Great Scores vs Great Rotator (Which has more weight)

I'm sure I asked questions like this too.....
Now realize that this is only my opinion and by no means gospel, but I believe this to be true and hopefully it will help.

The reality is that there is no true answer to this question.
Rotating can get you an interview (but rotating can also get you uninvited from an interview that you would have gotten based on your record alone)
Great board scores can get you an interview
Nothing guarantees a spot at your top choice...NOTHING(unless your dad is the chairman)
Obviously rotating is better than not but people match every year at places they didn't rotate. This includes HSS, Harvard, Duke, Pitt, UWash et al.
The better your application, the better your chances of getting an interview, but even this is a crap shoot. The top programs are idiosyncratic about who they interview and sometimes it has nothing to do with your academic credentials.
Lots of people rotate.....lots....so while this does put you in a more rarefied group come interview and rank list time, it is no guarantee. There are large committees that meet and discuss all the applicants, and usually you only rotated with a select few of them. So decisions are made more based on interview day info, letters of rec and other mysterious factors that I have yet to comprehend.
Being a cool, humble, modest, outgoing, awesome, interesting and ENTHUSIASTIC individual on your interview day is by far the MOST important and BEST way to get a spot.

The be all and end all is that there are a LOT of great programs, there is no No. 1 program but there is a 'best' program for you based on what you want out of your life, where you want to be, who with and so on.
HSS is not better than Harvard, Duke, Jefferson, Rush, UMich, CarolinasMC, Ohio State. It is just different. Some people couldn't even imagine living in NYC and think the program is overrated anyway. Others think it is Mecca.
If you are lucky enough to get a spot, be happy that you get to live the dream of doing Orthopaedics every day. Where is really immaterial.

I couldn't agree more with Lifesux. I can only speak on my personal experience but I think lifesux hit it right on the money. I'm from a pretty small medical school but have been lucky enough to interview at the "top notch" programs around the country. From what I have seen, the quality of education that you will recieve is really not any different there than at small "regular" programs. Sure when you finish your resume might have more bling if it has Harvard, Mayo, Emory, Duke, UCLA at the top but your level of knowledge will probably be the same. In fact, your skill level might actually be better if you finish from a place that lets you operate more often and earlier. Every place I interviewed at sends residents to the "best" fellowships and their "top" choice. The bottom line is where you feel you FIT. Good luck. Just keep on working hard and you will be fine.

J

the bottom line for chairman is their percentage of grads that pass ortho boards. this is how they look good or bad to the rest of the world. your grads not crushing boards means you are running a crappy program. boards are tests, as are step I and II, and are very tightly correlated to residency grads passing. grades are obviously consequences of tests in various guises, so these matter as well. inter-resident harmony and "great person labels" matter to anybody with a brain, but when rank list day comes, it's board scores and grades 9 times out of 10.

hundreds of exeptions to this, but there is much demand for the "unified residency theory". none of this should keep a passionate low to average score/grade applicant from pursuing ortho, by the way. plenty of room for you too.

good luck - i don't miss applying.

I'd have to disagree with rocketscientist about the importance of grades/board scores on rank lists.

I interviewed applicants and helped with the rank list for my program this year. I'd say that grades/board scores got applicants in the door for interviews but scores took a distant second place to the rest of the picture for the rank list. We did not rank/ranked low plenty of 240+ step ones and highly ranked plenty of 200-220s non-AOA, etc. The largest part of the rank list was from personality/fit and how well applicants were felt to be able to perform at our particular program.

Good luck to all

I spoke with a residency director about that once, and he said they have actually done research on this. The only correlation with passing your boards is how you do on OITEs from 3rd year forward.

USMLEs dont correlate, grades don't correlate, and 1st and 2nd year OITE scores dont correlate.

A certain chairman/PD who is a past president of the AAOS told students during a lecture about applying for ortho that in his experience Step I scores have somewhat predicted performance on boards. Not to say that if you rock Step1, you're gonna easily pass boards and vice versa. But at his program, and probably lots of others, the top two things they look at for applicants are board scores and if they were a rotator (no suprise). Others things include letters of recommendation and where the applicant went to school.

Sorry to be Mr. Obvious here, but I think that this thread demonstrates that there is no single "conventional wisdom" on whether scores or rotation performance is more important.

It seems at least that if residents ran things rotation performance would be weighed more. At the same time, at least one person pointed out (what I also heard from one Asst. Chairman) that PDs think a lot about board pass rates and OITE averages. Whether Pds have adequate means to properly guesstimate success in ortho is of course up to debate.

Regarding applicant traits and success in ortho residency, one very scholarly attending with whom I interview stated that there was a recent study done on this (which I have not seen/heard of elsewhere). He stated that there were only TWO traits that showed a statistically significant probability of definitive success in ortho residency.....one was being married! (I forgot the second one). NOT on the list was AOA, class rank, clinical grades, veteran status, and a few other things he mentioned....

i have to admit i'm glad there is dissent to my opinion. i'm a big fan of the nice guy/hard worker finishing first.

I think there is no global answer b/c there are 100+ different programs looking at/ranking applicants a different way. Some places get so many rotators that they dont even offer all of them an interview. Some community programs only get a few, if any rotators a year.
Some Chairman are more obsessesed with scores than others, and even your definition of obsessed varies (no one under 220? 230? 240?)
I know of one chairman that give interviews to anyone who was an eagle scout. i bet there isn't any literature comparing THAT to passing the ortho boards!
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I am an EAGLE SCOUT -- so what program can I get an interview, LOL....
But seriously if you want you can tell me.
thanks.