UTSW General Surgery Chances

[abalone26]

Hi all,
I am an MS3 applying to General surgery, and due to a variety of reasons, UTSW is my dream program. I would love to go there, but know it is an upper tier program so it may be tough to get in. I would love to know what some of your input is about whether or not I am a competitive applicant.

I have a 250+ step 1, and my aim is 260+ for step 2. That is the best part of my application, and otherwise I am not a super stellar applicant. I have 2 publications in non-surgical fields, but am working on getting on some projects now. My pre-clinical grades were great with all honors except one high pass and one pass. My clinical grades have been all high pass so far with a pass in psych. Hopefully I can finish the year with an honor or two especially in surgery.

Let me know if theres anything else you'd like to know. Thanks for your feedback.

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[vhawk]

Id say your chances are about 50/50. Either you match, or you dont.

 

[abalone26]

Id say your chances are about 50/50. Either you match, or you dont.

Thank you for the feedback. What institution are you a fellow at?

 

[Winged Scapula]

Thank you for the feedback. What institution are you a fellow at?

I don't think you get how this works.

Most here want to maintain their anonymity; they aren't going to tell you where they're training.

We do have some here who are familiar with UTSW and perhaps they will post.

 

[vhawk]

Thank you for the feedback. What institution are you a fellow at?

I mean I was just making a joke, but these types of threads are very common around here and its hard to really respond seriously every time they get posted, though thats no fault of yours. The part that is a fault of yours is asking a question for which the answer does not matter. If we tell you that, in our estimation, your chances are 23% +/- 11%....what would that change for you? Would you seriously consider not even ranking it or applying to it based on that? Of course not. Similarly, if we told you 83%, you arent going to just unlist every other program, right? I'm not gonna tell you how to live your life, but as someone who trains residents, its never to early to internalize the single most important principle in medicine: dont order a test that won't change management, and dont ask a question you dont know what to do with the answer. The result of your question isnt gonna change your management, right?

I'm not super shy about where I train at or anything and if you have a good reason for wanting to know I'd be happy to tell you, but for the purposes of this discussion...it isnt UTSW, and I dont have any special knowledge of the program other than having a friend and co-resident on faculty there.

 

[abalone26]

I mean I was just making a joke, but these types of threads are very common around here and its hard to really respond seriously every time they get posted, though thats no fault of yours. The part that is a fault of yours is asking a question for which the answer does not matter. If we tell you that, in our estimation, your chances are 23% +/- 11%....what would that change for you? Would you seriously consider not even ranking it or applying to it based on that? Of course not. Similarly, if we told you 83%, you arent going to just unlist every other program, right? I'm not gonna tell you how to live your life, but as someone who trains residents, its never to early to internalize the single most important principle in medicine: dont order a test that won't change management, and dont ask a question you dont know what to do with the answer. The result of your question isnt gonna change your management, right?

I'm not super shy about where I train at or anything and if you have a good reason for wanting to know I'd be happy to tell you, but for the purposes of this discussion...it isnt UTSW, and I dont have any special knowledge of the program other than having a friend and co-resident on faculty there.

I guess where we disagree is that the answer won't change anything. It's true that I will still apply to it if my chances are slim, but my expectations might change drastically. I am just trying to get a better feel of where I sit GENERALLY compared to other applicants for this program, not a precise confidence interval. Since you don't have any connection or knowledge of them, I understand why you can't add anything to this conversation and maybe this isn't the best thread for you.
I think it is wise to have as much information about as many programs as I can, so since I hadn't seen a recent discussion of utsw in this forum I thought I'd ask. I don't want to be the guy that says to his friends "oh yeah I'm looking really hard at these programs" not having a clue that he is batting way out of his league. And in that case, it definitely should change the plan because I would apply to additional back up programs to make sure I at least match somewhere.

 

[SpecializedSurgeon]

Hi all,
I am an MS3 applying to General surgery, and due to a variety of reasons, UTSW is my dream program. I would love to go there, but know it is an upper tier program so it may be tough to get in. I would love to know what some of your input is about whether or not I am a competitive applicant.

I have a 250+ step 1, and my aim is 260+ for step 2. That is the best part of my application, and otherwise I am not a super stellar applicant. I have 2 publications in non-surgical fields, but am working on getting on some projects now. My pre-clinical grades were great with all honors except one high pass and one pass. My clinical grades have been all high pass so far with a pass in psych. Hopefully I can finish the year with an honor or two especially in surgery.

Let me know if theres anything else you'd like to know. Thanks for your feedback.

I know your question is a little bit old, but seems like you never got an answer. Thought I'd give a more specific one in case you or somebody else needed it:
A 250 with a couple of publications will likely get you interviewed. Your chances from there depend on things like class rank, reason for wanting to be at a particular program, and of course your interview. An Honors in surgery would be ideal but isn't an absolute. This is probably true for most of the high-end surgery programs around the country. Hope it helps.

 

[bannie22]

It is all a crapshoot. All you want to do is maximize your chances, you already know what is needed and have already achieved some of the benchmarks required.