Hello, everyone. Welcome to this member May session, setting up your sports medicine career for success advice on fellowship applications and preparing for fellowship and beyond. I'm Michael Graves with the AP MR just here for a quick housekeeping update, I think we've all used zoom enough times by now to know. Just raise your hand when you're have a question or please use the chat desk question but I think the directors would like this to be a little more interactive so please just feel free to raise your hand and jump in when you have questions. Without further ado, I'm gonna kick it over to Dr graph. Hey everyone thanks for joining tonight. As I kind of mentioned in the invite we're going to keep this fairly informal. I've got a couple of questions sort of prepared but I want this to be time for you guys to to pick our brains and getting any information that you would find helpful I suppose for for your careers going forward hopefully in the sports medicine. So I'll start out we'll have kind of all the faculty introduce themselves, kind of where you're at currently maybe where you came from, and if you feel comfortable telling everyone where you're going as well and maybe what kind of first brought you into into PNR and sports medicine. So I can go first I'm I'm crystal graph I'm one of the PGI for residents at University of Colorado I'm from Wisconsin originally. I will be starting my sports medicine fellowship in July at University of Iowa. As I'm sure a lot of us on this call or former athletes had a ton of injuries and just always was super drawn to the population sports medicine found that PNR was just an awesome way to sort of get to that field and just sort of fell in love with it. So, I'll let maybe I'll go next to introduce yourself. Hey guys, I'm Ella, I'm originally from New Jersey. I'm currently at University of Pittsburgh Medical Center in Pittsburgh, and I'm starting in July, a sports med fellowship at New York Presbyterian the Columbia Cornell track. And I guess the last part was why PNR and sports medicine, which I think early on in medicine I became very frustrated that a lot of medicine felt like it was throwing medicine at people and not looking at the whole picture, and how to keep people active and happy throughout their lives and that's what dropped drew me to PNR and the more and more I learned about sports medicine, the more and more fit. So, I guess I just wanted to reiterate all of my interests. And here I am. Yeah, I'd love to. My name is Mani Singh. I'm a current sports medicine fellow at University of Colorado. Originally before this I did my PNR residency at New York Presbyterian. And then after fellowship took a job at Columbia so going to be joining there in September. I stumbled into sports medicine actually in in residency it wasn't something that I like new going into residency that I wanted to do. But started doing a little bit more kind of like musculoskeletal ultrasound and then started seeing some of the more kind of like the, you know, the procedural component of sports medicine and I always love sports and they, you know, I played sports But I think it was just good luck and I think to all this point kind of like human are just uniquely prepares you from kind of a comprehensive, you know, evaluation of an athlete head to toe and so it just was a perfect union. Really excited I did this fellowship. Dr. Cruz, you want to go next. Sure. My name is Brian Cruz from outside Chicago originally I did PNR residency at Mayo in Rochester fellowship at University of Iowa, which is where I'm currently on staff now. I'm also in position for US soccer and USA rugby so in terms of why PNR and why sports, you know, similar to, you know, what Ella and Mani and Crystal have said already, you know, I was a prior athlete played soccer in college. And really like this whole idea of restoration of function and I think one thing that separates you know non operative sports medicine from operative sports medicine is you know operatively, it is, you know, whatever structure is broken must fix that structure. But how does that then translate, you know, to getting folks back on the field or doing the activities that they want and I really feel that, you know, sports medicine in general and specifically PNR sports, you know, really focuses on how to get people back you know what do you do to, to allow them to, like I said, restore their function and so that's why I found a PNR and subsequently sports medicine. Hi everybody, my name is Derek Stokes, I did a residency at Colorado, and then fellowship at Utah, and I'll be going back to Colorado next year for sports medicine faculty. I would say that my again reasoning for going into sports through PNR is very similar to everybody else I kind of knew that's the route that I wanted to go to and I felt like with the skill set that we gained in PNR through musculoskeletal ultrasound training it set us up pretty well and then just kind of learning all the sideline skills and medical skill sets. This year has really compiled on top of that. And after class who's filling in for Dr Kenyon do you want to go next. Hey everybody, I'm Scott class. I'm now two years into practice I did my PNR residency at University of Miami, and my sports med fellowship at NYP and Columbia Cornell track, and then started up at Dartmouth. And then started up at Dartmouth. I currently am a team physician for football hockey and lacrosse and do some US soccer as well. Similar to a lot of other people kind of same thing but I was an athletic trainer before doing medicine so I was really interested in sports medicine prior to that. And just really loved working with the patients I love the population of relating and talking to them. And when I was in medical school I kind of pictured myself in various roles and really fit in with the PM and our crowd and thought the procedural skills and the hands on skills really translated well the first medicine and so, yes, that's me. And then last Dr Romero. Everybody glad to see everybody on this call and those will watch this later. So I did my PNR residency at Mayo Clinic in Rochester, and I did my during my sports medicine fellowship there. And then I'll be coming on staff here in about eight weeks after fellowship within the division of sports medicine. So, for me, I think some of what a lot of people have said, and I think that, as most people know there's multiple paths into going to sports medicine I think for me I really enjoyed having a, I really wanted a deep foundation of musculoskeletal knowledge, and I feel like human I would provide me with that the best foundation for that. And I also really enjoyed ultrasound, and so I thought that PNR residency would provide me again the deepest foundation from that perspective. And I think some other components to our you know, a part of sports medicine is concussion evaluation and so as part of our training we get a lot of training in traumatic brain injuries and so I think that would be fairly helpful and I also felt that our biomechanical understanding was going to be deep as well and so those are some things that I appreciate and I also think that, you know, sports medicine is really, how do you collaborate and interdisciplinary team, and that's a big part of sports medicine, and that's a big part of what PNR does as well. And so I think that our involvement on inpatient rehab team and some other settings as well we tend to focus on how do you be a team leader in those settings. And I really feel like that translates well to sports medicine. So, you know, just to kind of echo a few things that I think were my, my why. Well thanks everyone. So again, we'll keep this fairly informal I want to, you know, guide this in a way that you all participants kind of want it to go and any questions that you may have. If you don't have any questions to start I can kind of get forward but does anyone want to throw anything out there if I kind of don't hear anything in the next couple seconds I'll throw out a question and feel free to chat it as well I know zoom is kind of clunky so. I'm a PGY2 at UCLA and PNR. So, looking into the programs and looking into fellowship I think one of the things that's the hard part is looking at the fellowships versus the. If you all could talk a little bit about your experience with that and what you looked into along during, you know, interviews or the application process that kind of made you steer you one way versus another or the pros and cons of one versus the other. Yeah, I'm happy to just start here, I think we got, we got cut off a little bit there with when you're talking so I think we got the gist of what you were saying, you know, I think that. So, this is a little bit of a soapbox but I think that it's very easy to put labels on, like defining PNR specific programs or traditionally family medicine specific programs. And I think that's one way to classify programs. I think maybe a better way to think about it is, what is that specific program going to give you and what skills or what experiences are going to give you, and that could be whatever label you put on it, because there are quote unquote PNR programs or quote unquote family medicine programs that really might have a lot of PNR exposure, or maybe are, you know, it'd be PNR based but don't give you as much exposure or vice versa. And so I think maybe the framework I would, I would, I would offer you would say, thinking about, okay, let me take a step back from what these programs offer, let me think about maybe where I want to be in a few years. What are some of the skills I really appreciate and value, what settings I want to work in, and then think about what fellowships might give you those skills to, and will put you in a situation that you want to be from a career standpoint. And then that could be a quote unquote family medicine based program or a PNR based program. And so I think that it's very easy for us to get stuck in this label of, you know, we try to fit ourselves in a box, whenever we're looking for the next step. And I guess my encouragement would be try to think take the step back and say, where do you want to be in five years and which program regardless of what label they have is going to get you there. Can I can I add to that. Yeah, Josh is Josh is spot on with that and I could not agree anymore with that so I'm PNR I love PNR PNR is the greatest group people ever created in mankind history right. But I did fellowship at a family medicine based program. And so I knew what I wanted coming out of residency I knew you know what I wanted to get better at what I wanted to focus on. And this, the program that I went to allow me to do those things and so yeah I would really just eliminate you know what the the home base is of the program and just really focus on what they offer what they can give you how they can better you as a sports medicine physician. So yeah, I just wanted to echo Josh's as usual his comments because he is spot on. Maybe saying it in a slightly different way what I what I had done was kind of create a priority list for myself of maybe what three things that I wanted to get accomplished in fellowship. And I like, or put those programs at the top of my list, where I knew I was going to get those things. And maybe another program had certain strengths that didn't necessarily fit with my priorities, and those programs might go down a little bit, but you kind of have to figure out exactly like Dr. Cruz and Josh said, what exactly you want and does that program actually fit. I can kind of speak to to like being a little bit closer to the process of a lot of us kind of are close to process here I personally applied to almost all of the kind of human are based programs and then a couple kind of family medicine based programs kind of sprinkled in there I think, like, I was one in particular that yes it is technically family medicine and they have historically taken a lot of family medicine people but they have some rock star PMR faculty there, which I think was important to me to know that they're going to understand what my training was like, it's going to be pretty easy for me to kind of have like a sort of like continuity clinic type requirement there as well. So, if you're someone who's kind of wanting to look into more of the family medicine programs I think also obviously make sure that they take PM and our applicants. It just was kind of easier to apply to mostly of the PM and our ones. And also maybe like considering whether there's PM and our faculty kind of on their staff as well. And you also for the for how they're categorized that cruise you might know a little bit more about this. They're categorized by where the funding comes from. So, it doesn't necessarily mean that like if they're under family that there's not like a lot of PM and our representation and vice versa. Primary funding. Yeah, so whoever is the biggest, the biggest funder it falls. Usually, under that classifications like for us, you know our fellowship. Don't quote me on this but the vast majority of our money comes from family medicine and that's where we're housed under the EM does provide some sort of funding. Also, so yeah you're, you're, you're spot on it's it's whoever is the primary funder. For the most part is what that fellowship falls under. What other questions does anyone maybe have. Sorry, I have a question. My name is Jasper I'm a PGI three at Emory. Besides the personal statement, and like coverage. What else would you say would be the most important in terms of applications. I'll jump in here. I felt like for applications. The important thing is to kind of make your story right. So you should be involved in a few different things but it's important to pick the things that you're interested in and have a longitudinal experience to kind of create your story of who you are, why it makes sense that you're interested in sports medicine, what you can bring to the table and what you're looking to get out of a program. So I don't think it's like you must do research or you must do some leadership or you must do education it's like, what of those things are you really interested in and why, if you have a really good story I think that really says a lot to programs that you're thoughtful, and that you've put together an application and a reason that you're that you're there you're not just trying to do checkboxes. I can add Scott's 100% correct there I agree completely I think you know just just showing your whole body of work and why you want to be a sports medicine physician or fellow then and then obviously attending, I think is important, you know, if, if I love Michael Jordan, and I want to take care of Michael Jordan and then that's probably not a great, a great story and a great application but just showing a whole body of work and and showing why you want to go into that field I think is, is, is the best thing to do so yes Scott is spot on with that. And then along those lines one of my mentors very early on, I think I was a PGI to at the time, had me and my co residents, write down, write down or why, why we're in human are, why are we in medicine. What do we want our careers to look like an impact that we want to have. And I kept referring to that throughout my residency. And that's like kind of how my, my CV bloomed is by always coming back to that why. And I think if you do that if you stay true to yourself. Just as everybody was saying that your, your CV will reflect who you are truly inside and that will shine through when you are in the application process and the interview process. I think that that's a really helpful exercise that I probably wouldn't have done unless somebody nudged me to do it but it was really valuable. Yeah, I think that's, these are all very wise comments and I think to give you some objective examples of this I think is, you know, take a second to think about what when people think about sports coverage like what level of sports coverage do you want to cover, is there a particular sport, is there a particular level, is there a particular population you really want to get exposed to, and I think that's one component. Do you really prioritize research, do you, are you okay with just doing a little bit of research, do you really want to teach this part of your career. Do you really want to be a specific part of the country. And so there's a lot of variables to consider and I so I think it goes back to this why, or this priority list that most people have mentioned. And again, I think that we spend so much time trying to think about how we make ourselves competitive for a particular program for Program X, rather than saying, I really want to be this person, this is what drives me this is what I find meaningful, and then finding which place is going to springboard you to being that person. And so I think that that's where I would, if I could go back, I would spend a lot more time reflecting on those components, rather than trying to like fit ourselves into a box. Yeah, I think one more thing that I will add is our program director, kind of given our residency historically gives very good procedural experience to the residents so oftentimes to ask the residents will, why do you want to go to fellowship what do you need to get out of fellowship so kind of along the similar lines like knowing exactly what you want to get out of that year, and how that's going to sort of springboard you forward or kind of make, make it so it's like unique that you're, you know, have done a fellowship versus just you know started practice right away. All right, what else any other questions from people otherwise I'll jump in. I think we can't quite hear you. Can y'all hear me now? Hey, I'm Ramil. I'm a PGY3 at University of Central Florida's program, PM&R program in Pensacola. Question regarding letters, four versus five, including the PD. Is there a preference, hey, this attending has to be a PM&R attending versus orthopedic surgery, or it doesn't matter as long as they know as well? Yeah, sure. I can take that. Yeah. I don't, I don't think it matters a ton. I think if you have at least, you know, two letters from your primary specialty, I think that's, that's helpful. You know, when I, when I was applying, I don't think I had any orthopedic surgery letters. It was mostly PM&R. I think it was all PM&R. And then one family medicine, because I had a good interaction with, with one of them. And so I added that on, but all of mine were PM&R. Personally, I don't think it matters if you have an orthopedic surgeon write a letter for you, it might, it might be helpful, maybe. In some instances, I don't, I don't think across the board, at least with us, I'll just give my example. When we review applications and letters of recommendation, you know, we want to see one from the PD, obviously, and then at least two from a PM&R physician, and then hopefully at least one of those two, if not, then two PM&R and one sports physician, you know, from, from that specialty. And, you know, I don't, I don't think outside of that, that it matters all much, all that much. I would say if it's at least people that know you well and can write you a good letter, I think, I think that goes a lot further. And, you know, the, the example I always give, you know, if you can get, you know, two PM&R letters from people that, you know, nobody's ever heard of that are very strong and, you know, I know him and I had seen him in clinic and I, we have worked together every single day and he is, you know, top 1% of residents that I've worked with that is much more powerful than a letter from, I'll just throw out a name, John Finoff, a letter from John Finoff that says, hey, I met him once and we talked, right? That's not a very helpful letter. And so the name isn't as important as the content of, of the letter. So hopefully that somewhat answered your question. Yes, sir. Just to clarify, it's like one of the team docs that I help cover hockey team with happens to be orthopedic surgery, but he knows me, you know, probably the best out of the faculty. So I was going to ask him, so just to clarify. For sure. Yeah. Yeah. If he knows you well, then for sure, then definitely use that one for sure. Yep. Yeah. I really was going to say the same thing Dr. Cruz said, because I think a lot of, a lot of the application process now, as you guys start applying, you'll notice is a little bit kind of truncated or limited as in the number of experiences that you can put in your application, you know, board scores, things like that becoming more pass fail. And so letters of recommendation as we were reviewing applications this year were really helpful. And even though they're subjective, it was almost treating it like an objective way. If we can have just like understanding the person a little bit more, trying to figure out the passion, you know, we talked a little bit more about kind of like, you want your application to show your story, want you to see that passion of sports medicine. And I think the letters go a long way in supplementing and kind of showing, Hey, I'm an external person. I also see the passion in this person. So to Dr. Cruz's point, I think, you know, if they know you well, that goes a lot longer, I'd say then, or a lot further than, you know, who specifically the person is or what their field is. And I would just add to that. And I think, you know, Scott would probably echo this, you know, there is some subjectivity to these letters, but there's also some hidden objectivity, you know, in the words that we use and whatnot. And so, you know, good letters, there are hidden words that will help out as well. So I don't know, Scott, if you disagree with that, but I think there are ways to provide some objective hidden messages as to the quality of the applicant. I agree. Yeah. When I was a fellow, we definitely reviewed applications at NYP and one of the things that unanimously, unanimously everybody looks at is those letters of recommendation and tries to find those little key things that kind of separate people apart. And I actually review now for, you know, an Ivy league orthopedic surgery program. So they're extremely competitive letters and sometimes they all kind of bleed the same as the best person that ever walked the face of the earth. But like Mani was saying that if you do have that connection and it kind of talks about your story, like, oh, they covered hockey with me and they were here every single day on time. They were really engaged. They loved what they did. And then you want to go to a place where they're also, say example, covering hockey or even just in general, covering, you know, collegiate sports that could really show something a little bit more unique. And I do pick those out when I review applications and take a second thought about that person. And then to kind of piggyback on that, that also reflects back towards their personal statement. If it also, you know, comes congruent with the personal statement, that's really strong. And I'll just add one more comment to that, not to be a dead horse, but, you know, great letters are expected, right? We, you know, assume that people will submit their best letters, you know, from their mentors and whatnot, but a not great letter can be fairly harmful, right? So if you have a letter recommendation that is very bland, it's very obvious that either, you know, you weren't great or, you know, the writer didn't really know you at all. You know, we have, you know, applicants that have one really bad letter that we kind of, you know, bumped down a fair bit. So I think just another point to make that letters are actually more important than I think most people realize. I'll say one like last quick thing too, since I know you guys are, if you guys are PGY3s, you're probably starting to ask people for letters. I personally only had three letters. I don't actually know, maybe Dr. Cruz or one of the other and older faculty can fill in like how many you can actually have or how many programs actually expect, but I only had three personally. Did you just call me old? She called me old. You're like, no, you're faculty Dr. Cruz. You just said one of the old doctors. Okay. All right. I'm just kidding. I don't know the answer. I think you can upload up to four, I think is the limit. Maybe it's five. I have no idea. Most people, most, most applications that we review have three or four. So. All right, Crystal, I'll remember that when you get here in July. Can I piggyback off that question? Hi, Michael, Michael Morgan, PGY3 at University of Miami. I'm actually at another conference right now. That's why I'm kind of dressed up, right? So mine, don't mind me. So regarding letters of recommendations, let's say you don't have, you're requesting someone from a letter from someone that's like, you didn't actually have any clinical experience with, or you didn't let's say cover games with or anything, but they worked with you on, let's say maybe a research project or you know, them from, excuse me, from conferences and you've kind of kept in contact with, and they know you on a little bit more personal basis and they can't really comment on your clinical expertise or anything regarding the field itself. How would you say that a letter from that person would bear off? I'm happy to take that if you guys want. I would say, I would say fairly significantly less powerful than somebody that has worked with you clinically. I think if you, if you have, you know, whatever, two or three other letters from people that have worked with you clinically that know, you know, your, your, your work ethic and clinical acumen and that can attest to those things, then having that letter that specifically talks about, you know, your, your personality traits, I think that's fine. But if that is your main letter, somebody who's never worked with you clinically, honestly, we're probably going to kind of push that to the, to the back burner and use that as supplemental material for your application review. I don't think that most places, and then anybody else, you know, Scott or whoever can correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't think most places are going to put a lot of stock into that, that letter by itself. It's more of an, of an augmentative letter, I would say. Yeah, I was going on the lines of as a supplemental letter, not as a main letter, that would that be, would that be harmful in any way of having that as an extra letter, just for like personality purposes, I guess? I don't think harmful. I don't, I don't think harmful at all. If you can get, you know, again, I forget the number and I apologize if it's two or three or four total, but if you can get three, you know, strong letters that talk about you as a, you know, clinical or from your, from a clinical perspective, then I think then that letter will be fine. But if, if the other letters don't talk about, you know, your clinical acumen and whatnot, then I don't know how helpful that'll be. I don't know if anybody else disagrees. Yeah, I mean, I can fill in that. I mean, one of the faculty that I got a letter from, I hadn't worked with a lot clinically, but I had worked with at least somewhat clinically. And then I knew her super well, just as being my mentor, doing research with her, and then being chief resident with her. So I think if you have like a ton of other experience with that faculty, maybe in research and leadership, and maybe even some coverage, that's one thing. But again, I had a little bit of at least clinical experience with her. So I think, I think to what Dr. Cruz mentioned, it probably would be good to have, you know, at least a little bit of clinical experience, even if it's just a couple of days or a week with them. Cool, any other questions from people? So I've talked to a couple of my buddies that are either in family medicine or have, you know, matched into fellowship and are about to start fellowship, and their input since ARIS hasn't opened yet, you know, it opens in June, with the application portal in there on ARIS being kind of more conducive to the residency application as med students go into residency. Our list of, you know, things that we've done on our resume, would y'all prefer it being, you know, there's that happy medium between listing everything and then just kind of combining everything into one kind of paragraph kind of deal, would y'all prefer more listed out or do y'all prefer more succinct or, I mean, I don't, you know, you don't want to pad your resume, but how do you get everything in succinctly without leaving things out, because sometimes it does get cramped on that portal? I think this is kind of what I was alluding to a little bit earlier, in the sense that you're going to be limited in how many experiences and how many things you can put. Now I forget the exact number, I think it might be a 10. Crystal, maybe you remember a little bit better, but like, yeah, it sounds like you guys are both shaking your heads, but, you know, it kind of depends. The key thing is you want to just put things that are meaningful that you can talk about. You don't want to fluff up your application per se. Like, there's things that, you know, we've all done in residency that is, you know, maybe you get a title for something, but maybe you don't do more than like a couple hours of work for this position or role, and in that sense, like, I wouldn't have that keep its own section. You know, if you're someone that has a ton of publications, a ton of coverage, a ton of stuff like that, things that, you know, I've seen people do as we're reviewing applications this year would be like, hey, this is like my coverage section, and I'm going to just dedicate one out of my 10 bullet items to just talk about all the different coverage I've done. But then there's some different folks that have, you know, done a lot of meaningful coverage with a specific team, maybe had a research project based off of that, so one of their bullet points might be their role with a specific team, the coverage, the training room, the research that they've done all associated with that team, and then maybe another kind of of the 10 is a different team kind of going off of that. I think, you know, being able to talk to everything that you list is going to be the most important thing, and again, it's kind of, I think Scott mentioned this a while back, but just the story that you're painting, right, like if you want to come across like a certain way, and I think Josh was talking about this too, right, like kind of think about how you want to be or like how you want to be practicing in a couple years, think about what kind of program you're looking for, and paint that picture, right. You may very well have like 15 things you could list instead of 10, but you can kind of pick pick what kind of picture you want to paint based on that. I can speak to what I did because I had to do the 10 items only for my application, and first of all, you asked about paragraph versus bullet point. I did do bullet points. I don't know what people prefer to read or not, but I felt like it was easier to quickly, when people are reading thousands of applications, that it's a little bit faster to get through. I, in terms of how I grouped things, mostly had it, so I went through my CV first of all, and I kind of looked at what was most important to me and most significantly impacted my journey and kind of spoke to my why that I was talking about earlier, and I think there was only like, I definitely clumped together my sports coverage experience and maybe one or two other things, but that's it, and if I did do that, I tried to provide very objective measures because it did significantly shorten how much you could, if you're trying to talk about multiple different coverage experiences under only one experience, it's very limiting how much you can say, so I tried to provide more objective measures in that case, so how many hours was I covering? Was it independent or was it with an attending? So I could hopefully capture that image a little bit more clearly for the, for the reviewer. Another opportunity not to forget about, too, is that three of the experiences you highlight as your top experiences, and that does give you a little bit more wiggle room to talk a little bit more on why those are the most meaningful experiences for you. I think it's only a sentence or two of additional space that you get, but it's definitely another opportunity to kind of let that experience shine a little bit more. I'll kind of throw one out there for also my own curiosity, but was there anyone on this call who did anything like specifically whether it was studying wise or otherwise to sort of prepare for starting sports fellowship. I did. I had elected time so I just tried to spend as much as possible with various people so with family meds, sports meds, sports medicine. And then just spent a lot of time practicing ultrasound and practicing the things that I wanted to be at least competent in day one. I also think the AMSSM and the APM&R have a lot of good resources in their like online education platform as well as like on the YouTube channel for AMSSM with tons of lectures that can help fill in a lot of the things that you may not have gotten from residency. I know every residency is going to have, you know, gaps in terms of, you know, a strong faculty here or some other faculty that they may not have so I think just trying to kind of come up with a list of things that you felt you might want to learn, and then just, you know, trying to come up with a study schedule to at least get yourself somewhat familiar with those things like you're going to have a whole year of fellowship but it's a quick year because there's a lot to learn and there's a lot of things you can kind of dive into. So at least getting some of the basic stuff down to feel more comfortable with what's good for me at least. I agree with all that I would say, you know, coming out as a, you know, PMR resident you're going to be fairly comfortable with most of the MSK stuff right and an MSK medicine is the vast majority of what you're going to do as a fellow. However, there's this big looming bubble of non MSK stuff is primary care stuff that, you know, I think we do some of, but not a lot of. And so, you know, maybe trying to do a refresher on the primary care portion of sports medicine is not a bad idea. I'm not going to endorse any books, but there are certain, you know, sports medicine review books that are out there, some that are pretty well known, and that do cover some of the non MSK portions of sports medicine and so I think that's probably pretty helpful to look at at least have an idea of, you know, how to generally manage some of these, again, non MSK sports illnesses and conditions I think that'll be helpful for you. Quick, quick aside, you know, my first day of fellowship. I did not do that. And so I came in and I was like, it's all MSK stuff and you know I'm just gonna, you know, I know how to diagnose these things. And I had an athlete that came in, had whatever a sore throat and I saw the patient and the attendee I work with said all right go evaluate. I did and I came back out and he said all right, can you present it. He's like, all right, you know, what's, you know, what do you think and I was like, well, you know, 30 or whatever 18 year old male comes in with sore throat. Anything else you want to add. Nope. All right, so what's your different diagnosis. sore throat. Any sort of ideology want to add. Nope, no idea. So I had no idea going in and probably pretty convenient to have an idea of, I don't know what causes pharyngitis, or even know the correct term for it, but I had no idea and so it would just be helpful for y'all. Yeah, I think just to echo that point, you know, I think that an important skill to develop both for sports fellowship and I think for practice in general I think is understanding your limitations and understanding the kind of knowledge gaps at the end of your knowledge and I think you know for me knowing just for where I trained I just knew that like some acute exposure to like fractures was something that I was not going to be as was like me so I was gonna be as exposed to and so anytime there was a fracture like in coverage or something like that I would try to be make sure I was part of that decision making process. I think something else that would be really helpful to is that the day you become a fellow, somehow there's like this bubble that comes around you and people think that now you're making these independent decisions like in on the sidelines or during coverage, and that can somewhat depend on what what level you're covering, but if you're covering like a smaller medical decisions on the sidelines. So I think as part of that, trying to be in situations in which you're making the decisions about an athlete returning to play, or going back to activity I think is going to be helpful. And so I think that anytime you can put yourself in a situation that you can be that person making that decision. Obviously that depends on what experiences are available to you, but I think that that would be one thing that I would, I would encourage. And I think that I tried to get exposure to, to more of the medical conditions, Dr. Cruz alluded to in terms of like covering marathons to get exposure to like hyponatremia, or exercise associated with hyponatremia. So I think that just trying to get exposure to some of this, this medical aspect of things. Because, again, as a fellow, there's going to be when you do training groups, there's going to be a lot of different things that you're going to be able to do. And so I think even just going through a training group, you're going to be able to do a lot of different things that you're not going to be able to do in a training group. And so I think that that's going to be helpful. Because, again, as a fellow, there's going to be when you do training room and other components, you don't know what's going to walk in the door. And maybe the majority of it's MSK, maybe you feel comfortable with that. But there's going to be a lot of other things that you're not comfortable with. And so I think even just going through that decision making process of how are you making these decisions independently in those settings is really helpful. Just to piggyback on that, I think one of the things that makes new fellows really nervous is just that, being on the sidelines alone. So if you can try to get some of the emergency situations on the sidelines down and, you know, what you should be doing, try to kind of read up on that stuff would be helpful. A lot of programs will have some days in the beginning where they're going to go through that stuff. So, you know, check in and see what you do have in terms of your education for the program. And that can help to kind of ease up some of that stress about getting started. And I'll mention specifically when you guys are starting your fellowship, it'll be around the time of a lot of PPEs, like pre-participation evals, which may or may not include ECG interpretation. So definitely get comfortable, not just with like ECG interpretation, but like elite athlete ECG interpretation because there's some subtle variations. So it would be like one objective thing that you could start working towards prior to the start of your fellowship. I had a question. Sorry to ask so many questions. Going to AMSSM and ACSM coming up, meeting some current fellows, some of y'all and so on and so forth. Do y'all prefer us send like a follow up email? I mean, I know the nature of the beast and, you know, I don't want to annoy y'all, but like, what did y'all do and what would y'all recommend now that y'all are on the other side kind of? Yeah, I can kind of speak to that one. I'm assuming you're saying like follow up emails to like after interviews, correct? Yeah, I started out by sending emails to almost everyone, but I kind of tailored them based on, you know, how interested I was, like whether I sent it more of a kind of general email versus not. I don't think I probably needed to do that necessarily. I think for sure if there's a program that you interview at that you're like, man, I think I'm probably going to rank them one, two or three. I think it's good to send a follow up email. Dr. Cruz, you can probably speak to if that makes any sort of difference whatsoever, but I think for me it just made me feel a little bit better and it was also nice when they responded to kind of get that feedback there. Yeah, I, I don't know. I'm not that old. I'm like Crystal thinks I'm sold, but I think that that thank you letters and follow up emails are really important, right? I think that anybody you meet or any interview you go on, I would say, you know, send them a follow up email, whether it's, you know, thanking them or hit the program and say no. And say you don't or you're not interested in pursuing, but, you know, I think it goes a long way. So, you know, we have our residents that apply for fellowship. You know, honestly, the ones that I get emails from afterwards and say, hey, you know, just reaching out. Thank you so much for what you did or whatever. And then the rest of your program, you know, we put kind of like a, like a flag on their application. Right. And they, hey, this person really wants to be here. You know, it certainly doesn't make or break their, you know, their fellowship application, but it certainly helps out. Right. And it certainly helps out. And if they're kind of on the border or whatnot, but we have that flight that says, man, this person, salvagely for us, loves Iowa. Right. They want to come to Iowa. They're, you know, whatever they, they're super interested, you know, that, that kind of helps out and that bumps them up. And, you know, I'm still, again, I'm of the cohort that says thank you letters for whatever are very important and very helpful. And again, especially for, you know, applications, I think a thank you email, don't write a letter. We're not, again, because I'm old crystal back when I did it, I wrote a little stupid letter, handwritten letter, which is not that long ago. Yeah, you have to do that. I think there's an email that says, hey, thank you so much. Love the program. I'm interested, whatever. And honestly, I think that's, you know, whether consciously or subconsciously very helpful for us when we are, you know, reviewing applications. So I would say, certainly do it. I agree with Dr. Cruz and the thing that also comes down to is that everybody knows each other and when you're looking for jobs later that email maybe something that somebody's like, oh yeah I remember they wrote me that email they liked our program, even though they went elsewhere. might want to try for a job here or why, you know, they may want to go to a job that's nearby and ask if we know something about it or, you know, just kind of building that network which is just general really important thing to do because it's a small field and you'll find that, you know, everybody kind of knows each other and connects to each other so Yes, Scott spot on. I agree completely. Yeah, I'll also speak to that last part even being only just now going into being a fellow and only having gone to am system, two years now, you realize just how small of a community is and how, and everyone knows everyone, I mean, even the people on this call like so many of them know each other super well and they're at very different institutions. So, you know, I agree with Dr. Cruz I think, like, what have you got to lose and you could have a lot to gain by kind of following up with those people whether you need them for fellowship, or later on, I think the fellowship process. While you're obviously applying to fellowship was also like an awesome networking opportunity for such a, you know, kind of small fields for to get to know these like really, you know, high up people in the field that you may want to get a job at that institution later on. So, Thanks. Well, we had one question in the chat. Michael was asking a majority of programs still doing virtual interviews. Since I'm unmuted and just interviewed I can kind of quick speak to that and then anyone else can fill in if needed but I probably had about a third of my interviews were in person. And I feel like I've heard rumblings from some of those programs that were virtual this year being in person next year so I would guess there may be more in person next year. Yeah, I would say most are in person. At this point, I think we've all moved on from the virtual we do virtual for a long time. We have moved on. So I think most everybody is in person. At this point. I'll throw out one or two more questions here and then if you guys don't have anything else we can end a little early. I'll throw out kind of like were there any specific questions that the people on the panel remember from their sports interviews that either they they kind of wish they would have prepared for more or they just kind of repeatedly got over and over. I can start off. I mean, definitely first and foremost was why this field why are you doing sports medicine. A lot of even more generally program started out with just tell me a little bit about yourself. I think a little bit different from residency interviews where it's a little bit more formal felt like overall the residency or the fellowship interviews were a little bit more laid back and truly just trying to get to know you as a person. Some of the other things that came up quite frequently. We're also trying to dig a little bit deeper about that why. So, knowing your top three things like the top three things that you're looking for in a program like Derek mentioned earlier, is something that would be really helpful to kind of reflect on before interview season. And then the other thing is where do you see yourself in five to 10 years. That one also came up quite, quite a bit. One thing when you are answering those questions too is to reflect as well on making sure that you have that story, and that those answers fit in into those stories. So let's say you want to be a pro sports team sideline physician and 10 years from now. Well then one of your top three experiences should probably mention your sideline experience, like kind of just making sure that those pieces are true to yourself get you those answers and make sense to your story, but just kind of reflecting on on that before jumping into interview season I think it's helpful. I think something else to think about as part of this too is not just what questions you're being asked but what questions are you asking. And I think that that's an actually a really important piece as an applicant, because one it shows that you've done your homework about that program, and you know you can imagine each programs going to have a varying amount of information on their website, or on information I sent you prior to the interview, and so I think that shows that you've done your homework from that perspective. Number two, I think it also allows you to then gain objective measures about what a programs offering you for so for example if somebody says, we do a lot of procedures, or we do a lot of thing x. Well, let's say, oh that last two fellows you've had the last few fellows like what is the average number of procedures or the average number of sporting events they cover like make put put some objectivity to it, because that shows that that actually is like they're, that's the way for that program to follow through what they're saying. So, you know, I think that sometimes if things are described in a vague terms that to me that was a little bit of a red flag, right, I was just caught my attention a little bit. And so I think that realize that that process is active on both ends, both in answering questions but then also offering questions as well. And so I think that again you don't want to just ask a question just to ask a question, but I would say, to really find information that you think is gonna be important for you to make a decision about is this program the right fit for you or not. And again that questions can be different for every person, but I think that showing that you've done your homework is really important as well. And the other thing to think about and we've all interviewed at various points and medical training at this point. interview to where you want it to go to a degree. So if they ask you a question like why you want to go into sports medicine answer, blah blah blah, but then this is why I did XYZ. And then if you think that's something cool that you want to talk about more than likely it would be a follow up question about that. So just kind of thinking about what your answer is going to be and kind of where you want the interview to go is something, something to think about as well. I think the other thing to add, and Josh may have said this and I missed it, but asking where prior fellows, where they are now and what they're doing. I think that's important. You can ask about some of these objective measures previously and whatnot, but I think asking where they are now I think really gives you a sense of what that program will set up their fellows to do. And there's no right or wrong answer right it depends on what you want to do. You know some programs you know most of their fellows are in, you know, community practice and that is perfectly fine if that's what you want to do. Some fellows from certain programs are doing, you know, high level academics, and so if that's what you want to do and that fellowship makes a lot of sense for you. You know, a lot of fellows from prior, you know, from certain fellowships are doing, you know, administrative or leadership sorry leadership roles within, you know, high level organizations and so if that's what you want to do that may that fellowship makes a lot of sense for you, or they're doing you know USOPC stuff or Olympic level stuff or professional stuff. And so I think asking what the prior fellows are currently doing. I think is a surrogate way to measure what that fellowship is setting their fellows up for, you know, for their future so I'd really harp on that. Yeah, I think one other kind of quick thing that I will add is, I think, one of our panelists made a good point is a lot of times they'll ask you what questions you have. I think this might have even been the case when I interviewed with Dr. Cruz but sometimes you'll just walk in the room and the faculty will just immediately ask you what questions do you have. So I think just making sure that you have some things prepared I know for me personally to I, I looked up the profiles of all of the people that I was interviewing with because they'll usually give you that at least a day or a couple days ahead of time. So that kind of just gave me something to talk about with those people and it was really cool to, you know, I saw that they had done a research project on something I was super interested in. And so it was really cool to kind of connect with that faculty member and also to get an idea of, you know, there's something that I would be able to get involved in with them while I was there as a fellow. Well don't tell my secrets. First of all, crystal. If you do any sort of research at all. It shows that you have any sort of, you know, desire to be at our program. And so you can ask even just a single question about something that that I do or that I'm interested in. And even if I don't like the rest of the interview the fact that you asked that and show that you have some interest in in me or the program. You're going to be ranked and pushed up higher than anybody else and so I think that is, that's an invaluable skill right there if you go into interview and just have your little, you know, your, your, your book that you wrote down you know some some specifics and all of us, you can ask us a question about what we do and what we bring to the program. I mean that that's going to bump up your, your, your interview and your application. So I mean that's an invaluable point. So, good point crystal. I think it's also important to think about interview style a little bit so some programs are going to be doing interviews so that they have a standardization so they may ask the same questions to every single applicant. So, just making sure that you have like your thoughts that are somewhat unique or somewhat kind of tell your story is really important because they're going to hear the same thing from a lot of people and that gives them the ability to kind of put you on to a scale of where you rank against other applicants. So think about how the programs asking it versus another program that may be more like an open question dialogue type of dial those are going to be different kinds of interviews. At the beginning of the interview trail you may feel a little bit overwhelmed by one style or the other but by the end you're going to have those stories and everything kind of really down so when you try to set up your interviews if there's ones that you really think you're interested in, you may want to not have them as the first interview you may want to wait a little bit, if you can, down the line, and just kind of anticipating some of those harder questions you'll come out in earlier interviews. Kind of spinning off that statement. When we schedule interview dates, if there's programs that we're really, you know, hoping to match at what y'all recommend scheduling interviews later and y'all's in the application cycle it doesn't really matter as long as you schedule an interview or. I think what Scott just said is spot on so in the first couple interviews way early in the game I think are good for. I don't like to say this but like practice interviews right to get an idea of what they're going to ask and how you're going to answer it I think that the the middle, like a third of the interview cycle is probably your sweet spot. And that's where you know your top programs I would, I would filter those into your middle third again front third practice middle third, where you're kind of going and feeling good about yourself. And then the last third, I would say, you know, not across the board, maybe some programs that are kind of your backups and whatnot. Not across the board, maybe some programs that are kind of your backups and whatnot, you know, I may try and prioritize those into the last third now certainly if dates don't work out and your new top programs have to filter into the first and last third and that's fine but when I talked to our fellows that's generally how I encourage them to set up their, their interviews. The other thing is that some of the your faculty might probably has a lot of experience with interviews. So if they offer to do like a mock interview or something like that. It's awkward, it's super super awkward, but I would take them up on it for sure. I can add one more thing in there. I think I had no idea, kind of the timeline, I guess I had a general idea I suppose from people like Derek ahead of me in terms of like when they were going to send out invites and when the interviews were going to actually be. It was a pretty like big timeline I suppose in terms of when they offered it out like it was definitely on a rolling basis. I think I got some of my first interview invites like early August and then I had kind of like a break for a couple weeks where I didn't get many until kind of mid September. So you just have to sort of, you know, fill them in the best you can. I think there were a couple places that I wasn't able to interview at because I, you know, had already taken other interviews that I, you know, felt to be a little bit more important. But in general I know for me interviewing wise I think my first interview was like the last week in September and then the last interview was like the first, second week in November. So it's really really jam packed in October there. So you just have to, you know, fill in the best you can. And if you know if possible try and put a program you don't think is going to be one of your, you know, maybe top five as one of your, you know, first couple interviews just to sort of, you know, practice as other panelists said. My second point is APM&R is usually in the fall of November time. And I found it very helpful because that's kind of when interviews are starting to teeter off. And when things will start to blend together in your head. So if there are programs that you have follow up questions about where you can't quite remember where things are starting to blend together and get confusing, and you do have the opportunity to go to APM&R, that's definitely an easy way to run into some of these people and ask questions if there's things that you want to follow up on. Just a thought. One other question or chat here. During the interview cycle if you haven't heard from a certain program you want to interview at would it be wise to send them an email or a letter of intent. It's not going to hurt. Right. I mean, I think it just it's it's fine to check in and see what's going on and see, you know, where their heads at or maybe they haven't gotten back or sent out, you know, interview invites so yeah I think if there's any question at all, you know, sending a follow up email is very reasonable. Cool, any other burning questions from anyone? If not, that's okay too. All right, cool. Well, thanks everyone for joining tonight. Hopefully you guys got a lot out of this. I believe that somehow you probably would be able to get my contact information. If not, you obviously have access to the kind of member community page where you can post stuff. I can put my email in the chat here as well though. If you wanna get in contact with anyone on our panel here, if you have any other further questions, I'm happy to answer them or get you connected to someone who could answer them. So thanks everyone for joining tonight again and thanks to our panelists for taking time out of their busy day.

sports medicine fellowship applications

interview preparation

career goals

motivations

interview questions

thank-you emails

networking opportunities

interview formats

APM&R conferences

professional conduct