reports are important--moreso than pre-clerkship marks given that many schools' marking systems, including mine, at UofC, are pass/fail--but just how important are these to each program. Does anyone have any inklings? (Clearly I'm an upcoming CaRMS applicant! )

 

Cheers,

Kirsteen

[TimmyMax]

Hey,

 

The main idea of the CaRMS interview is for the program to get to know the applicant, and the very question that they are looking to answer through the course of the interview is exactly the one posed, namely "can I get along with this person as a colleague in my program?"- that's why you can be interviewed by not only staff but by residents in the program when the time comes.

I'm not sure that ITERs really comment on personal qualities of applicants, but I can assure you that they definitely carry more weight than pre-clerkship marks- if you aced pathology in pre-clerkship, that's great, but if your clerkship evaluation/ITER says that all the patients you were supposed to be looking after on your CTU rotation seemed to all develop sepsis/pneumonia/UTIs and died because you didn't bother rounding on them each day, then chances are pretty good that you're not that great a candidate for IM, regardless of what your pre-clerkship marks say.

I'm sure that the ITER/evaluation specific to the program you are applying to carries a little more weight than the rest, but that's no reason to tank your other rotations (or maybe it is, I don't know for sure). Your elective evaluations will carry the most weight, of course, and your letters of reference should be able to say something about your character and personal qualities, but this is all speculation, since I'm not on any residency admission committees (yet)!

Just my two cents.

 

Best of luck!

Timmy

[Kirsteen]

Hey there Timmy,

 

Thanks for your response. Here at UofC, all of our ITER comments are included on our MSPR. (Is this standard for most schools?) So I'm assuming that our MSPRs end up being pretty huge documents.

 

Cheers,

Kirsteen

[EJL]

What is an ITER?

 

EJL

[summervirus]

ITER stands for "In-Training Evaluation Report" and are periodic evaluations that are completed by preceptors that we rotate through during clerkship.

 

My understanding is that most, if not all, schools include ITERs into the MSPR (formerly known as the "Dean's Letter"). Indeed, it becomes a big document. I had the opportunity to review it with one of the faculty members before it was officially sent off to CaRMS last year and it contained a cover letter that summarized my activities, community involvement, awards, and academic accomplishments in med school. Then, it had a few pages that outlined my grades throughout med school, my individual rotation evaluations and ITERs, and a little bit about my research involvement. I tried to get a copy of it to keep but wasn't allowed to.

 

In terms of what I said about "...and you're a decent student that others can get along with...", I think that's decided upon based mostly on elective experience (i.e. what their impression was of you) and reference letters (i.e. what their peers think of you). ITERs (at least at my school) did have a section that touched on interpersonal communication and relation skills as well. I think that the interview itself was pretty important too. I didn't end up applying to that many programs and I ended up knowing all the interviews that I met because they had either been former preceptors of mine or people I had been introduced to on my electives in the past. That definitely helped because there had already been some rapport established.

[Kirsteen]

Hello there,

 

It would be interesting to see how different schools' ITERs differ. You had mentioned, above, that your school's ITER contained some information on communication skills. At UofC, our ITER is 3 pages long and contains multiple factors (on which we are marked unsatisfactory/satisfactory/good/excellent/outstanding) that are related to communication skills. The good thing is, if any given student has great people skills, then this can certainly be highlighted in the ITER, but if a student is a little quieter, less mature, or has less well-honed communication skills then the ITER can become a bit of an albatross.

 

That's also fabulous, summervirus, that you knew most of your interviewers prior to attending the interviews. Some of us do not have the luxury of being in that situation, perhaps because we might have switched career choices and have had relatively less exposure to all the folks in the field. Any tips on getting your name out there in that event?

 

Cheers,

Kirsteen

[summervirus]

Hi Kirsteen,

 

I was actually pretty lucky to run into people I knew as interviewers. It just so happened that I worked with them beforehand and it wasn't intentionally planned. I think it was quite a bit easier for me to get to know the people in the field compared to some of my peers because I only really applied to two cities (as opposed to most people who apply to 5 or more). I was also quite fortunate that I worked with one of the chief residents in the program that I successfully matched to. He apparently took a shine to me and told the other interviews that I would be a good addition. I guess what he said worked!

[CutieYellow]

I'm so annoyed. Just previewed a copy of the MRSP that Laval U sends out... it has NOTHING on it practically:

 

So and So is a Sr student at Laval University. During the course of his/her study here, she has done x research on this and that. She also was involved in this and that. She won this scholarship and gotten that bursary.

 

That's pretty much it. So if you didn't do much during med school, that's pretty useless. Ugh. I'm depressed b/c when i apply it's not as if people could actually READ my ITER - they are in French after all, how good is that in English Canada. And honestly, most of them are not legible (doctors' handwriting obviously).

 

All in all to say that i'm having a hard time applying b/c i'm running after english letters (seriously, i am worried about some of my docs' English) as well as french ones, gotta find a bilingual MRSP (which is pretty useless)... Some students are gonna try and find a translator for the ITER - but those are only the really hardcore ones... We'll see how this ends. UGH. Just needed to vent.

 

CY

[Kirsteen]

Hey there CY,

 

That's too bad about your MSRP. I was speaking to a pal of mine who graduated from UofT's medical school a short while ago and she said the same thing, i.e., that their MSRPs weren't too descriptive and the only factor that theirs seemed to include which you didn't mention is their class ranking.

 

As for the English letters, did you complete any electives at English-speaking schools with English preceptors? If so, it might be an idea to contact them for a letter.

 

Cheers,

Kirsteen

[CutieYellow]

I did contact one. But i still need two And those are gonna come from french preceptors...seriously, we'll see how that goes..........

 

CY