Medical Student

Goals as M1/M2

• Find Research Mentors: Ask professors, mentors, and administrators at your medical school to see if they know of anyone working on a research project.
• Get Involved: Ask if there is a way you can get involved in these projects at your level of training, but be honest about what you know and what time you have to commit to a project around your studying and schoolwork. Involvement can be in multiple fields - biomedical science, clinical, social science, public health, or translational research.
• Build Research Skills: Attempt to help in any capacity to learn different aspects of research including research design, protocol development, institutional review boards (IRB) approvals, data collection, and data analysis.
• Look for Student Funding Opportunities: Some might be available through your home institution, or else seek opportunities through other professional/industrial/governmental institutions like the EMF-SAEM Medical Student Research Grant or the National Institutes of Health (NIH) Summer Research Internship.

Year Off Planning

If you want to take a year off between M3/M4, start looking at opportunities now. They often require preparation on developing a research project with a mentor within the program prior to the application. If your home institution does not have much research, look for outside opportunities. Consider the NIH Medical Research Scholars Program (applications due on October 1 of each year for the following academic year). There are lots of opportunities if you seek them out. If you're interested in global health research, consider the NIH Fogarty Global Health Program for Fellows and Scholars, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Foundation Fellowships, and more.

Goals as M3/M4

• Electives: Consider using elective time in your M3/M4 years for research. Start planning early, as all research projects take time. Give yourself time to develop a research question, design it, get it IRB approved (if necessary), collect your data, analyze it, and start writing your paper.
• Away Rotations in Research: Consider away rotations for your M4 year focused on research or research-focused clinical education, including NIH Clinical Electives, CDC Epidemiology Elective Program, and more.
• During Residency Interview Season: While looking for residencies, consider those who have strong research backgrounds and opportunities for residents to do research. If you have a particular research focus, find institutions that match your interests and can help you start your research career early. Some programs offer research integrated into the curriculum, others may offer fellowships, so find the program that's right for you.
• Mentorship: Mentors will help you develop and avoid pitfalls that may increase frustration and stumbles. Look for mentoring events like SAEM's Speed Mentoring or the Emergency Medicine Residents' Association (EMRA) Student Resident Mentor Program to give you access to national mentors.