Can I ask why you didn't feel you could've gotten away with not doing a fellowship?
I personally felt I could, and I didn't go through fellowship. I was hired by a small PP in a rural setting during third year with a nice stipend. I made the decision to skip fellowship a few days before list were due. I felt that psychologically it was too much to ask. Tired of the BS, along with the lifestyle at the time, which was essentially ratrace, big city, traffic, hours a day on the road and so one.
There a plenty of jobs out there even without fellowship.
Can't speak for the person you asked specifically, but competitive markets/groups that are more subspecialized will usually require fellowship because of some combination of their referrers, branding, and having enough applicants that they can get away with it. The more rural or smaller PP you go, the less a fellowship will be required. When the job market tightens, people without a fellowship will be hit the hardest unless they have some other skillset (admin, list crusher, good schmoozer etc) and have good relations with group leadership.
Fellowship isn't mandatory, but it does decrease your options and the jobs available to you. For some people this doesn't and will never matter. For some, it limits their career trajectory and what they want to do in a day-to-day setting. And once you're a real attending making money, hard to go back. Best middle ground is to do a chill fellowship where you can moonlight on the side for a PP, you can make 200k+ and still get your certificate.
I think poster above is spot on.
Before doing a fellowship one needs to know how one sees his/her career. I personally believe that doing a fellowship because everybody is doing one is the wrong answer. Location, setting, type of job you want etc... are very important. Many elect to do teleradiology and salaries I am hearing are absolutely insane in the field. No fellowship required.
I will simply add a few things:
- The notion that a fellowship protects you in a rough market may be true, but I would say that it would depend to the same extent that a fellowship may be needed to find a job or not. Perhaps in the biggest groups and most desirable locations. The market has been excellent for rads the last few years, and I am not seeing any slowdown anytime soon. In fact the market continues to be more favorable to rads. That does not mean that this will continue. Also keep in mind that because of the market, you are more likely to become more and more a generalist who will read more outside of his/her specialty than the other way around. In my opinion, you are likely to be more interesting to a group if you have well rounded skills, with nuc/mammo and procedures. Just an opinion without numbers/facts to back this up. At least it is the case in my group (but this is because of our setting).
- Doing a fellowship is a serious financial cost as well (in my case it would have resulted in 450K of lost income in todays money, more if you invest it obviously). Is it worth it?
- One of my partner is a generalist with a lot of experience. He is a specialist in absolutely everything including IR. Not kidding, by far the best radiologist I have ever worked with. Absolutely crazy.
- Today I am a partner in my group, while my co-residents who did a fellowship are starting their attending position, as associates. Not doing a fellowship was the best decision I could have made. At least in my own case and for now. This would not be true for everyone, but I believe many who do one end up in a situation where they could have ended up without a fellowship.
The one major issue I have had with not doing a fellowship is the certification exam that I just took last month. A fellowship is a tremendous benefit is passing the exam. I did not do too well but I will find out soon enough. It is not that big of a deal as it can be retaken multiple times. But still, to have acquired skills in a particular field is definitely a big plus to pass it. Again, not worth 1 year of my life and certainly not 450K.
Whatever you decide, I wish you the best of luck.