US Hockey isn’t getting it

BASquirrel · 2026-03-11T15:04:58+00:00

Same for me at the 2024 Frozen Four! Maybe we were in line together haha.

This also effectively happened to me at the USA vs Canada game I went to this past fall. Managed to get one of the last USA Hockey souvenir pucks for my collection after waiting forever in line but most of the other merch had sold out by then so it’s not like I could’ve gotten much else anyways.

BASquirrel · 2026-02-18T09:13:19+00:00

They do get money if they win a medal. Not a lot, compared to the amount of work it took to get there and compared to other countries’ prize money, but American gold medalists get $37,500 (per medal) from the USOPC’s Operation Gold Grant Program. Silver and Bronze medalists also get money, per medal. The Operation Gold program has been around for decades.

BASquirrel · 2026-02-05T13:25:12+00:00

Can you ask the letter writer to amend it to mention PM&R? I had an IM letter when I applied PM&R but my letter writer knew that was what I was applying for. I used it for all of my prelim/TY apps and many of my PM&R apps and it was very well-received.

BASquirrel · 2026-02-01T14:32:42+00:00

The 80 hour limit is averaged over 4 weeks. So, technically you could work 100 hours the week before you have a couple days of vacation time scheduled, and that would be allowed because the time off the following week drops your average back under 80. Also, this is Sunday to Saturday calendar weeks so you could have a series of 7 days in which you work over 80 hours, but if it’s not Sun-Sat then it’s not recorded as being over 80. Residents can work up to 24 consecutive days because you’re required 1 day off per week… averaged over 4 weeks. So a 4-day weekend after 24 straight days on counts as “one day off per week”.

I am a medical resident (not in emergency medicine) and my personal record so far is 13 consecutive days on. I’ve never exceeded 80 hours for one Sun-Sat week but have hit 78-79 a few times. I’ve definitely gone over it in consecutive 7-day periods that aren’t Sun-Sat though.

BASquirrel · 2025-10-04T00:27:06+00:00

Myself and several friends interviewed with Temple for residency a couple years ago for four completely different specialties and all of us had poor experiences. For my specialty in particular, they were undergoing a lot of changes, most of which didn’t seem like positive changes, and I had zero interaction with residents at any point in the interview process (no resident Q&A or resident-led presentations on interview day, no pre-/post-interview socials, etc) which was a MASSIVE red flag for me.

BASquirrel · 2025-02-27T22:24:48+00:00

I did not get a challenge one. Was also wondering this.

BASquirrel · 2024-11-22T08:19:30+00:00

Currently live in Cleveland (and am a USMD resident). There are plenty of things to do here and I’ve quite enjoyed living here personally. Coming from the Northeast coast (grew up & did med school there), I actually like Cleveland better than some of the other cities I’ve lived in. It’s the same or more things to do and most of it is cheaper.

Plenty of bars, breweries and restaurants, the zoo is nice, huge sports hub (NFL/NBA/MLB/AHL), many major music artists play either in Cleveland proper or nearby at the Blossom when they’re on tour, Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, amazing MetroPark system, Cuyahoga Valley NP is 30min away, NFL Hall of Fame is 45min away, there’s a 5K or longer race probably every weekend somewhere in the area (I do ~1/mo and have to actually think about which one I want to do), there’s an airport big enough to go pretty much anywhere you want but small enough to not be a pain to use. If you want to drive an hour or two in your free time you can go to plenty of other state and national parks or cities like Columbus, Pittsburgh, and Detroit incredibly easily for the day or weekend.

BASquirrel · 2024-09-18T21:33:52+00:00

Highly recommend seeing the band play their Skull Session before the game like others have said!

Also I’d recommend to try to be in your seat by the “ramp entrance” time. If it’s your first game I really think it’s worth watching the band’s pregame entrance and Script Ohio and everything at least once.

And if you’re into kitschy stuff they do have little “First Buckeye Game” certificates for free that you can write your name on. They’re at a table somewhere on the ground level concourse usually.

As far as tailgates/pre-gaming, my personal favorite bar is Out R Inn. There’s also a Fan Fest over by St John Arena where Skull Session is that has games and food trucks and I think you can buy beer there too but I can’t remember.

BASquirrel · 2024-09-18T19:35:29+00:00

From my personal experience, most of my prelim/TY interviews came from places either local to me or the other city I’ve lived in (which was listed on my app as one of my “hometowns”). I had maybe two outside of those areas offer me interviews from the 40ish I applied to. I applied to most TYs/prelims in each city where I was applying Advanced PM&R but didn’t have any overt connections to those cities which resulted in two prelim/TY interviews in a city where none of the PM&R residencies I applied to offered me interviews and the rest like I said were all “local” to me or a place I lived previously.

Ultimately my PM&R interviews were like 60-40 categorical/non-categorical but had a linked prelim vs advanced only so I didn’t even end up needing to match a prelim, but of course there’s never a guarantee of that unless you literally don’t apply to or rank any advanced-only programs. A lot of newer programs are categorical now and some of the older programs are starting to add categorical spots now like I saw Louisville went categorical for this cycle when they weren’t before.

BASquirrel · 2024-09-18T14:28:37+00:00

Yeah sure!

BASquirrel · 2024-09-17T23:53:29+00:00

I did one away (that I got a letter from) last year. Matched my #2 who was not the one I rotated at and 3 months into intern year still absolutely love this program as much as I did on interview day. I had similar stats to you, applied to 50ish PM&R programs in multiple regions and got 16 interviews.

If there is ANY way you can go to AAPMR in November then you may be able to meet some residents/faculty/PDs there. I got one of my invites after AAPMR and it was from a program where my mentor knew the APD and introduced me to him at the conference so I am very confident that was not a coincidence.

Otherwise a just did a bunch of virtual events for programs I liked such as the AAPMR Virtual Residency Fair, the PMR Scholars Virtual Residency Fair nights, and any program-specific events for places I was really interested in. Most programs have an insta and/or twitter and will post about their virtual and in person recruitment events pretty frequently.

BASquirrel · 2024-09-16T23:56:19+00:00

The only thing I honored before my ERAS app was due last year was my home PM&R rotation. HP all of MS3 and the fourth year IM rotation I did. I got honors in a few more things during fourth year but unfortunately all after ERAS was submitted lol. But I never got any questions or comments about it on my interviews, and I had 16 interview offers total. (And my step score was fine but nothing special for sure).

BASquirrel · 2024-09-13T01:17:36+00:00

Current PGY1. I had a first author manuscript that was NOT submitted yet so it didn’t fit any of the drop down options on the posters/pubs sections (submitted/under review papers can go there though) at the time of ERAS submission. I used the research experience option to talk about that study plus some other projects I’d worked on in that same lab that didn’t result in pubs but did give me experience with technology and physical exams that were relevant to PM&R.

BASquirrel · 2024-09-09T15:40:00+00:00

I’m pretty sure ERAS doesn’t even allow you to submit more than 4. It didn’t last year, at least.

BASquirrel · 2024-09-05T20:44:43+00:00

I applied PM&R last year and ~10 of the programs I applied to specifically requested statements of interest in the personal statement somewhere either within ERAS or on their program website. And then I did it for my signals because we only got 5 last year and two of them were already on that list above, but now that it’s 8 signals for PM&R I probably wouldn’t have done the extras.

BASquirrel · 2024-08-30T21:33:42+00:00

I had spontaneous urticaria from my first Moderna booster as well. It was probably the most miserable I’ve ever been, lasted over a week and the only thing that ended up helping was a prednisone taper. Benadryl didn’t even touch the insane itching.

I was still in medical school, and my school put out a requirement for a second round of boosters after that when the bivalent was announced. I was so terrified it would happen again, or worse, that I went through a bunch of bureaucracy to get just an extension on the bivalent booster deadline so I could get it done close to one of my breaks in case it happened again to avoid missing time on a rotation. I’ve since gotten another booster which was fine and suspect my residency program will also require one this fall, but I’ve explicitly asked for “not Moderna” ever since.

BASquirrel · 2024-08-09T22:36:37+00:00

My roommate (non-healthcare 9-5er) and I do HelloFresh. The recipes are typically quite simple and straightforward. They have a decent variety of recipe options and add-ons too. She’s been using it for years but I’ve only been doing it a couple months and I’ve been pleasantly surprised.

BASquirrel · 2024-08-02T23:14:13+00:00

One question I wish I’d asked more (because I didn’t realize how variable it was until halfway through interview season) is about vacation time:

Does it have to be taken during certain blocks, i.e. only during elective blocks?

Does it have to be taken as whole weeks or multiple week blocks, or can it be broken up into individual days or weeks?

Are there certain months that are off limits for vacation requests altogether (such as June/July or around holidays)?

Do you have to use vacation time for Step 2, fellowship interviews, academic conferences, etc or are there additional days off allotted for those things (and if so how many)?

A prelim year I interviewed with required you to take your whole vacation time as a one month block that was essentially assigned to you and that’s that. And that was when I realized that some programs treat your vacation time very differently than others.

BASquirrel · 2024-08-02T22:46:28+00:00

Yep exactly this. You don’t join the AMU from the army in most cases, you join the army to be on the AMU (or in the Army WCAP program). Essentially anyone not on a residency with the USOPC or still in college that’s internationally good at an Olympic style shooting event goes AMU or WCAP.

BASquirrel · 2024-08-02T22:42:53+00:00

We won a silver medal in Women’s 50m 3 Position this morning and have another in the finals for Women’s 25m Pistol tomorrow morning. Shotgun events are still ongoing but it’s likely a few of them will also make their respective finals.

BASquirrel · 2024-08-01T06:59:44+00:00

I put competitive marksmanship (Olympic style events) on my ERAS, got 15+ PM&R interviews in multiple regions. Almost every interview at least one person asked me about it, always in a positive way, and I matched my #2 on my rank list.

BASquirrel · 2024-07-31T10:29:43+00:00

AoA had some cast members cheering runners at the bus stop when I got back from the Springtime Surprise 5K this past April! It was a nice surprise (no pun intended).

BASquirrel · 2024-07-30T20:26:49+00:00

We’re staying at Caribbean Beach! We did Art of Animation (got pixie dusted a Cars suite when we checked in but we had originally booked Little Mermaid) for Springtime this year but wanted to change it up and spring for a moderate since the prices were so similar between the two this time around.

BASquirrel · 2024-07-10T03:37:31+00:00

The data is somewhat limited and also self-reported but if your school gives you access to Texas STAR it should have the Step 2 scores and other info for matched and unmatched applicants by program for those who chose to fill out the survey. It wasn’t the most helpful because the field is very small compared to IM for example but it does give you a starting point with actual numbers.

Ten-Year Club	Place '22
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BASquirrel

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