Uncommon Pathways Episode 1Although the shortest distance between two points is a straight line, that’s not always the path that a career in medicine follows. Host Ryan Orwig speaks with STATMed alumni who share their uncommon pathways to their dream careers in our newest podcast miniseries. In this episode, Ryan and JT, an orthopedic surgeon, discuss challenges he faced in his journey to becoming a surgeon. JT recounts the issues he faced when struggling with boards. He also digs into the hurdles his relatively low scores caused when trying to get into a super competitive orthopedic surgery residency. "When I found out what my Step 1 score was, I was freaking out. And so, of course, I would ask people, it's like, man, you know, is this even worth it? Is this even worth doing? Should I just try something different altogether? And you know, almost universally, people told me, and this is what I tell people now, your step score shouldn't completely define you or dictate what you do. And so if this is something that you really, really want to do, and you know that beyond a shadow of a doubt, you should just go for it, and you should make every effort to make yourself a good applicant, despite the fact that you may not have the best test scores." - Dr. JT