how much publication is important for surgery IMG - dnasequence

[ArchivalUser]

dear friends I am an IMG recently graduated have good scores ( I think), have USCE in surgery for 3 months. I really want to do surgery. but unfortunately I don't have any publication. all IMGs I see in surgery had publication during application.
someone please help me and tell me the importance of it.

do you know anyone without publication matched in surgery just with high scores, usce and us lot????

thanks in advance

[ArchivalUser]

any one? any idea??? please friends !!!!

[ArchivalUser]

good scores, where you went to medical school, visa status, and CONTACTS matter the most.

It doesn't matter that you don't have publications, your citations and impact factor will not make or break you.

People confuse the issue of medical research and how it impacts their residency chances.

Productive medical research will give you contacts within the field you are applying to, get you more interviews and increase your chances of matching in an ideal scenario

If you are one of the many, who is doing research passively, ie not utilizing contacts or networking properly, publications will come to play when programs rank their applicants, and in those programs who value research they may rank you hire than similar applicants.

[ArchivalUser]

@kash_md:
thanks for the reply. my scores are in 250+, did med school in turkey. and now doing research in surgery but to have publications have to wait at least 1 year.
want to get prelim at least if not cat

[ArchivalUser]

and I need visa, J1 or H1 whichever they give

[ArchivalUser]

dnasequence,

you are well on your way to success, don't dwell on your lack of publications, especially if it is a basic or translational surgery lab and not clinical research, PDs understand that research takes time

1) you need to define your career goals, do you want to be an academic surgeon or will matching into any community program suffice?

if you desire to get into academics, then obviously your best shot is at the institution you are doing research at, but steller IMGs match into university programs all over the country, and yes research helps tremendously at matching at those research oriented institutions.

Basically at this point, apply broadly, utilize contacts, and focus on programs with IMGs or programs who have a smaller prelim pool and have historically taken a student from their prelim pool.

one word of advice, network more within the lab you are in, offer co-authorship on your papers for involvement on others work, it may lead to more publications but this depends on the dynamics of your PI.

also another piece of advice is if your time permits, do a pubmed search on doctors at your institution who you feel maybe connected, see if they are doing clinical research, and ask to work on the side on a clinical project

[ArchivalUser]

Surgery is a very tough field to enter as an IMG, I would say that research is a must when you are competing against US AMGs.