Most aways are four weeks, and are organized through the other school. Check their websites and try to do it early, since a lot of places fill early. The only advice i liked about doing aways was to try to do one at a place you think you really have a shot of going to and another at a place that is a bit of a stretch, but the away may give you that little boost.

As for other rotations, I really liked doing a radiology rotation and trying to just stick with the musculoskeletal guys. They are really good at fracture patterns and classificaions and its nice to be able to read a study efficiently and well for your rotations or even just residency.

Hope that helps

how many aways are we expected to do? is doing only 1 away too risky?

Usually the number of away rotations vary between 1-3 (this is in addition to your home school ortho sub-I). At my school, the norm for anyone going into ortho was 2 aways. Just like the previous post said, most people try to go for one location where they would most likely get in and another location that is a stretch. If you do a good job, most locations will give your application greater consideration than if if just came across their desk.

I don't think one is too risky assuming your application is very strong. If your application is average or not so strong, you're better off doing two. More pros of doing more aways is that you're able to see what it would be like to be as resident (at that location) as well as travel. Obviously the cons to more aways are cost and living away from your home.

thanks for all the advice! are there any other electives we should consider doing (radiology, etc) prior to completing our home or away ortho rotations?

I would try to have your home sub-I prior to going on your aways. At home they are more "forgiving" of what you don't know. Plus you can use all the knowledge gained from your home rotation to impress on your aways.

As for courses, radiology is good to take as an elective if you can have it more ortho based. It can definitely help you with reading radiographs (again impress on your rotations) so I would recommend it if you can fit it in. I chose to place my MSK radiology elective between my two away electives and feel it helped me when reading more advanced films like MRI and CT when I was on my second away. Don't worry if you can't fit in radiology prior to your ortho electives. I dont' think it would hurt you since many fourth years can't fit it in during the busy summer/fall during away rotation "season".

Best thing for your fourth year is to take courses that interest you (doesn't have to be anything related to ortho). You have 5 years to learn how to be an orthopod.

i did my first ortho elective away... i received good feedback. a few residents seemed impressed that i would be willing to my first elective away.
the real advantage was that i got every away that i applied for during that time... at many popular places. since everyone else was trying to do their programs first, then aways later, there are a lot of vacancies.

even after the first or second rotation, people don't expect you to know a whole lot (in my experience at least)... so dont let the idea that you have to do your home program first dictate your entire fourth year schedule.

you dont also have to know everything or impress anyone. its nice, but not necessary. being genuinely interested and hardworking is usually suffice.

i agree with painkilla. do what you want fourth year... its the last time you may have to so for a while.