*** Updates will be provided once the 2025 ERAS® Residency Timeline is available. ***
Standardized Letter of Recommendation form are now being recommended by the SNS and are different for your home program versus external programs. They should be used whenever possible and are available on the SNS website:
Standard Letter of RecommendationIn accordance with the AAMC recommendations, Neurological Surgery supports ensuring that all interviews at a single institution are either all virtual or all in-person. This is due to the fact that the AAMC recognizes that applicants interview better in-person, and an interview scenario that includes both in-person and virtual creates inequity. However, if an institution allows, programs may perform all in-person interviews. They cannot, however, then perform make-up or any other interviews virtually.
Programs have been asked to only send out the number of invitations for which they have interview spots. Hence, there should not be any immediate waitlists for an interview. This does not guarantee availability for your desired interview date if that date has filled, however you may have options of dates to waitlist for, rather than take an open spot if there is not a date available which fits your schedule.
Programs are encouraged to send invitations on FRIDAYS at/after 4pm EST during the month of October. This is so you do not need to be constantly watching your emails for invites. You will have until Sunday night to respond and an interview opening will be guaranteed. However, keep in mind that if multiple dates are offered in an invitation your first choice of date is on a first-come first-served basis.
After October, programs may send individual or small groups of invitations out on subsequent Friday afternoons to fill in for cancellations. If an interview is coming up, they may send the invitation on another day but will hold the offer for 48 hours to give you time to respond.
Programs may be able to offer optional, educational in-person visits for you to be able to better evaluate a program culture and location. Please note that this must happen after all interviews for that program have occurred virtually. This visit is for the applicant’s benefit and will not be used to score or rank applicants. These in-person visits should be reserved to evaluate only around 3 programs (max 5) to help you assess them appropriately. Institutions may not allow programs to offer this benefit, which is out of the program’s hands.
Program interview dates are available on the SNS Website:
Interview DatesOnline Resources
Society of Neurological Surgeons – Medical Students
- Policies for Rotations
- Interview Dates Schedule
- Educational Lectures
- Essential Neurosurgery for Medical Students Supplement:
General Information about applying for residency
General Information about neurosurgery residency
- ABNS
- ACGME