Unexplored Questions About Away Rotations – A Student’s Perspective

This article was migrated. The article was marked as recommended. Many fourth-year medical students complete away rotations as elective courses within their specialty of choice. The popularity of away rotations is increasing and has become nearly ubiquitous in certain competitive specialties (Higgins et al., 2016). Benefits include obtaining letters of recommendation, diversifying clinical exposure, expanding research opportunities, and establishing a connection with a residency program. Some disadvantages include cost, stress, competitive nature among applicants, and separation from personal support networks. We are writing this to bring attention to the pros and cons of away rotations, and to the absence of substantial data available in the literature to help us understand the actual impact that away rotations may have on our residency matching outcomes.