At my school we have one 4-week elective rotation at some point during our third year, which we can opt out of if we would rather have an extra four weeks to prepare for Step 1 before third year begins. I would ultimately like to do an ortho rotation at my home institution, plus two away rotations; but I also understand that Step 1 is not something to be taken lightly, and I'm a person who needs to prepare a lot to do well on exams. Thus I'm wondering about timing.
Does it seem like a bad idea for me to forgo the opportunity to do an ortho elective at the end of third year, instead doing all three ortho rotations (one at home, two away) at the beginning of fourth year? I'd sure like to have those extra four weeks to prepare for Step 1. If my ERAS application is submitted on the early side, before I finish my three rotations, will a program that knows that I'm scheduled to do a rotation with them hold off on tossing my application in the trash until they get a chance to see me? Or should I strive to get all my USMLE ducks in a row early as best I can, and get one rotation (my home one) out of the way at the end of third year?
How long would you have to prepare for step 1 w/o the extra 4 weeks?
I think 4-5 weeks is the max you can study for the thing. Any more and you'll get diminishing returns.
I believe that it's 4 weeks. People often gripe that we have one of the shortest windows between MS2 and MS3. It's hard to tell now how much time I'll need for Step 1, and I'd rather have too much than not enough.
There's another reason why I'd like to take all three ortho rotations at the beginning of fourth year instead of taking one 3rd year. Details aside, it would allow me to take surgery at the end of third year instead of the middle; and it would allow me to take all three ortho rotations after a full year of clinical stuff rather than taking the home rotation right after surgery midway through third year. Even if I didn't need the extra time for board prep, I could take a rads elective or an anesthesiology elective third year, which would also be nice to have under my belt before doing ortho rotations.
So, my real question is this: if I were able to get all three ortho rotations done by the end of October, would that be plenty of time for all programs to consider all three of them before having to make decisions regarding whether to interview me or kick me to the curb? What about by the end of November?
