Be like Rocky!
Step 1 : 227 (first attempt)
Step 2 CK : 232 (first attempt)
Step 2 CS : Pass (first attempt)
GAP since graduation: 15-Years
Non-US IMG
First attempt at matching
Number of interviews: 3
Here's the story of an older non-US IMG who had a 15-years gap since medical school who fought his way to residency!
Hi Dr Barone,
I am a Venezuelan IMG who graduated in 2003 and I wanted to share my history with you, so I can inspire other colleagues.
I arrived in the Windy City on a cold January 2016, with the desire to eat and sleep the boards (I imagine myself as Rocky Balboa in Rocky 4 when he was training in Russia) leaving my wife and my 1-month-old baby girl back home. Back in Venezuela I graduated from med school in 2003, as a General Surgeon on 2009, and Oncology Surgeon on 2012. When I got to the states I was very open to any specialty... I just wanted to get into the American health system because I just love MEDICINE in general.
So I began my preparation, mentioning that my worst day was when I took my first NBME, 6 months into studying 7 days a week with a minimum of 8 hrs a day (not resting, huge mistake, but just thinking of all my responsibilities I could not take any days off) and I failed miserably. So I made the proper adjustments, and kept on going. It took me a year of preparation to take the step 1 which I passed with a decent score of 227.
Then I went on with step 2 CS and CK passing them on the 1st attempt (CK also with a decent score of 232). I did a rotation with a cardiologist for 1 month and I just had to apply because the financial burden and separation from my family was getting to me! (I was leaving alone all this time just to fulfill my dream!) Many times I heard people saying "it's impossible or almost impossible to get my into a program when you are an old IMG, and if you don't have more than 240 in your scores is gonna be even more difficult," and many other histories , which I never took into consideration and just kept going.
When I was applying to programs I saw in the requirements that around 80 percent or even more did not take doctors with more than 10 years of graduation, so I had to apply as many specialties as I could to improve my chances in getting into a program. I applied to internal medicine ( because it's the specialty that takes more IMG in general, so I had to think with my mind and not my heart) , family medicine, obgyn and general surgery.
Fortunately I had a very good CV with publications in pub med, and posters in important congresses, and of course my two previous specialties. At the end I got 3 interviews (1 internal med, 1 obgyn and 1 surgery preliminary) My first interview was the internal medicine one, on a Monday and on the Friday of the same week I received an e mail from this hospital offering me a pre-match position, which I took without even hesitating, because at the end I know how hard is to get into the System.
So, in conclusion everybody has to write their own history and I am an example that hard work pays off (while everybody was partying, going to the beach or whatever I was having my Ivan Drago fight everyday with the books) Keep on going, and to my fellow SENIOR ROCKY'S especially, the fight is not over till you say so!
- L. C. March 14, 2018
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