Got this in an email, thought you all would enjoy it.
This number can only grow with the addition of lot more medical school seats while the number of residencies stays stagnant.
I don’t think we’ll see much growth in unmatched US MD students. DO and especially IMG will see more unmatched students for sure.
I’d believe this……
I saw a Powerpoint presented at an this year meeting of PDs that showed that 20% of the students who did’t match had applied only in the 5 most competitive specialties (derm, ortho, plastics, neurosurg and integrated thoracic surgery) without applying to a back-up specialty.
Looking for the link but can’t find it right now. Will post it when I track it down.
Some specialties are much more selective than others. I am familiar with the residency application to one of them. In D’s class, 9 people applied to a selective specialty. One person out of 9 did not match. I do not know the stats of this person. I am only aware of 1 fact. The goal for number of interviews in this specialty was 10. I know that one person received 20 invites and went to 18 of them. D. received 12 invites and went to all 12. The person who did not match had only 6 interviews. This is the only fact known to me about his “stats” so to speak. After the whole cycle was behind us and actually after the matching day, D. keep mentioning (even now, 3 months later) that the single most significant aspect of application in her opinion is the LORs from nationally known people in the specialty, who may actually hold “national” positions in specialty / sub-specialty and definitely more so if the person is well known nationally to write very hard LORs. Apparently, your Step 1 score and 3rd year grades (D’s school is p/f, so not grades in pre-clinicals) will get you an interview or cut you automatically. Now, again, depending on the specific Med. School, AOA, publications, away rotations may or may not be important. At D’s Med. School, neither of these 3 played major role. 5 away rotations that person with 20 invites went to, produced 5 additional interviews, that is for sure. However, this person matching was in line with my D’s and few others in the specialty. What I am saying is that 5 away rotations did NOT result in any advantage. Out of 9, only 1 had AOA and she matched but not as well as 7 others. Again, there is no general rule, it all depends on the specific Med. School.
And again, what they do after not matching, depends on specialty. There is no “fast” scrambling of any sort in the specialty that I am discussing. There are maybe 2 -3 spots in whole nation that are still open after match. They like to proceed slowly. In other specialties, applicant actually may obtain position relatively quickly after he did not match.
Miami, what the person who didn’t match end up doing? I’m applying into the specialty this upcoming year, and I’m kind of afraid of not matching anywhere.
Is “not matching” the med school euphemism for “rejected” ?
"Miami, what the person who didn’t match end up doing? I’m applying into the specialty this upcoming year, and I’m kind of afraid of not matching anywhere. "
-The specialty requires prelim year. He matched to the prelim year, so he is going to be an Internal Medicine resident for one year. Most places started already, D. is in orientation for her prelim year. He is doing the same. He will have to research his options for the following year. One is a Research Fellowship. It, of course, will make the process longer. He probably could re-apply. But if he matches, then it is still not clear what is he going to do in the following year as prelim year is only one year, I do not know if he can stay for the second year there. Not a very good situation after working extremely hard for 8 years and spending huge amount of money. it makes me sad thinking about it.
On the other hand, only 1 not matching out of 9 is a pretty good matching rate.
My daughter knows someone who matched for prelim but not afterward. I assume that person will reapply to their chosen specialty but also another (less competitive) area. I am sure it was a huge blow. AOA, publications, nice presentation…all of that good stuff. I have no idea what may have gone wrong but the possibilities have been discussed in this thread. Staying in a particular geographic area could have come into play.
Top programs in every specialty are competitive. Even those with the best credentials need a broad match list.
In this context it would be the euphemism for being rejected from every program you ranked. Although it’s not a total euphemism since getting into a program is called matching, not being accepted. It’s probably because unlike applying to college and medical school, everyone gets only one offer. Not matching happens to about 5% of US medical school graduates, ~12% of DO graduates, and ~55% of foreign medical school graduates.
For an explanation of the match algorithm, see: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ywzYRo1YIv4
@WayOutWestMom I 100% believe all of them. The only thing that even remotely surprised me was the idea that 50% of unmatched applicants were discussed before their school’s promotions committee. It indicates that not matching shouldn’t really come as a surprise for many unmatched students, particularly if they had promotions committee issues + are doing some of the easily avoidable things on the list of 7 things during the process (2,3,4,6).
The guidance part - 4. it is important to listen. However, as an applicant is the only one who will shoulder consequences of incorrect decision made during residency application cycle. I warn to be on a more cautions (safe) side than advised. What happened that if D. listened as is to what she was told and did not apply much wider than she was told, then her number of interviews would be so low, that she would probably get enormously depressed. We were (and she was) completely surprised by the geography of her invites. She was told that since is very regional, then that is where she should apply to about 30 places or so. While she still got her first choice and staying where she has been, she believes that applying widely and to a much great number resulted in more predictable (at least on her own part) outcome. Overdoing is OK, it is more expensive though, but you do not want to count few thousands plus or minus at this point, you just want to match, whatever YOU believe it takes.