Research, letters of recommendation, drive, ambition… If you are interested in applying to REI fellowships, this episode of Inside Reproductive Health is for you. Griffin sits down with Dr. Jaimin Shah to discuss what it takes to land at the top of the applicant pile.
Listen to hear:
Dr. Shah’s tips to those interested in entering the REI field.
What REI fellowships are actually looking for in an applicant.
What Dr. Shah did to secure upwards of 30 acceptance invitations to interview for fellowships.
What you can do to stand out as an applicant, and when you should begin preparing.
Dr. Shah’s info:
Website: https://www.shadygrovefertility.com/
LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/jaiminshahrei
Transcript
Griffin Jones 00:00
If you're a regular listener to inside reproductive health, this might not be the episode for you. This is for those who are not yet in our field because we sometimes get people that are still in residency, maybe sometimes still in medical school, they're looking into the field, because they want to come work in your field, and they use this podcast as a resource. So I took advantage of that with Dr. Jamin. Shaw. This episode is really for OBGYN residents who are applying to REI fellowship or maybe to some med students that are going into residency but know that they want to sub specialize or at least strongly feel about it. For those of you that are in the field, I'm going to do a different interview with Dr. Shah about how to attract those candidates that you want. But this is for those folks that are doing the applying and if that's you, but I've talked about what Dr. Shaw is how you find your mentor, the difference between senior and junior mentorships a delineation that Dr. Shah used that I wish I had used in different aspects of my life, how to attract those mentors or how to reach out to them. We talk about what kind of networking OBGYN residents need to do we talk about what the average candidate looks like to REI programs we talk about the importance of offside rotations is a competitive advantage. And speaking of how to candidates look to REI programs, we break candidates into three different tiers based on the amount of research that they've done. And Dr. Shaw gives us numbers of first author publications that make sense for each tier, Dr. Shah applied to over 40 programs, he got interview offers from at least 30 of them, he went on 18 interviews, and he got his second choice. And this is a really competitive field. So I hope you take advantage of these tips. And if you are to join this field, welcome. I hope you enjoy this conversation with Dr. James Shaw, Dr. Shah Jamin. Welcome to Inside reproductive health.
Dr. Jaimin Shah 02:06
Thank you for having me today, Griffin,
Griffin Jones 02:06
it's good to have you on because we became friends from you listening to the show, and then us corresponding and then we got to meet in person. And that was probably a couple years ago that it started. And now I consider you a friend. And it's cool to have you on to do a topic for an audience that normally isn't a part of our audience. But I still find some of those folks. So a lot of times we're not covering content for residents, we talked to REI fellows a lot, but have not really created anything further up the channel for those folks that are considering going into Rei. And I want to take advantage of your experience to have that for that little audience, invite those folks that aren't even in this world yet. And talk about what they need to know to make them more attractive for getting into the REI fellowship program that they want to so can you give us a little bit of context of your self and what your process was like? And then I'm just going to give you more specific questions.
Dr. Jaimin Shah 03:11
Oh, thank You that mean, it's great to you know, broaden the audience. I think the REI potential, you know, the residents that are potential interested in Rei fellowship are obviously the seeds to make our field grow. So I think trying to reach that group is important. But I you know, I came from UT Houston, OBGYN residency, so it was not affiliated with an REI program. And learning that process from a resident perspective. And working with various mentors was was key to my success in matching into Rei fellowship. So I do have a couple of tips. You know, I wanted to share with other potential residents interested in the REI field.
Griffin Jones 03:54
How early did you start? Because it seems to me that some people know that they want a sub specialize even before they go to medical school, and then other people don't know until well into residency. When did you start the process of deciding this is something that I'm going to move on to do?
Dr. Jaimin Shah 04:13
Well, to be honest, I was doing quite a bit of research when I was a medical student because I stayed the same medical school program and to residency. So I was doing lots of research in GYN oncology. Actually, that's I thought the route I was going to be taken until I pivoted during my intern year. So I started pretty early on doing the research. And that's one thing I'll touch on later in the episode is that starting on any kind of research is important early on, even if you think you might have an inkling that you might want to do any sort of fellowship.
Griffin Jones 04:41
So what was the first research that you did? What did that look like?
Dr. Jaimin Shah 04:45
I mean, I started as a first and second year, medical students doing Emergency Medicine Research. And then because that was one of my initial interests, and then I kind of slowly pivoted into women's health into OB GYN and doing GYN oncology research with MD Anderson. And then that slowly pivoted into when I was an intern transitioning to more fertility preservation, and then trying to broaden my horizon onto other different Rei topics, in addition to I was also contributing on MFM research because we had a robust mmm department. What
Griffin Jones 05:20
are Rei fellowship programs looking for in your view? Well, what
Dr. Jaimin Shah 05:24
they're looking for is, first of all, a well rounded applicant with research experience, I think research is a big part of what they looking for what your prior experience was, even if it was Rei research, or non REO research, trying to find someone with a passion to learn you research techniques and interviewed research projects early on. Also having an applicant with good letters of recommendation from REI and non Rei mentors, who can speak on behalf of their abilities, and speak on their experience of working with that specific resident. And then most importantly, obviously, trying to find a hard working resident who could be a good fit for their fellowship, who could flourish and utilize all the resources that would be available in that fellowship program.
Griffin Jones 06:11
There are how many Rei fellowship programs 4044 Do you know the exact number?
Dr. Jaimin Shah 06:16
I don't know the exact number. I feel like it can range between 40 and 50. I think my year there was like 41, because there was, you know, handful programs that took internal candidates. And I think it varies from year to year. But I think that's a general ballpark of about 40 to 48 or so.
Griffin Jones 06:29
however many there were your year you applied to all of them why?
Dr. Jaimin Shah 06:36
I think as an applicant, obviously I had, I wasn't limited by geographic constraint. So I wanted to kind of put my hat in the ring for all all programs, right, I think it's always better to try to apply to all programs early on, versus trying to add programs later down the line. Because you know, programs are going to be reviewing applications from the get go. And so trying to be in the front of the line is is important, I think,
Griffin Jones 07:02
did you make that known to the programs that you were applying to?
Dr. Jaimin Shah 07:08
No, I mean, I just applied to all of them, right? You submit the application, it's one application, you have your letters of recommendation and the kind of the portal, and you can you can submit to All Programs and then see if they would be interested in offering you in an interview spot.
Griffin Jones 07:23
And you got quite a few you got 30 interview offers, or about that out of low 40s. However many it would have been, what do you think that you did to get that many interview offers?
Dr. Jaimin Shah 07:38
I think someone told me early on was from a research perspective, you know, there's different, there's different tiers. As far as kind of the number of publications you can have there, you know, most, most resin applicant applicants will kind of have one or two first author papers, I think the next tier might have three to four. And I think in the top tier of, of applicants might be you know, five first author publications in addition to other research that you've contributed on. So I think that is one yet you kind of have direct control about as a resident. So if you were in that category, you could potentially stand out a little bit more compared to other applicants. Someone told me that early on. So then I took that to heart and said, You know what, I want to try to be that top tier and, and tried to work very hard to get into a lot of research out and learn the process. And in that I think that was one thing that did stand out my application.
Griffin Jones 08:29
Sounds like you did because if I have my notes, right, you did 10 first author publications while you're a resident. Yes. And our tiers were so the third tier is what one or two, you said,
Dr. Jaimin Shah 08:42
I think the third tier would be kind of five plus?
Griffin Jones 08:46
Well, you and I are going backwards. Third, bottom one, bottom one is one or two, I would say So on average, and middle is three or four. Correct? And then the top tier is five plus. So you were like I'm gonna comfortably set up in this top tier here. When did you start on that? The very beginning of residency,
Dr. Jaimin Shah 09:12
like I said, I had some projects I was working on as a fourth year medical student that were more Juhan oncology specific. And then kind of pivoted into kind of fertility preservation, and then more into Rei based projects. So I started I would say fourth year medical school and then really going in, in my intern year, my first year residency.
Griffin Jones 09:33
So if you want to be in the top tier for the number of first author publications we're referring to, you have to start pretty early. In your case you started even before residency, is it too late by the end of residency
Dr. Jaimin Shah 09:49
by the end of residency is too late because obviously you'd be graduating. You can continue after residency, but you're going to be applying for Rei fellowship during your third year of residency. So, it's really good to know if you have an inkling to do any sort of fellowship. And that's what important to start on any kind of research early on and your residency training. And even if you pivot to another subspecialty, like I did, it's still show that I saw I, you know, developed a project, you know, created, developed it, collected data, presenting at a conference and then published it. And so it kind of shows fellowship program directors that okay, this applicant, you know, created a project with a mentor, saw it through, presented it and published it, right, it shows that that that resident applicant is capable of learning research and doing research, and you have to understand that certain constraints, but certain programs may or may not have as many resources, like an REI division or not.
Griffin Jones 10:49
So you did that, and it made you attractive enough to at least 30 programs to offer you an interview. Is there other things that you think other than the research that you authored that made you invited to those interviews?
Dr. Jaimin Shah 11:11
Yeah, I mean, it's more of a general, you know, I think there's six other points that I think you know, apply apply to my case, but more broadly, would be trying to find good mentors, junior and senior mentors, considering away rotations, making sure that you're networking as much as possible throughout your residency career, utilizing your available resources, you know, thinking about different Wow factors that you might have in your prior experience. And then there's, I think the other component is criado scores.
Griffin Jones 11:43
Let's talk about the network and for a minute, because there are some conferences in our field that are very fellows heavy, but residents sometimes go there for whatever, maybe they work on a paper and they get to submit their abstracts, somebody sponsors them, they get a scholarship, some, some kind. And I have talked to a couple of those people, and they're not totally sure if they even want to sub specialize in reo. Let's pretend they're a first or a second year resident. And somehow they get to one of these conferences. I know people who said you can't go to PCRs or whatever. Some other conference, if you're a first year resident, you can I've seen them there. So they're there sometimes. But so let's say they're early on in residency, what should be they be doing to network there, if they find themselves in one of these conferences,
Dr. Jaimin Shah 12:32
I think beforehand, trying to reach out monks, other local fellows in respective programs and trying to get to know them get their numbers, that's what I did. And some of those fellows kind of took me in there under the wings and introduced me to people. I was picking their brains about how they went about it. You know, they introduced me to their mentors. So I will basically trying to talk to as many people as I could to learn their experience, how could they help me? Or how could you know, they give me some advice to make sure further my agenda, making sure I, you know, successfully match into Rei fellowship.
Griffin Jones 13:06
How did you decide upon which mentors, you wanted to mentor you?
Dr. Jaimin Shah 13:11
Through your question? So I had Junior mentors and senior mentors. So Junior mentors, I would say, our fellows, you know, I had yield Chappell. He was Baylor fellow, and I reached out to him and a bunch of fellows. And he kind of took me under his wing, and it was great to kind of get his experience and get his advice. And so I worked on some projects with him, right, so he was more of my, my Junior mentor, you know, senior mentors, you know, we had some affiliations and some private practices. And that was just me networking, reaching out to different programs, you know, Baylor and other private physicians and trying to find positions that might be willing to take on a resident on a certain project, and then really kind of diving into learning more about their experience and kind of how I can better myself as an applicant.
Griffin Jones 14:03
Earlier in my career, I was really obsessed with learning how to acquire mentors, I find that as you advance in your career, and you get better, it's actually easier to acquire mentors, because you sometimes just start doing business with them, or you have similar interests. And so you can acquire mentors a little bit more readily. But in the beginning of my career, I had to be really intentional about it. And I never thought in terms of junior and senior mentors, where did you come up with that framework?
Dr. Jaimin Shah 14:37
It was something I just learned along the ways because you'll get advice from two different people. And they could be doing the same exact thing but one is a little bit more senior and one's a little more junior, and I think they're closer to the experience of REI fellowship. And I needed to get that advice and input of directly have over these next one to two years that are going to be critical to my success of the In Rei fellowship, how did they do it? What suggestions do they have? For me? What did didn't work for them? What did you wish you knew? Right? So those are all the questions I was asking you a lot of REI fellows. And they have that. That direct insight because they're loved. They're living in that process recently versus someone who might be 10 or 15 years out and just a little bit different of how they came about that process.
Griffin Jones 15:23
I think you are smart to not view each of those as mutually exclusive. Like, I struggled for a long time thinking about this for financial advisors, because I look at a lot of the younger financial advisors and like, well, they don't have the experience, they never actually really built wealth, because in order to build wealth, it has to stand the test of time, there's got to be decades, but then I worry about some of the older financial advisors if they are leaving things on the table, ignoring some of the new technologies, the new types of trading the new types of asset classes and everything else. And I always kind of viewed it as it had to be one or the other. And I think you more wisely said no, I've there's two different classes, and I want each of them. Correct. For those that were more senior, how did you approach them?
Dr. Jaimin Shah 16:16
You know, we were affiliated with the private Rei group. And I knew that constraints to that in the sense that, you know, the private clinicians, they don't have as much dedicated time to education and to reach out to residents. So I kind of reached out to different Baylor faculty reached out to other other private clinicians, I literally emailed and called different problems in the city of Houston to figure out who could pick me on as a resident for research and then kind of use that as a as a segue into kind of trying to pick their brain and and trying to see if they could be a mentor for me,
Griffin Jones 16:50
picking up the phone and calling the office.
Dr. Jaimin Shah 16:53
Yep, sometimes if they didn't respond via email, then I reached out to the next source and saying, Hey, can I get in touch with his doctor? I'm a resident in the local area interested in in talking to them? And that's what I did for a lot of programs around the city.
Griffin Jones 17:07
How often did it work?
Dr. Jaimin Shah 17:07
Most times it usually worked.
Griffin Jones 17:11
Were you nervous about being perceived as a salesman? Or does the distinction that you offer really quickly, hey, I'm a resident, did that help?
Dr. Jaimin Shah 17:21
I think it helped when they said, when I said I was resident, and it was one of those things that I learned very early on in my career, the worst that someone can say is no. And so it's okay. If someone said no, or didn't call back or didn't reply back to email, then I just tried to the next one. One
Griffin Jones 17:35
of the other tips that you gave, in addition to networking was and mentors was offsite rotation, something more about that?
Dr. Jaimin Shah 17:46
Yeah, so I did an away rotation. And I use that as a strategy to learn more and go to a different program for a month to, you know, continue to work on research, and to also try to find a good mentor that could you know, write a good letter recommendation, in addition to getting great experience. You know, I came from a non Rei I didn't have an REI division, for as far as the fellowship goes. So I was trying to utilize doing an away rotation as another way to kind of think outside the box of how to make my application a little stronger. And that was one idea that a previous resident had done before. And I kind of utilize that as a great idea to try to do an away rotation. And it was a great experience. I learned a lot. And now I got kind of a lifelong mentor, wanting the process,
Griffin Jones 18:42
like how much do you have to do to do in a way rotation? Do you have to go through your program? Can you submit that to your own program? Hey, are these other places that I would like to rotate into how does that work?
Dr. Jaimin Shah 18:55
Well, first, you have this makes sure that your residency program allows and has the ability to do a one month rotation, luckily, my program had the ability to give me that opportunity. And then I talked to you know, the different Rei clinicians in town who maybe had some suggestions and some insight and some programs, and that's kind of how I use that route. And they kind of put me in touch with that mentor at that institution, and then connected me via email, and they agreed to take me on and that's kind of how that process started.
Griffin Jones 19:26
So not every residency program allows for rotations. Yeah, I think it just depends on the curriculum. And then does it also vary, per programs curriculum, what types of institutions that you can do that rotate? Does it have to be an REI division within an academic system? Can it be at a private practice? What's that like?
Dr. Jaimin Shah 19:50
I think it's kind of enlist as far as the the kind of the different type of programs you can go to. I wanted to go to a program that had an REI division. Um, that was more academic affiliated, just because of thinking about a potential mentor who could, you know, write you a good letter recommendation? You know, that's something you have to take into consideration as well.
Griffin Jones 20:13
What tips do you have for applicants as they're going into the interview?
Dr. Jaimin Shah 20:20
As they're going into the interview? You know, I think you want to create a list of questions that you want to ask all programs, I would recommend asking the same question to multiple people during the interview process to see if you get the same answer. In try to think about, and I would recommend talking to it and current Rei fell, it helped create some of these questions for you. You know, I have a list of them, too, that I created with a bunch of different Rei fellows that they felt were important to ask about numbers and about hours and about monitoring and basic things you might not think to ask. So I would ask a lot of the same questions to most people to interview to see if I got similar same responses or different responses. And that was kind of a telltale sign if there was, there was some discrepancy. And another thing that I found very helpful going in the interview process was to make a real time rank list. You go through the process, and a lot of programs blend, like, okay, every program, most programs are really good, they're going to get you a great education. But you really got to find calm and try to find, look at the fine details. And that can get very blended when you go on multiple interviews. And so I would, I would jot down notes, and mainly when I left when I was in the car or in the lobby, and just
Griffin Jones 21:42
want to make sure physically, when you say a real time rank list, you're talking about physically, not just up in your head, you're you're noting it out,
Dr. Jaimin Shah 21:49
I had notes on my phone, and I would I'd started ranking programs, because it was one of those things that you want to trust your gut, as far as kind of what what did that program really make you feel good? Did you feel good fit? Did you feel welcomed, etc. So I would go before I left the premises, I would jot down notes of the things that stood out to me things I liked, didn't like things I need follow up questions on right because was fresh in my mind. And then I would go to my next tab and go put my rank list together. And I literally had a running rank list. And it was the best thing because by interview 10 or 12, they really started blending it together like Did they do monitoring? How many retrievals? Did they do? Did the fellows do transfers, like do have to take call or like what's the call structure, like you know how many faculty like those little things are very hard to remember. And it's very hard to go back. And so that was one thing that I learned from someone that and I was it was a blessing. Because if I didn't do that, it'd been very hard to really comb through some of those details. So that was also really helpful. And the other tip was, pick the program, you think you're going to be the happiest app, don't pick the program that you think that you need to be at. I think now going into the REI fellowship, this is kind of hopefully the last stop for you. You want to pick a program that you think you're going to excel at, that you're going to be happy at. And that was one of the biggest things that I took away from that is don't necessarily assess the interviews as a way for you to make your rank list. Because to be honest, most interviews are pretty relaxed. They're very conversational. And you think honestly, every interview goes well, at least how I felt in the REI fellowship realm, because everyone is very happy. They feel that the conversations are very nice. So it's really hard to tease out a, a pleasant interview experience versus Do they really liked me, because to be honest, I bet they are like that with pretty much most applicants, because that's just the general nature of the field. And so I think that's where you got to trust your gut and pick the person that you're, you think you're gonna be the happiest set and not the other way around.
Griffin Jones 23:58
So when you say pick by where you think you can be the most happiest you're saying as opposed to where you think, as opposed to thinking based on how they're ranking you?
Dr. Jaimin Shah 24:09
Correct? Because it's a rank system, right? So it's supposed to be in favor of the applicants. So I think you have the trust of where you think you've been happiest. And it's all going to work out in the end. And it does when you talk to most of my other friends and colleagues around the country. It all works out kind of how you make the rank list.
Griffin Jones 24:28
In your real time rank list. Did you put those different factors that you have in one kind of general note section? Or did you have very specific criteria in different columns of your rank list so that you made sure that you were comparing each of the programs on similar criteria? It's a great,
Dr. Jaimin Shah 24:48
great, great question. So I actually made a note section and I kind of had my free hand notes for every program. And then it was actually my my wife's idea to make Have a an Excel list and do exactly what you said kind of put surgical volume, number of embryo transfers, geographic and certain geographic location, you know, call structure, research opportunities, and put some of those. So I could actually rank each program for those specific categories. And that was actually really helpful to look at my first rank list and then look at my final rank list. And it actually turned out to be very similar in the end, but it was a good exercise to go through it. To really look at some of the nuances to the interview process.
Griffin Jones 25:36
When you say that it was similar your first rank list and your final rank list. You mean, before you ever went on the interviews, you
Dr. Jaimin Shah 25:44
should rephrase that. It's actually when I finish the interviews, and like my running rank list, compared to my final rank list, after looking at my kind of Excel file that I went through,
Griffin Jones 25:55
how long did you take to digest from you've finished your last interview, you've got your running rank list versus, okay, now I have to make my final decision. How long did you give yourself?
Dr. Jaimin Shah 26:07
I had a few weeks. And I kind of after my last interview, I gave myself a good four or five day just pause, just to kind of process and digest and just kind of reflect and then went back to the list. And back to the criteria to help me rank
Griffin Jones 26:26
for the running list, did you you're going into interview number eight, you walk out of there, and you're like, Okay, I think that they're number three, and so you just put them at the number three spot? Was it in real time like that? Yep, exactly. Did that skew your perception in any way of thinking? Like, okay, now I have to? Well, you know, I've already got these eight. And I feel so strongly because this one has been number one since the third week. Did that? Does that skew your perception in any way?
Dr. Jaimin Shah 27:01
No, it kind of just, it kind of really, when you have a couple good, you know, three or four poems that you really liked? It'd be very hard to choose from. Right? Those are a good comparison, when you go into a new interview, as far as well, I like this about that. I can do transfers, and I can do as many retrievals as a fellow. Right. I think that's a really good thing. Right? So that was really a thing that was important to me. And so when I heard about oh, yeah, you would get to do 10 transfers across the whole fellowship and union, you get limited experience in retrievals, or things like that, right, like, so those are things that you had a benchmark of saying, Well, this is where I've heard a programmer would allow me to do such things, or I would have this access to this research opportunities that this program doesn't have. And you can internally figure out when you go out the interview process, what you value and don't value for your future education.
Griffin Jones 27:47
Do you remember the criteria that you had, in your real time list what you said, I think cycle volume or a number of transfers, what were the criteria as far as you can remember,
Dr. Jaimin Shah 28:00
procedures, that was definitely one one big one, looking at transfers, retrievals. Looking at the your research opportunities, what have prior fellows done, I wanted to get really into like, prospective and randomized controlled trials, I wanted to go to a center that would give me the ability to do that as a fellow versus just retrospective studies, I wanted to have the ability to do translational research, wanted a program that had you know, you know, decent surgical volume, not heavy surgical volume, but not very low coming something in the middle. I wanted to have the ability to have my own fellows clinic, where I was the attending and I had supervision but I was the one making the decision because I think that's really important. I think geography was also a factor lower factor. I had a wife category in there as well, my wife had to say for my partner had to say cuz you know, happy wife happy life, right. So that was also an important factor in that as well of where she might want to go where opportunities would be good for her. So that was another piece. I think those are the some that kind of come to mind.
Griffin Jones 29:08
Many of those things are an individual's preferences. Are there some things that you think are must haves or should be must haves, regardless of someone's preferences? So the amount of clinical work or if there's a fellows clinic, where they can be attending or if they, what kinds of research opportunities are available? A lot of that will have to do with someone's preferences, but are there a few things that you feel should be in everybody's must have list and if so, what are they?
Dr. Jaimin Shah 29:41
I think procedures as a fellow is key. It's a small thing in some people's eyes, but I think it's a big thing. In most people's eyes. I think there's a lot of buzz about transfers and retrievals I think that's definitely up there. The ability to do other ancillary procedures HFCs water ultrasounds, just being able to do lots of hands on procedure and surgical Other things that are important. And I think the fellows clinic of really getting a robust clinical experience not just working with other attendings, but actually having your own true clinic, where you're kind of running the show, I think is really important. I think those are the two main things. Because you know, every program is going to have research, just different facets of research.
Griffin Jones 30:23
How common is that or not, is that to have a fellows clinic where you're the attending,
Dr. Jaimin Shah 30:29
I felt like half the programs kind of had it to some extent. But, you know, the program I ended match now was kind of at a true fellows clinic, where you're running, you're running everything you have is assigned team, you have nurses, you have financial counselors, right, that are kind of assisting and doing those things. And then you obviously have attending supervision to some extent, but it was really kind of my own clinic that with my own patients that they were booking under my name. And I think that was a great, really great experiences as a fellow that really have the autonomy to make those decisions, cycle my own patients. And that taught me a lot.
Griffin Jones 31:05
So you were talking with other folks that were also applying to fellowship, and you gave the advice to ask the same question of multiple people in a program. And you you rattled off a few of those questions, just making a different point. What were some of those questions that you made sure that you asked every person in any any given program?
Dr. Jaimin Shah 31:29
It's kind of touching the same stuff, you know, the research experiences, what? You know, what have prior fellows done? Are there any limitations on what I could do as a research research perspective? Could I do randomized control trials? Can I do prospective trial? Has that been done before? Understanding the numbers, When can I start doing procedures when we start getting that experience? Asking about, you know, the call structure understanding? You know, will you have moonlighting opportunities, you know, understanding that call structure, I think is important. Understanding the structure of the program, certain programs are structured differently, do research or new clinical first, understanding some what flexibility may have in that you understand if you want to do other electives that you might have an interest in. I think that's also important to ask, too. What is the average
Griffin Jones 32:19
candidate look like? In your view, and I'm going on a bit of an assumption that you are, we're not an average candidate, and didn't appear as an average candidate to most of the programs, because you had done a lot of research, you've thought a lot about the and by research, I mean, research into different kinds of fellowship programs, but also what you authored as the President having 10 first author, publications, having four other papers that you contribute into that being at least double what we would consider the basement for top tier here. You don't have to be humble about this, I actually want to know, what do you think the average candidate looks like to in the eyes of pro work programs,
Dr. Jaimin Shah 33:04
and being on from the applicant side, and then being done on, you know, the fellowship standpoint, to kind of see kind of the trend of applicants, I think the average candidate, you know, would have one or two first authored papers with being on maybe two other papers that they contributed a second or third author. I think most applicants would have at least one national Rei conference presentation, either poster or oral presentation, a lot have more. And then coming in with at least one or two very strong letters of recommendation within the REI community,
Griffin Jones 33:44
Jim anniversary a lot. And you've given us a lot on how to select a mentor, how to approach a mentor, how to network, how to think about getting other opportunities, if there isn't the rotation that you want through your program, how to think about getting started on research? How would you like to conclude with this audience that I haven't created that much content for in the past, but these are the folks that are either going to be your colleagues or not in the next couple of years, but they might be your peers, and they're making that decision? Now? How do you want to conclude with them?
Dr. Jaimin Shah 34:24
Find good mentors early. Don't be afraid to reach out and kind of extend yourself. The worst that someone can say is no, move on to the next. Work hard to organize your research projects early on, present at national meetings, and carry through at the end and publish that paper. So truly try to get a few first author publications and get on a couple other projects with other colleagues and establish connections, build connections, learn from the junior and senior mentors that you have within your program or in your local area. And I think the most important thing is be a great resident and be a team player. I think that really helps you develop as a resident and then hopefully develop as a great fellow.
Griffin Jones 35:06
And I think you are both. And you're also a great guest to have on for us to give some generous counsel for those that are thinking about this step. And hopefully many of them will consider it because we love adding to the number of good areas in this field and the field has nothing but upward to go. So I appreciate you coming on to cover the topic. Thanks for having me.
35:34
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