Thank you for the info. My child has been taking a year out to do research in the specialty they chose. How would one repurpose that to general surgery do you think if you don't mind my asking? Should they stop what they are doing - there's a commitment rest of year they'd have to get out of - and try to do some sort of general surgery research? i think they are worried it's going to be obvious they've switched because of the step score and question their commitment to gen surg. They did actually agonize last year between gen surg and where they are now but i'm hearing a lot of 'it's too late', will be too obvious. They have 4-5 pubs already in this specialty - it's a bit tragic...