Cardiac Fellowship 2021

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Historically, most people at my program have matched somewhere in their top 5 or not at all. Is this trend mirrored elsewhere? Anyone know of anyone matching at number 11 on their rank list?
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Beeftenderloin said:
Historically, most people at my program have matched somewhere in their top 5 or not at all. Is this trend mirrored elsewhere? Anyone know of anyone matching at number 11 on their rank list?
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I'd have to get 11 interviews for that to even be possible...
 
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Anyone ever hear from U of Utah or U of Washington? (this obviously means I have not heard anything).
 
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Nebraska invite. Didn't think places would be sending invites this late! Had to turn it down because they offered only 1 date and I couldn't make it work.
 
I think it's still somewhat early, certainly not late, in the process. Interviews go out on a rolling basis. Based on prior years, February seems to be when a good chunk of interviews are sent out.
 
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UF sent dual applicant interviews, too.

Has anyone received word from MUSC after the new year?
 
I’ve found myself in the fortunate position of having more interviews than I could reasonably attend. My program is limiting the number I can attend and I need to start canceling less desireable ones to “make room” for ones I’m more interesting in attending. How bad does cancelling look? I have one in 2 weeks that I’m really not excited about going to. But I feel like an @ss canceling this close.

I know, poor me... I recognize this is a good problem to have. Not looking for shade, just advice if anyone has any.
 
Beeftenderloin said:
I’ve found myself in the fortunate position of having more interviews than I could reasonably attend. My program is limiting the number I can attend and I need to start canceling less desireable ones to “make room” for ones I’m more interesting in attending. How bad does cancelling look? I have one in 2 weeks that I’m really not excited about going to. But I feel like an @ss canceling this close.

I know, poor me... I recognize this is a good problem to have. Not looking for shade, just advice if anyone has any.
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Same here... I guess that as long as you cancel with >1 week notice you should be fine. Programs usually expect this.
 
How many interviews are people generally going on?
 
JBOB said:
How many interviews are people generally going on?
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I've got 7 lined up. Had to turn one down for scheduling issues. I don't think I'd want to do more than 8 personally.
 
Beeftenderloin said:
I’ve found myself in the fortunate position of having more interviews than I could reasonably attend. My program is limiting the number I can attend and I need to start canceling less desireable ones to “make room” for ones I’m more interesting in attending. How bad does cancelling look? I have one in 2 weeks that I’m really not excited about going to. But I feel like an @ss canceling this close.

I know, poor me... I recognize this is a good problem to have. Not looking for shade, just advice if anyone has any.
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I’m the PD at a small program. Please - for the love of all that’s good and holy - just use a modicum of class and call or email the coordinator as soon as you know you don’t want to come. Of course we all want to train the next editor of Kaplan, but it’s a business. You likely have a “top program”, and if mine isn’t it, that’s fine. We try to respect your time, please respect ours. At least for us, there are no hard feelings. Unless you don’t cancel AND don’t show up.

Seriously. We just interviewed (and offered a job to) a faculty candidate that cancelled her interview for fellowship with us a few years prior.
 
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bigdan said:
I’m the PD at a small program. Please - for the love of all that’s good and holy - just use a modicum of class and call or email the coordinator as soon as you know you don’t want to come. Of course we all want to train the next editor of Kaplan, but it’s a business. You likely have a “top program”, and if mine isn’t it, that’s fine. We try to respect your time, please respect ours. At least for us, there are no hard feelings. Unless you don’t cancel AND don’t show up.

Seriously. We just interviewed (and offered a job to) a faculty candidate that cancelled her interview for fellowship with us a few years prior.
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How big is your fellowship? How many people are you interviewing per spot?

My PD asked me to help screen applicants. I have no clue how to do so properly.... Because EVERY application looks good to me.

EDIT:

OMG i just realized you've interviewed me IRL. Can't PM you but sup man!!!
 
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dchz said:
How big is your fellowship? How many people are you interviewing per spot?

My PD asked me to help screen applicants. I have no clue how to do so properly.... Because EVERY application looks good to me.
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I am sure everyone has stellar scores and look great on paper. Letter of recommendation and personal statement?
 
JiPo said:
I am sure everyone has stellar scores and look great on paper. Letter of recommendation and personal statement?
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Yeah it can be really hard to differentiate! You are absolutely right about letters - a solid recommendation from a well-known name in the field goes a long way. Also important is showing some dedication to the field in terms of research, even a poster is fine! But if someone applies with a bunch of chronic pain and pediatric research it kind of makes me second guess the applicant.
 
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For the curious, here's how my program handles things:

-Six spots total
-All internal applicants interviewed together, competing for three spots
-10 external interviews are offered, for three spots

I believe interviews offers either just went out, or are about to.
 
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Nivens said:
For the curious, here's how my program handles things:

-Six spots total
-All internal applicants interviewed together, competing for three spots
-10 external interviews are offered, for three spots

I believe interviews offers either just went out, or are about to.
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Any spots reserved for dual fellows that matched a year before? Or are all 3 external spots available for match this year?
 
JiPo said:
Any spots reserved for dual fellows that matched a year before? Or are all 3 external spots available for match this year?
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No dual fellows next year- all 3 external spots are in play.
 
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On the residency side, I’ve been deeply disappointed by letters of recommendation. We have had a couple of complete fu(k-ups come through our program, from start to finish. There’s no plausible way they were even average medical students, but their letters were great. Fortunately for me, the cardiac fellowship applicants (by and large) have self-selected to do an onerous year of extra training with sick patients and obnoxious surgeons, AND they’ve completed half of a residency program, so the “floor” for the average fellowship applicant is much higher than that for residents-to-be.

In order of importance, I prefer letters:
1. From someone I know (applicants have no control over this, I know) that writes GREAT things about you
2. Someone from a residency program with a cardiac program of known robust repute that writes GREAT things about you
3 & 4 (i.e.: the same value). A “big name” in the field and/or someone random that writes GREAT things about you.
5. Anything else.

The single best thing you can have is a letter saying you are an outstanding resident. I tell our residents to approach faculty and ask “Would you be willing to write me a fantastic letter of recommendation?”. A moderate letter will screw you, because literally every letter says “I witnessed this resident turn water into wine”.

Oh yeah; be careful asking the “cool staff” - I read a letter this year by some guy who told like 3 (terrible) jokes within the letter, and added the phrase “this resident has shown a dearth of knowledge throughout his training...”.
I mean...WTF. I’m not lecturing on Thiopental, because I never used it. Maybe you should....
 
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Interviews all done? Worth reaching to programs?
 
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NCMED101 said:
Interviews all done? Worth reaching to programs?
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I've only done 1/7 interviews. Crazy to me that anyone could be done interviewing!

Unless of course you are asking if programs are done sending out interview invites? Then I don't know about that. I'd say probably yes. I reached out to one program I REALLY wanted to hear from. They never even responded, so there's that.
 
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Some programs are cancelling in-person interviews and doing skype interviews instead. They are not reimbursing, so a huge waste of money for applicants as airlines are not giving me money back for last minute cancellation.

How would this affect the match? It is very hard to get a good sense of the program, and vice versa, through skype interviews. I anticipate most programs that do this will end up filling internally.
 
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JiPo said:
Some programs are cancelling in-person interviews and doing skype interviews instead. They are not reimbursing, so a huge waste of money for applicants as airlines are not giving me money back for last minute cancellation.

How would this affect the match? It is very hard to get a good sense of the program, and vice versa, through skype interviews. I anticipate most programs that do this will end up filling internally.
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Oh man that would be awesome! I wish they would start doing that for me.
 
abolt18 said:
Oh man that would be awesome! I wish they would start doing that for me.
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It would only be awesome if you are an internal candidate and you want to stay. These programs clearly do not care about external candidates if they are offering a skype interview.

If you were a program director, would you pick someone whom you talked to for 15min skype over an internal candidate that you know?

What they should do is reschedule the interview and offer some monetary compensation. At least give external candidates a full chance to be evaluated in person.
 
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NCMED101 said:
Interviews all done? Worth reaching to programs?
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Interviews are still going strong! I have some all the way into April. I've only done 2 so far with many more to go. I did that on purpose as a northeastern candidate as I was unsure what how bad this winter was going to be (didn't want to cancel flights and reschedule interviews). I think many of the interview offers now will come from those cancelling interviews (one of my offers came from a cancellation). I am planning to cancel at least 2 myself and I've met a few other applicants along the trail that are planning to do the same just from a shear numbers perspective (too much time away from the program or too expensive to travel). I'm sure more offers will sprinkle in over the coming month.

It may be worth reaching out to program if it's one you're really interested in. Worse thing that can happen is they can say no, with huge upside of being invited!
 
JiPo said:
Some programs are cancelling in-person interviews and doing skype interviews instead. They are not reimbursing, so a huge waste of money for applicants as airlines are not giving me money back for last minute cancellation.

How would this affect the match? It is very hard to get a good sense of the program, and vice versa, through skype interviews. I anticipate most programs that do this will end up filling internally.
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All of my remaining interviews will be virtual interviews.
 
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I've got 2 that have changed to video format and 2 that I haven't yet heard from (likely to also change to video format)

Edit: they've all changed to video now.
 
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JiPo said:
It would only be awesome if you are an internal candidate and you want to stay. These programs clearly do not care about external candidates if they are offering a skype interview.

If you were a program director, would you pick someone whom you talked to for 15min skype over an internal candidate that you know?

What they should do is reschedule the interview and offer some monetary compensation. At least give external candidates a full chance to be evaluated in person.
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I agree that most programs will favor internal candidates more than ever, which is very unfortunate, but I do not think there is anything else they can do when the hospital is telling them to cancel in-person interview.
 
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I agree that video interviews are going to promote increased interest in internal applicants staying at their home institutions from both the programs' and the applicants' perspectives. Would be interesting to see this type of data from SFMatch.
 
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CoxMD said:
I agree that video interviews are going to promote increased interest in internal applicants staying at their home institutions from both the programs' and the applicants' perspectives. Would be interesting to see this type of data from SFMatch.
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The thing is, almost every program I have interviewed at, with the exception of large programs like Duke, Cleveland clinic, Texas Hearts, and Columbia, all programs have more internal applicants than the # of spots. This will be a competitive year and will hurt applicants without a large home program.
 
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I have been hearing hints from some program directors on the interview trail that SF Match may delay the rank submission/match date due to COVID issues. Anyone else have info about this?
 
JBOB said:
I have been hearing hints from some program directors on the interview trail that SF Match may delay the rank submission/match date due to COVID issues. Anyone else have info about this?
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I have not heard anything, but that makes no sense when every program has transitioned to virtual interviews. Covid or not, Interviews will be done way before June 1st deadline, so there is no point in extending the deadline.
 
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JBOB said:
I have been hearing hints from some program directors on the interview trail that SF Match may delay the rank submission/match date due to COVID issues. Anyone else have info about this?
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I had an interview earlier today where the the PD said that the SCA recently had a meeting discussing pushing back the match date in order to give everyone 'a fair shot' at interviewing. Apparently there are some programs that are pushing back some of their previously scheduled interviews. I have one such interview, pushed back until May. From my understanding, the SCA's decision at this point was inconclusive, but definitely in the realm of possibility.
 
fearlessmg said:
I had an interview earlier today where the the PD said that the SCA recently had a meeting discussing pushing back the match date in order to give everyone 'a fair shot' at interviewing. Apparently there are some programs that are pushing back some of their previously scheduled interviews. I have one such interview, pushed back until May. From my understanding, the SCA's decision at this point was inconclusive, but definitely in the realm of possibility.
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Seems like we dodged an SF Match delay, and our rank lists will be due 2 weeks from today. Anyone else rearranging the top spots on their rank list on a daily basis?
 
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CoxMD said:
Seems like we dodged an SF Match delay, and our rank lists will be due 2 weeks from today. Anyone else rearranging the top spots on their rank list on a daily basis?
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Submit mine 1.5 weeks ago and have not turned back or made any changes.
 
Also, I'm very relieved that they didn't delay the match! Thank goodness.

When I walked in this morning and saw that the flag was half-mast, I thought ‘All right, another bureaucrat ate it!'
 
What do you guys think of Columbia's program? I know it doesn't have the name Duke, CCF, Cedar-Sinai do, but in regards to training does it fall far behind the top places?
 
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