Is reputation or experience more important for rotations?

[Bancrofti]

When choosing where to do away rotations or if you have an option of where to do elective rotations at your school affiliated locations, should reputation of the hospital take precedence over potential actual experience?

A little confused. I feel that at the larger, more well-known hospitals I won't get as much direct/hands-on experience, but I will be learning from some people who may be more well known (hence a "better" LOR) and I will be in a location that will likely actually have a higher volume of overall ortho patients with a greater variety of issues.

On the flip side, a rotation at a smaller hospital will probably let me be more involved, which come interview time may help separate me from other potential residents... but I don't know if that is even considered important.

So is it better to go into an interview saying I've seen xyz surgeries performed many times and have this great LOR from Dr. very well known in the field vs. I've participated in quite a few surgeries and I have this great LOR from someone you may have never heard of before?

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[Magillicutty]

I'm an MS4. I will eventually post in more depth about my thoughts on ortho aways. However, in answer to your question, I think I'd give three pieces of advice:

1) rotating to get "experience" is not what it's about. You rotate to impress the people at that rotation site with the hopes of getting a residency interview invite there, and you rotate to get letters of recommendation from faculty outside your home institution.

2) rotate at big name programs, especially, especially if you think your application there (at that place) will be seen as stronger for having rotated there. With this comes the advice that, if you are a top candidate on paper, the risks of rotating might outweigh the benefits.

3) rotate at a place known to favor rotators (how you find this out...I don't really know, but you can ask around on orthogate and forums like this). There are some community-type places like this, and there are even some bigger name institutions that favor rotators as well.

 

[Bancrofti]

Thanks! I appreciate the input.

I also was thinking of trying to do all of my rotations at the site I would be comfortable in matching with. I've seen somewhere before it can give you an upper hand if you're known in the hospital already and did well in all of your rotations there.

However, I have seen popping up more recently that it is something that can go either way in that yes, you can impress people at that site, but likewise you could have been a good candidate on paper, but your time at that site let them know that you definitely weren't a good fit for them.

 

[Tygacil]

Magillicutty has some good advice. I also wouldn't look at trying to plan them based on experience. They are month long interviews. You are there to get to know the program, their residents, and with the minimal free time you're going to have, the location. I would also consider thinking about where you are going to medical school and where you want to do residency. For instance, if you go to school in the south, you will likely have decent love from those programs around the south but little from the west coast. If you want to move to cali, then you would need to do an away out there.

In the end people argue about planning aways for a specific letter from a big name, doing them at a reach program to try and land an interview, or doing them regionally to get interviews in the area. I think doing a mixture isn't a bad idea and is personally what I did with my two ortho aways.