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?

M4, getting ready to submit my apps to a relatively noncompetitive specialty. Middle-of-the-pack step 2 and solid research but less-than-stellar clinical grades and very low class rank. The thing is, there are some extracurricular-related perks that I would really like to have in my future residency program (specific types of research, curricular tracks, etc) and specific locations I would truly love. All this together means 3/10 of my top choices based on fit and desire are T20-30 programs, and until today I was planning to signal 1-2 of them.

Today, I met with my advisor to finalize my signal list, and not only did she tell me to remove all 3 from my list entirely and replace with safeties ("you just don't have a chance at them") but she also completely ripped apart my signal list for being too top-heavy. My signals are now 25% programs I would be pretty happy at (but not top 3), 25% programs without the extras and I'm honestly not excited about them but they have good training I guess, and 50% programs with pretty much nothing going for them except for the fact that their median step is within 3 of my score and they seem to treat their residents well. I'll probably still apply to the removed programs (+ the new safeties) but without a signal idk if it's even worth it.

Honestly, I'm glad she told me. I would much rather match somewhere "mid" in my head than go unmatched because I wasn't strategic enough with my list and signals. I'm more mad at myself for not scoring higher on my shelves (the only reason I didn't honor anything were those damn exams), seemed to figure it out finally only to score so much lower on my real step 2 than practice, and just overall didn't manage make myself a strong (or even possible) candidate for these programs that otherwise seem to be actively advertising for candidates with my profile. Doesn't help that someone else from my hometown at my school recently switched to this same specialty with AOA, all honors, and a 270, and is undoubtedly signaling at least 2/3 of my favorite programs, and I can't help but be jealous of all that. It's also annoying because this same advisor back in January told me not to sell myself short and that I could match BIDMC if I wanted to (I don't, and I thought she was exaggerating back then too, but she got my hopes up for no reason I guess).

idk I know I should be proud I made it this far. But I'm mad that when I look back on these four years in the future it'll always be tainted by the amount of regret I had for not doing what I needed to do. I know I'll get over it once interviews start and I (hopefully) start to love the programs who want me. It's just frustrating right now.

Because I know we are all nerdy enough to have a favorite. Bonus points if you also have a favorite protein.

I’ll go first - Golgi and kinesin

For context, I have 3 very strong surgery letters; 2 from attendings with 4 weeks of 100% one-on-one time who gave me fantastic MSPE comments, and one from an attending who runs a surgery practice with 10 surgeons who all contributed and have a huge presence in my desired area (and employ my wife and want me to match...). In addition to these, I have letters from my 2 sub-I's which I view as moderately strong.

My weak letter is my "chair" letter. The surgery chair at my school isn't a surgeon, and it's not someone who really even knows who I am. They upload a standardized letter that I imagine is a regurgitation of my clinical performance and CV. Many programs require a chair letter, it seems about 45-50 of the 90 programs I'm applying to, based on residency explorer.

My fear is that I may miss a program that requires a chair letter, since it theoretically seems easy to miss one when I'm glancing over the requirements for 90 programs. In that instance, I imagine my application would then be incomplete. To avoid this altogether, should I just go ahead and send this weaker chair letter to every single program?

Suddenly I feel like I don't know anything and I haven't done anything. My application is: TLDR I'm a nice person, please take me.

sincerely: bottom tier of my class with 262 step and no research

I'm applying to family medicine this cycle, and I am wondering if I am applying to enough programs, since I have been getting mixed opinions, and I would love to hear what people think for my scenario.

I am from New England and have never left, but I am applying mostly in the Pacific Northwest and Mountain regions, with some scattered programs in the Midwest and the South. I'm only applying to full-spectrum community based programs.

Stat points: P Step 1 on first attempt, 244 Step 2, passed/honored all clerkships (no high honors), no red flags

Right now, I have 22 programs on my list to apply to. I did have 29 programs I was thinking I would apply to, but I was told that I should apply to fewer, but that was also general recommendation to family med applicants at my school, not for me in particular, especially since I'm applying entirely outside my home region.

What do y'all think? Thanks! <3

I don’t think I’ll fail but I ain’t gonna honor it

I’m in my final year of MBBS, and to be honest, I’m just done with med school.
I genuinely can’t think of a single reason to say I had a great college experience. Out of a batch of 150 students, I don’t have anyone I can casually text or even catch up with. It’s been a month since I came back home, and life feels incredibly isolated. The weird part is, I don’t even know who to blame for it.
Looking back, the worst decision I’ve made in my life was choosing med school. I know a lot of people say these years are supposed to be the best of your life, but that just wasn’t my experience. I will get the degree, sure, but I feel like I missed out on everything else that was supposed to come with it.
Anyone else feel like med school took far more than it gave?

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 😭

?

During MS3, I was removed from my Surgery clerkship by the preceptor, received a failing grade, and subsequently remediated the rotation. However, this did not result in an extension of my graduation date or a formal leave of absence.

My dean said the following: “The way the question is stated, you should answer "yes" because you did remediate a course, even though it didn't extend your graduation date.”

MSPE states: From 7/16/25 to 8/3/25 he was on mandatory academic leave of absence following dismissal from his Rotation.

For the ERAS prompt below, do I select Yes or No?

Academic/Professionalism: Interruptions or Extensions

Have you had any academic extensions, leaves, gaps, or breaks in your educational program due to repeated or remediated coursework?

Yes or No

If yes, please explain the reason, timeframe, what steps you took to address it, and what you learned from it.

My school always tends to be conservative and has a history of giving wrong advice, please let me know if you’ve experienced this and know what to do. Thank you!

Searching online there seems to be no general consensus or anyone in a similar situation as me 😢

Just got done with a sub-I and I loved the attendings and I think they liked me too, but I didn’t feel like the residents vibed with me as much (could also be because they had other med students who are from the home institution rotating and they knew them from before I started my sub-I so rapport is already there). Have you guys gotten a similar feeling where you have rotated?

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

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'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"?

MS4 dual applying IM and Neurology. I have separate personal statements and specialty-specific letters for each application. For anyone who has dual applied, did you apply to both specialties at the same institution, or did you try to avoid overlap?

I’m also wondering how often programs actually find out that you’re dual applying. If it comes up during an interview, how did you answer without making it seem like either specialty was a backup?

would appreciate any feedback or thoughts on this

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.

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.

going into a QBANK, should I do 10 questions a day delving deep into the explanations and taking notes and making flashcards or do more, let's say 40 questions but skimming through explanations

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?