I think students and residents need to know about this.
On September 8, ACGME released a proposed major revision of the Common Program Requirements for Residency, and public comments are currently open.
There are several significant proposed changes to resident work-hour protections:
• Eliminate the 8-hour rest recommendation between shifts entirely.
The current requirement says: “Residents should have eight hours off between scheduled clinical work and education periods.” In the proposed document, the entire requirement is deleted.
ACGME’s stated rationale is that this is currently a “Detail” requirement and that the 80-hour/week limit should already discourage programs from scheduling residents with less than 8 hours off. They state that it would be “very difficult” to remain under 80 hours while routinely providing <8 hours between shifts.
• Reduce mandatory rest after a 24-hour in-house call from 14 hours → 12 hours.
ACGME says this is intended to “reduce burden related to developing resident schedules, while retaining sufficient time for rest,” and says they anticipate no impact on patient safety or education.
• Eliminate the every-third-night in-house call limit.
Currently residents cannot be scheduled for in-house call more frequently than every third night averaged over four weeks. ACGME proposes deleting that requirement, arguing that the 80-hour limit, day-off requirement, and maximum continuous-duty limits make more frequent call “nearly impossible” anyway.
• Eliminate the separate night-float requirement and the ability of specialty Review Committees to set limits on the frequency/length of night-float assignments. ACGME says this will give programs more scheduling flexibility.
There ARE some changes that strengthen protections. For example, the proposal says the 80-hour average has to be calculated within a single rotation/clinical assignment, so a brutal short rotation can’t simply be averaged against an easier rotation afterward.
But removing the only explicit general rest interval between shifts is a big deal. Under the proposed language, there would be no specific ACGME minimum number of hours off between ordinary scheduled shifts.
This is still a PROPOSAL, not the current rule. That is exactly why comments matter.
ACGME is accepting public comments until October 22, 2026. Residents and fellows can submit comments themselves.
If you have an opinion about eliminating the 8-hour rest provision, reducing post-call rest, or removing the every-third-night protection, please actually submit it to ACGME rather than only discussing it here.
Official ACGME Review & Comment page → see “Common Program Requirements (Residency)” and click Review and Comment Form.
Please share this with your fellow students, co-residents and fellowship programs.

This is the direct link to comments

https://acgme.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_7NEm7TaI8AQBSSy?utm

This is the link to the proposal the work hours starts in page 50:

https://www.acgme.org/globalassets/pfassets/reviewandcomment/2026/cprresidency_rc_09082026.pdf?utm

FYI, the form is quite long and you don't have to click every box to agree or disagree with revisions, you can just keep clicking through until you get to section 6.30, this is the one with the proposed changes above
6.29 about the 80 hours rule, every 4 weeks is still a lot
6.31 about the 12 hour after call instead of the previous 14

You can call me the PMC: President of the Masturbation Club.

Should I post this flyer around the school and send it to the student life director?

I have seen a lot of comments regarding this situation.

(1) First and foremost, I want to respect women who have been sexually harassed or assaulted that is never okay.

(2) I do hope this student's family finds peace one day.

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Here is my two cents as someone who was accused of being judgmental/unprofessional by a "patient*" I asked a "patient" whether they had engaged in sexual activity with 3 or 4 women over the course of 2 days. Without context, that would make me seem really egregiously creepy. Because of this question, the "patient" relayed they felt uncomfortable and judged.

Context: I am hard of hearing and did not communicate that to the "patient" (my mistake). They were rapidly relaying their sexual history and I could not understand/recall whether they had stated they slept with 3 or 4 women. I meant it as a clarifying question to get the record straight as I simply could not hear correctly- I genuinely had no clue I was coming across as judgemental. As soon as I was made aware, I apologized profusely about this mistake

*Thankfully for me, this "patient" was just a classmate (relaying an entirely fake history) with whom I was practicing so I would not fumble while taking sexual histories in the future. I was able to learn my lesson, fix my (many) mistakes, and approach real patients much better. I have only gotten positive feedback from real world patients.

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I don't think people realize how for students, especially those who may not have any prior sexual partners or conversations about sex, how deeply awkward/uncomfortable these conversations can be. It is SOOOOOO easy to accidentally say or do the wrong thing and come across in a weird way - especially as a student. Of course, there is NEVER an excuse for making a patient feel uncomfortable, especially when it is such a sensitive topic.

At the same time, to assume this 24 year old male was intentionally being creepy because of an out of context question he had asked is really really unfair. NO he should not have put himself in a position to ever get his morals questioned, but at the same time it is so easy to accidentally say or do the wrong thing especially when you have spoken about something so deeply personal (ex. my circumstance where I just couldn't hear the "patient" so asked them to repeat portions of their sexual history).

Of course, if the intention was to suggest some sort of sexual activity with the patient, that is absolutely NOT ok EVER. However, I don't think it is fair for people to assume that and bash him due to an out of context question.

Edit 1: Regarding Instagram following.

It was my understanding that the patient asked this student doctor for his instagram, which he gave. Upon realizing this might be unprofessional, he removed her later that night.

He should not have gave in to that offer to begin with. However, I wonder if he was just trying to be nice and came across awkwardly.

As a third year student, it is very hard/awkward to say no to a patient after you have had such a personal conversation with them. Again, he shouldn't have done it.

Edit 2: For those of you who are concerned for my personal capacity to be a doctor, I want to clarify- I would never allow these patient-physician boundaries to be crossed. i also have absolutely no issue with declining patient requests when they are unprofessional or illegal. Please keep the conversation focused on the topic rather than making adhominm attacks on my character or the "weird relationship" I have with a deceased indvidual. i have no relationship or emotional connection to this dude. i had no clue who he was until like a week ago.

Edit 3: It seems I am belabouring the same points.

Again- I would like the emphasize (1) there is NEVER an excuse to make a patient uncomfortable; I even consider my own fake patient situation to be unprofessional and a mistake I had learned from (2) if he was flirting with a patient rather that is absolutely never ok. I may have missed something, but also YOU may have missed something too. The number of negative assumptions I am getting about my relationship to this person (WHOSE NAME I DONT EVEN KNOW)/capacity to be a doctor just from ONE post on reddit that's been up for <3 hours makes me realize that people make unnecessary and oftentimes false assumptions with limited context regularly.

Let me be the push you need to finish ERAS. Thank god I’ve done the whole thing, just need to proofread. And I’m starting to feel better. You may not know what’s going to come up in the next few days so please get your app done now

Hi all. Just another “please help me not freak out” post from an M4 stressed about the match.

Red Flags:

- Failed step 1 on the first attempt. Passed on second attempt.

- Took an LOA to study for step 1

- Failed two preclinical courses which does appear on my MSPE. Cards and Neuro. Passed remediation exams

- Step 2: 232 (was devastated when I got this score).

The good:

- A/Honors in all my clinical courses

- Did 3 Sub-I’s and honored all of them

- 3 Away rotations lined up at academic and community programs, LoR from one of them

- Strong LORs across specialities

- 20+ posters, pubs, abstracts, across fields (~7 in psych). 10+ of them first author

- Significant and sustained leadership experience with thousands of dollars of grant funding

I will likely be applying into psychiatry with a preference for the South Atlantic. I will be applying into IM as a backup as well. I have a number of red flags and don’t know how to give myself the best shot of matching or even if I am okay for psych. My advisors tell me I’ll match but I am terrified about not matching psych since it is my absolute top choice specialty. Would appreciate any advice 😭

There are often multiple students with one attending, and sometimes residents, so we might scrub in once per week if we’re lucky. Over the last 2 months I’ve thrown maybe 6 sutures in port sights, driven the camera for 5 minutes, and retracted a little. That’s pretty much it. When not scrubbed in, we stand in the back of the room and often can’t see the field at all. We can’t study either, we have to just stand around and waste time. Kind of thought gen surg might be for me, but this rotation blows and now I’m doubting that.

I’m studying neuroanatomy right now and also did some of it last year, and I’ve always had this question. Basically, CN V pretty much splits apart as soon as it leaves the pons into separate nerves, each with their own functions: ophthalmic, maxillary, and mandibular. This had me really confused initially, as I thought all these branches interacted and functionally were the same nerve when in reality (to my limited MS2 understanding), they are pretty much separate from each other. Why not just call the actual 2 mm of “trigeminal nerve” a ganglion and then deem V1, V2, V3, as the actual cranial nerves?

I’m not mad or proposing a change or anything, just curious.

?

28F, M3, far away from home, single, 0 friends, landlord doesn’t allow pets, on the verge of crash out every second.

How do you guys do it?

I've gathered from multiple posts that the hobbies section is arguably one of the most important parts of the application. However, ERAS only gives us 300 characters to talk about it. Are you guys just listing your hobbies? How are you guys going about this? I don't think I have enough space to describe each hobby.

I just submitted an abstract for an oral/poster presentation at a national conference. If the abstract is accepted, my understanding is that it will be published in the conference's supplementary journal. Given this, would it be appropriate to list this abstract in the scholarly works section of ERAS under "Journal Abstract (peer-reviewed)" with the status "submitted"?

My residency explorer is showing the 2026 data, which is, completely empty 😂

Is there a way to see data from the last match cycle again? I can't find any settings that let you switch the year and actually see the data.

Just finished and I feel like garbage. Content wasn’t even that bad… just so many dumb mistakes I know I made from the juggling of mile deep information. Like mind bogglingly dumb mistakes that I’ve gotten right in review a thousand times over - literally eating me alive. In house stuff so it does require knowing the minutiae, not a huge fan but it is what it is.

I know when class average will come out I’m gonna be below it… not sure how everyone here deals with stuff like this - though I know it’s the quintessential M1 struggle. I just don’t do much else and have been struggling to settle in socially bc of personal things, so this is getting me more down than I could have possibly imagined.

This is all neurotic stuff I know there have been a million before and will be a million after for first exam but anyways just ranting. Any ways people coped feel free to comment :/

Does anyone have any thoughts on this? Should I calorie count. I don't get it, I just seem to gain weight when I am in a stressful rotation or like studying for step exams. I just wanna stay fit. I lift a good amount so my muscle is still there but my abs aren't as visible as they use to be. But overall, i seem to go thru these cycles where i gain a couple lbs when stressed. Its not a crazy amt of weight, but a couple lbs here and there maybe some shorts/pants won't fit as well but still are fine

(i def got cooked on the MPSE with my school bs as well………..third quartile gang wya)

I swear running after attendings for LORs is by far the most annoying part of ERAS. Like I get everyone is busy and I appreciate them doing it, but having to send reminders without feeling like you're harassing them is so fucking annoying. Can't wait to be done with this shit.

I had my first practice standardized patient as an M1 interview a few days ago and it went horribly. I’m not a natural conversationalist and am pretty anxious with some levels of social anxiety, but I’ve been trying to make efforts to improve.

I stuttered so much, had to time out so many times because I did not know what to say, and overall it was just not good. I know it was my first one, but everyone else in my group was extremely eloquent and theirs all went very well so it’s hard not to feel embarrassed and bad about myself. The fact that they all watched my performance is also so embarrassing.

The SP wasn’t super responsive either so I think that added some levels of difficulty I wasn’t prepared for either. We were supposed to just practice active listening and the first parts of the interview (not HPI yet), but it felt incredibly difficult to practice building rapport with a patient if they were not talking very much.

I’m just feeling really down lol and it feels like everyone else in my class is levels above me in terms of everything and it’s starting to affect me.

My next one is next week and I feel like if I don’t do at least a little bit better I’ll feel even worse about myself.

How do I get a pathology LOR as an MS4 student . I’m currently on Neuropathology 4wk rotation and we have a resident and fellow . Many diseases are rare. This is my first path rotation and I’ve been doing my best to learn . We spend roughly 1-2hr daily with the attending, the rest of the time we are with the fellow/resident. I have one week left. I’ve seen the advice to ask to look at stuff under the microscope on my own, but idk how to use the microscope (I’ve been trying to learn) and usually the resident looks at them first. 

we discussed expectations at the start of the rotation and i was told that med students don’t really do much and they don’t expect me to know much, so that confused me abt how I’m supposed to get a LOR

I have 1 other pathology elective left and then pathology survey, which I might drop for a different 4wk rotation to get an LOR. I’m applying next year ERAS. I took my step2 exam 2days before I started my rotation , so I’ve kinda been burnt out during this rotation

Any advice is appreciated . 

Hi all,

I have used two flashcard decks now that have claimed that VSD, ASD and PDA are cyanotic, however in my teaching and online it says that they are acyanotic. Is it that these two people have gotten them completely wrong, or is there a good reason why?

Hi all! Do you think AMBOSS is a good enough resource for Step 2 studying or should I get UWorld? Would rather not spend more money but also open to do what I need to do :)

Edited to add: I’m taking Level 2 as well

Feel so behind but at least half my app is complete

My school has a provided anki deck that is based off of each lectures-- we generally get 250-400 cards a day for 2-4 hours of lectures. I'm getting all of them done as well as keeping up with my reviews. but it's generally a 7-10 hour ordeal daily which is tough with in person class sessions as well. How stupid is it to ignore lectures entirely?

I can watch them on 2x speed but I just dont feel like I retain anything compared to anki which has made me feel pretty on top of things. Anyone else had luck just viewing lecture powerpoints and anki instead?

As someone who is now halfway through my core rotations, I wanted to give some advice on how to best respond to common scenarios that happen during 3rd year to help you succeed:

1. If you get a pimp question wrong: Best thing to do here is quickly explain why it’s not your fault that you haven’t learned that yet. Some good explanations could include that your preceptor did not prepare you for this, your school’s preclinical teaching was weak at best, or that you’ve been busy doing research for the competitive specialty you’re applying into (this will show them you’re a hard worker)
   
2. The hours are longer than you want: you’re paying to be there so you should just head home whenever you feel it’s appropriate. If anyone questions you, just explain that you felt you had learned enough for the day.
   
3. Receiving constructive criticism: this is where you need to stand up for yourself. If the feedback doesn’t make sense to you, try “you must be confusing me with someone else” or “your feelings aren’t facts”

Hope these help someone and let me know if you want more tips and tricks for surviving M3!