Neuro match 2019 for DO student applying with Comlex only

[Iben_Sina]

Hello everyone,

I am new to SDN community and I don't know if this is the right forum to post my question here, so I apologize in advance if it is the wrong forum.

I am currently third year osteopathic medical student and I am very interested in pursuing neurology MD residency program, I would like to list my qualifications and then my questions come after:

1- 724 Comlex 1 score ~ 99 percentile in DO world (have not taken USMLE 1).

2- Top 10% in my class (Honored most of my pre-clinical courses, including neuro, for the first two years in).

3- Doing great so far in my 3rd clinical clerckships.

4- 2 years of basic science research before medical school (oral/poster presentations, awards, abstracts and bench work. No publications thought yet other than abstracts in conference journals)

My questions:

1- What are my chances to get matched in an academic MD neurology residency program with heavy opportunity for research without taking USMLE step 1 or 2.

2- If my chances are low without taking any USMLE, do you advice me to take USMLE 1 or USMLE 2 to increases my chances?

3- Is taking USMLE step 2 only will be enough? and what score range is considered competitive to match in an academic neuro-program?

I would appreciate any input. Thanks,

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[Craker]

FWIW I have similar COMLEX scores/academics/research to you and multiple residency programs (specifically academic programs) have commented that they really appreciated my taking USMLE 1 and 2. I got the impression that programs have a harder time evaluating a COMLEX score, especially programs with few/no DO residents in the past.

That's not to say that you can't match at an academic MD place with COMLEX alone, but it seems like it would probably help to have either or both USMLEs. I can't speak to if one is more important than the other but conventional wisdom would suggest Step 1 being more significant. The only upside is that if you did well on COMLEX, you'll likely do well on USMLE too.

 

[NeuroDO3536]

You should be fine matching at an MD program without the USMLE, but you may have trouble getting interviews from a lot of the middle to better programs without them. They just don’t have much to use to compare you to other applicants.

I would try to still take step 2CK. Having step 1 would help a ton if it’s an average score or better, but taking it now without much preparation could be risky.

I don’t think you need to worry at all about not matching as long as you apply fairly broadly. The better programs want USMLE for sure though.

 

[Iben_Sina]

Thank you guys for your input. It is highly appreciated!

 

[NeurologyHopeful2018]

Do you go to Westerns? Do you know Ibn Al-nafis? You guys have same icon and eerily similiar name.

 

[Iben_Sina]

Do you go to Westerns? Do you know Ibn Al-nafis? You guys have same icon and eerily similiar name.

No I dont go to Westerns, I don't know Ibn Al-Nafees either. My icon is for Iben Sina face.

 

[Iben_Sina]

Do you go to Westerns? Do you know Ibn Al-nafis? You guys have same icon and eerily similiar name.

Would you please add your input on my Question. Would be highly appreciated!

 

[NeurologyHopeful2018]

Would you please add your input on my Question. Would be highly appreciated!

Sure - while many institutions at least "prefer" USMLEs - because Neuro is not competitive, I think you will match no problem without it. Only 50-60% of all Neuro allopathic spots are taken up by US MDs - and DOs are prefered over IMGs - I would say you are fine without it.

 

[OurFord]

The majority of PDs I have interviewed with said that they really appreciate/prefer USMLE scores. One or two said that even though their program website says they accept COMLEX, they rarely/never interview DO applicants without USMLE scores.

Your stats look great and I do not think you will have any trouble matching into a solid neurology program - Just be aware that skipping the USMLE will limit you somewhat.

 

[Niels Bohr]

Hey guys, I'm a 4th year D.O. student trying my hand in the allopathic Neurology match at East Coast programs (closer to home) for 2019. I am currently planning to apply to ERAS programs in Boston, Connecticut, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, New Hampshire, Vermont, Rhode Island - about 40 programs total. To be quite honest I have vastly inferior statistics to the OP but can't imagine myself doing anything else besides Neurology. I am bottom of my class (literally like 148/158), COMLEX 1: 445, COMLEX 2 449 (borderline performance, 400 is passing), no USMLE. Things I have going for me include several neurology publications/international conference poster presentations from three years of research prior to med school, leadership in medical school (peer mentor, vice-president of a club) a masters in neuroscience, college major was neuroscience, tutoring for neuro during medical school, collegiate athletics, and Spanish speaking. I've also got a bunch of volunteer experience including EMS and medical volunteering with Projects Abroad in Argentina prior to med school. I consider myself friendly, extroverted and would interview just as well as the next guy. I am not interested in the osteopathic match because I really want to be closer to family in the Northeast and most programs are in Michigan, Ohio or Florida. For anyone with insight/experience with this matter I have a few questions:

1. Realistically what are my chances of matching? Do I need a backup plan?
2. Are there any specific neurology programs you recommend on the East Coast that are sympathetic to borderline D.O. applicants (albeit with demonstrated interest in the field) without USLME scores? I have reviewed program websites and adjusted my list to only include those that accept COMLEX but sometimes its hard to know if those programs actually mean it when they say "no minimum COMLEX score cutoff for interview consideration" (I try to count the number of D.O. residents in their program and if it's around 20% I consider that a win)
3. Is there a target number of slots/residency positions I should aim for (right now I'm noticing the average is ~4 slots/program x 40 programs = 160 seats)?
4. Anything I can do to boost my chances between now and match day? I've got 5 auditions set up between September-February, a good Mayo clinic book for review of Neurology I'm planning to read, and considering going to an AAN conference this fall.

Sorry for the long post, any insight is greatly appreciated. Thanks for helping a brother out!

 

[drecharles]

Hey guys, I'm a 4th year D.O. student trying my hand in the allopathic Neurology match at East Coast programs (closer to home) for 2019. I am currently planning to apply to ERAS programs in Boston, Connecticut, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, New Hampshire, Vermont, Rhode Island - about 40 programs total. To be quite honest I have vastly inferior statistics to the OP but can't imagine myself doing anything else besides Neurology. I am bottom of my class (literally like 148/158), COMLEX 1: 445, COMLEX 2 449 (borderline performance, 400 is passing), no USMLE. Things I have going for me include several neurology publications/international conference poster presentations from three years of research prior to med school, leadership in medical school (peer mentor, vice-president of a club) a masters in neuroscience, college major was neuroscience, tutoring for neuro during medical school, collegiate athletics, and Spanish speaking. I've also got a bunch of volunteer experience including EMS and medical volunteering with Projects Abroad in Argentina prior to med school. I consider myself friendly, extroverted and would interview just as well as the next guy. I am not interested in the osteopathic match because I really want to be closer to family in the Northeast and most programs are in Michigan, Ohio or Florida. For anyone with insight/experience with this matter I have a few questions:

1. Realistically what are my chances of matching? Do I need a backup plan?
2. Are there any specific neurology programs you recommend on the East Coast that are sympathetic to borderline D.O. applicants (albeit with demonstrated interest in the field) without USLME scores? I have reviewed program websites and adjusted my list to only include those that accept COMLEX but sometimes its hard to know if those programs actually mean it when they say "no minimum COMLEX score cutoff for interview consideration" (I try to count the number of D.O. residents in their program and if it's around 20% I consider that a win)
3. Is there a target number of slots/residency positions I should aim for (right now I'm noticing the average is ~4 slots/program x 40 programs = 160 seats)?
4. Anything I can do to boost my chances between now and match day? I've got 5 auditions set up between September-February, a good Mayo clinic book for review of Neurology I'm planning to read, and considering going to an AAN conference this fall.

Sorry for the long post, any insight is greatly appreciated. Thanks for helping a brother out!

Somewhat similar situation.. any further insight?

 

[Postictal Raiden]

Hey guys, I'm a 4th year D.O. student trying my hand in the allopathic Neurology match at East Coast programs (closer to home) for 2019. I am currently planning to apply to ERAS programs in Boston, Connecticut, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, New Hampshire, Vermont, Rhode Island - about 40 programs total. To be quite honest I have vastly inferior statistics to the OP but can't imagine myself doing anything else besides Neurology. I am bottom of my class (literally like 148/158), COMLEX 1: 445, COMLEX 2 449 (borderline performance, 400 is passing), no USMLE. Things I have going for me include several neurology publications/international conference poster presentations from three years of research prior to med school, leadership in medical school (peer mentor, vice-president of a club) a masters in neuroscience, college major was neuroscience, tutoring for neuro during medical school, collegiate athletics, and Spanish speaking. I've also got a bunch of volunteer experience including EMS and medical volunteering with Projects Abroad in Argentina prior to med school. I consider myself friendly, extroverted and would interview just as well as the next guy. I am not interested in the osteopathic match because I really want to be closer to family in the Northeast and most programs are in Michigan, Ohio or Florida. For anyone with insight/experience with this matter I have a few questions:

1. Realistically what are my chances of matching? Do I need a backup plan?
2. Are there any specific neurology programs you recommend on the East Coast that are sympathetic to borderline D.O. applicants (albeit with demonstrated interest in the field) without USLME scores? I have reviewed program websites and adjusted my list to only include those that accept COMLEX but sometimes its hard to know if those programs actually mean it when they say "no minimum COMLEX score cutoff for interview consideration" (I try to count the number of D.O. residents in their program and if it's around 20% I consider that a win)
3. Is there a target number of slots/residency positions I should aim for (right now I'm noticing the average is ~4 slots/program x 40 programs = 160 seats)?
4. Anything I can do to boost my chances between now and match day? I've got 5 auditions set up between September-February, a good Mayo clinic book for review of Neurology I'm planning to read, and considering going to an AAN conference this fall.

Sorry for the long post, any insight is greatly appreciated. Thanks for helping a brother out!

Your board scores are bad. Not having USMLE will make things worse. You will still match, though.

I don't think you need to have back-ups as long as you apply to AOA or formally AOA programs (Desert Regional, Valley, HealthOne, Botsford, etc...).

Seems that your applications shows true dedication to the field. This can go a long way.

With your stats, I'd apply to at least 60.

good luck

 

[deleted986861]

Any word on how you did?

 

[sinemet1]

You'll be fine. Apparently your scores are not great however, you have a good resume' that demonstrates commitment and deep interest in neurology. You will need strong letters of recommendation. I suggest that you also apply for as many programs as you can afford to maximize your chances in the match.
Be optimistic and realistic. do not listen to discouraging and negative people around you. Continue to work on yours weaknesses and improve you CV.
Never give up. Good luck

 

[Iben_Sina]

Any word on how you did?

Hi,

I'll write this for you and for everyone interested in neurology summarizing my experience in the match of 2019.

First of all, I ended up applying Neurology as a back up specialty and Radiology as 1st choice, I ended up matching into my 2nd ranked program (diagnostic radiology in a University of Texas radiology program.)

I have also ended up taken USMLE step 1 by the beginning of 4th year, it was very hard but I managed to find 3 weeks of dedicated prep for step 1 ( I used my 4th year academic pause that I was supposed to use for my comlex 2) as I have forgotten those tiny details of biochem, genetics, drug MOAs and microbiology and needed some dedicated prep time to master them again, I ended up scoring 245 and was very disappointed because I was aiming for 250+ but that was what I could get by preparing for 3 weeks only coming out from 1 year of clinical rotations forgetting most of those step 1 stuff.

Ill be very honest with my experience so you can plan accordingly.

I applied on Sep 15 with Comlex 1 score only (724) as I took my usmle 1 just few days before step 15, I applied to 110 Radiology programs and 21 neurology programs only. Due to (What I think) my strong academic performance (Top 7% in my class), relatively strong LORs from PDs of IM, FM, Stroke and Chairman of GS, I started to get communications from some of those 21 neurology programs asking me where is my usmle step 1 score?, they stated it is required to grant me an interview, I had to tell them that my step 1 score was supposed to be released by early October, so all of them told me to update them as soon as I receive it. Once my score was released in the first week of October, I contacted those programs and thus I was granted interviews. Also, after I released my step 1 score, I started to get bunch of interviews from radiology and neurology programs from mid Oct to mid Nov and I ended up getting 9/110 of radiology interviews 9/21 neurology interviews.

The ratio of the number of interviews I got to the number of programs I applied tells you the difference in competitiveness between radiology and neurology this match, however regardless of that, definitely taking USMLE step 1 helped me secure at least half of my neurology interviews and I think it was critical to be perceived as a competitive applicant for both specialties although I consider my score was not that great.

During the interviews, I noticed that almost in every neurology program half of the residents were IMGs (100% IMGs in some programs), which highlights the fact that although neurology is one of the most fascinating fields but for some reason it is not favorable by US medical graduates making this specialty relatively less competitive than other specialties, so that would be a plus for you as you will be looked at as more competitive applicant being a US medical candidate.

By the time I was interviewing, I gave my comlex 2 and I scored 665 (score released mid Dec), by that time I have received >90% of my interviews already and only got few interviews later down the road in 2nd half of Dec and early Jan, that highlights the importance of getting USMLE 1 score ready by Sep 15 for both neurology and radiology. I ended up going to all my 9 radiology interviews, only 8 neurology interviews, and 3 TRI/Prelim, and matched my 2nd choice radiology.

The programs I interviewed at in neurology were all ACGME programs but DO friendly having at least 1 DO resident in their roster, however, neurology in general is a very DO friendly specialty so you should not worry about that.

As a summary of my experience, I think the hardest part in matching into neurology is to get the interview first (in my opinion you need USMLE 1 one if you want to apply for at least medium tier ACGME programs), however, you don't need USMLE if you are applying to those historically AOA programs (Desert Regional, Valley, HealthOne, Botsford, etc..) which I did not personally apply to (I only applied to one). Once you get good numbers of interviews, I think you will match as long as you don't do something terrible during the interview as from my own experience many of the programs I interviewed at did not fill all their spots and they had to soap to fill their program, you may not imagine that a neuro program like Loma Linda university in Cali did not fill any of its 4 spots in the regular match and they had to soap to fill them, that what really happened!!

My advise to you:
1- I know it might be hard, but definitely give your usmle 1 and get the score ready before Sep 15 (If you can)
2- Apply broadly to as many programs as you can.
3- Aim for 9+ interviews in neurology and I don't think you need a back up.
4- Don't repeat my mistakes, please have a complete application by sep 15, If I applied with complete application by sep 15 I anticipate I would have got at least double if not triple the number of interviews.

Don't worry much, do your homework and leave the rest to the creator, I believe you have very good chance to match no matter what. Hope to see your good news in March 2020.

Hope this helps,
Regards,