DO schools discouraging students from entering allo match

Administration can say whatever they want, who cares? They can feed you whatever lines they want to, but at the end of the day its your decision.

Fact of the matter is there aren't enough DO residencies out there if DOs didn't enter the allo match anyway, so discouraging it is pretty stupid.

I wouldn't say there is as much active discouragement as there is intentional ignorance about the allopathic match by some DO school administrators.

I've gotten it from individual profs but never had any overt pressure from either of the institutions I've attended.

I agree with Engineeredout...at the end of the day you're in the driver's seat now...and it's akin to always being harped on about doing Primary Care... sure they can preach it to me until they're blue in the face about how noble it is but I'm still going to go with a specialty that interests me irregardless of their ostensible mandate to crank out FPs willing to reside in the wilderness and eat locus and honey.

I have gotten no guidance, discouragement, or encouragement, regarding the match and residencies from my school.

ShyRem said:

I have gotten no guidance, discouragement, or encouragement, regarding the match and residencies from my school.

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Too true for most of us. From what I gather on the interview trail, early in fourth year most allopathic schools have their students meet with the deparment chair/program director of the field that they are going to be applying for. They then get advice about which programs they are competitve for, ones to avoid, how to improve their app, things of that nature. There is no way that would happen at most osteopathic schools do to the lack of "departments" at most schools. Even if there are most do faculty did do residencies and are clueless about allopathic programs or are in denial over the many advantages to acgme training especially directly compared to their own programs.

I went to the same school as ShyRem. She is right, we got little to no help from our school. I picked up more from other med students I met during my 4th year rotations than I did from my own school. I rotated at a couple big allopathic peds programs during my early 4th year. All of their students were in the middle of having their "chairman meetings". At these, they sat and asked where they wanted to go, helped them pick programs, look at which programs to avoid and such. I got NO help from my school regarding this, and am definitely still really annoyed. I am lucky that I ended up at a great residency program.

I went to sit down and talk with one of my attendings last month and started talking about fellowship. He said we could sit down again in a few weeks and if I'm still interested that we could start talking about different programs. It was like, wait, what do you mean talk about programs. I thought I was expected to just do all the research myself and just wing it and hope things work out, you mean faculty members actually will help us out with our career decisions. I don't think it's limited to my school either, so this year as I meet 3rd year students that are thinking about peds, I try to help them as much as I can.

There was a distinct school I interviewed at where an administrator slammed taking the USMLEs. Absolutely slammed. Pissed me off. I know you don't have to taken them, but depending on what program you are applying for, you know...

acesup123 said:

From reading some posts on this forum I hear that some DO schools discourage their students from entering the allo match. Do the majority of DO schools do this or is it just a minority? How about schools like CCOM, PCOM, and NSU-COM? Thanks

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At NSU, a good portion (maybe up to 50%) of my friends registered for the USMLE.

Our school did not discourage us. In fact, some faculty members definitely recommended it: If you have the means to take it, take it.

BobBarker said:

Too true for most of us. From what I gather on the interview trail, early in fourth year most allopathic schools have their students meet with the deparment chair/program director of the field that they are going to be applying for. They then get advice about which programs they are competitve for, ones to avoid, how to improve their app, things of that nature. There is no way that would happen at most osteopathic schools do to the lack of "departments" at most schools. Even if there are most do faculty did do residencies and are clueless about allopathic programs or are in denial over the many advantages to acgme training especially directly compared to their own programs.

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That's how it was for us (MD school). We had mandatory meetings with our advisors (generally the program directors or assistant program directors in that program) before 4th year to discuss elective choices and program choices, as well as what they felt about each program.

For IM, most didn't meet with the dept chair but those in other programs did meet with the dept chair. We had the option to meet with them if we wanted and with the program director if she wasnt our advisor. Surprisingly, she talked very openly about other programs and there was absolutely no pressure to go to her program. She had even talked to some of the other program directors and knew roughly where some of the students sat with certain programs.

Unless you have a mentor who looked at ACGME programs, I could imagine it would be hard to find someone who would talk honestly about the options on the other side of the tracks. So, if you are in that position remember to come back to SDN when you are a resident to help students going through what you are now.

Interesting to hear there are others out there that feel like their schools give them little/no support once rotations begin.

That is REALLY sad considering what we pay in tuition.

Bacchus said:

There was a distinct school I interviewed at where an administrator slammed taking the USMLEs. Absolutely slammed. Pissed me off. I know you don't have to taken them, but depending on what program you are applying for, you know...

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We had a guest lecturer slam taking the USMLEs then deprecate himself for being a lowly DO...he'd preface things with "I'm just a DO so..." Is he a self-hating DO?

MJB said:

Interesting to hear there are others out there that feel like their schools give them little/no support once rotations begin.

That is REALLY sad considering what we pay in tuition.

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I don't know about you, but I kinda agree. Unless, of course, you want to do FP (general you), I'm not seeing much support or advice in general. I think it really has to do with the lack of departments.

IandIatrogenic said:

We had a guest lecturer slam taking the USMLEs then deprecate himself for being a lowly DO...he'd preface things with "I'm just a DO so..." Is he a self-hating DO?

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Sounds like an inferiority complex. I wouldn't listen to a guy who belittles himself or his achievements.

Doctor4Life1769 said:

Sounds like an inferiority complex. I wouldn't listen to a guy who belittles himself or his achievements.

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Well you would have like to of thought it was in jest because he was that type of lecturer who enjoyed using levity which IMO is always welcome from the Ben-Stein-reading-off-his-ppts- type but he did it multiple times to the point where it became apparent, at least to me, that he indeed has self-esteem issues. He also mentioned he wasn't very bright multiple times...boy I'd love to be a fly on the wall when he is bedside.

IandIatrogenic said:

Well you would have like to of thought it was in jest because he was that type of lecturer who enjoyed using levity which IMO is always welcome from the Ben-Stein-reading-off-his-ppts- type but he did it multiple times to the point where it became apparent, at least to me, that he indeed has self-esteem issues. He also mentioned he wasn't very bright multiple times...boy I'd love to be a fly on the wall when he is bedside.

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Obviously a self-esteem, childhood issue, that he thought he could shake by going through medical school instead of seeking much needed and much cheaper therapy.

w a n g said:

At NSU, a good portion (maybe up to 50%) of my friends registered for the USMLE.

Our school did not discourage us. In fact, some faculty members definitely recommended it: If you have the means to take it, take it.

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Yes they did. The dean told the M1 class last year NOT to take the USMLE. The admin there are a bunch of circus clowns with their own agendas.

At my school they take the stance that don't apply to allo unless you have stellar stats for that field b/c you're minimizing you're chances of getting of getting what you want. I guess it makes sense since DO students are isolated from the competitiveness of the allo world and may apply without realizing what they're up against.

bravotwozero said:

Yes they did. The dean told the M1 class last year NOT to take the USMLE. The admin there are a bunch of circus clowns with their own agendas.

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surprising. they never told our class that (2010) as far as i remember.

i recall one of the deans saying if you have the means to take it, take it.

.

There is a good article in the Journal of Academic Medicine talking about the current state of post-doctoral osteopathic education.

The Predicament of Osteopathic Postdoctoral Education http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17122485

Dr. Rohrer from the MSU Statewide Campus System just gave a talk to Touro CA students in Feb- he said that in reality, only 1/3 of the D.O. students who apply to allopathic residencies actually end up getting them. Has anyone else heard this? I want to think that he's saying it to make sure we apply to statewide campus system D.O. residencies... but imagine if this is actually true- that means over half of the students in my class will not get their first choice. Some of the most qualified students in my class will be scrambling for the leftover DO residencies after the match.

HealingDoc said:

Dr. Rohrer from the MSU Statewide Campus System just gave a talk to Touro CA students in Feb- he said that in reality, only 1/3 of the D.O. students who apply to allopathic residencies actually end up getting them. Has anyone else heard this? I want to think that he's saying it to make sure we apply to statewide campus system D.O. residencies... but imagine if this is actually true- that means over half of the students in my class will not get their first choice. Some of the most qualified students in my class will be scrambling for the leftover DO residencies after the match.

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It's way higher than 33%.

http://www.nrmp.org/data/resultsanddata2009.pdf

If I'm reading page 16 right, just under 70% of active osteo applicants match. An "active applicant" is someone who submits a rank order list. So there would be a few more who applied and didn't submit a rank order list but I doubt anywhere near the amount needed for such a low match rate. To actually be a 33% match rate, basically every osteo student would have to apply to ACGME programs (~4000 students) which i doubt happens.

Also, I dont think it takes into account people who pre-match so that would raise the rate that applicants get ACGME programs. So I think Dr Rohrer was wrong.

One of the biggest problems in terms of DOs and residencies is that the osteo match happens before the allo match and if you match osteo, you're automatically withdrawn from allo.

I'm just a first year, but I can tell you now that there's an allo residency program I've had my eye on since applying to med school. It's what inspired me to be a doctor so that's my first choice. But my second choice is an osteo residency in the mid-west. Thanks to the fact that the osteo match is first, if I get an interview at that allo residency in fourth year, I will withdraw from the osteo match and take my chances which could mean settling for my third or fourth or fifth choice residency instead of my second choice which would have been an osteo program.

All the 2009 ACGME match data is available here:
http://www.nrmp.org/data/resultsanddata2009.pdf

Here's a summary of allo matches secured by DO grads across the country in 2009:

Dermatology: 0
Urology: 0
ENT: 0
Radiation oncology: 0 (1 PGY2)
Neurosurgery: 1
Plastic Surgery: 1
Orthopedic Surgery: 5
Diagnostic Radiology: 8 (31 PGY2)
Neurology: 10 (35 PGY2)
PM&R: 15 (86 PGY2)
General Surgery: 31
Pathology: 34
Anesthesiology: 53 (48 PGY2)
Psychiatry: 102
OBGYN: 108
Emergency Medicine: 163 (8 PGY2)
Pediatrics: 190
Family Medicine: 244
Internal Medicine: 306

ncguy2005 said:

Assuming there is roughly 4,000 DO students in each class, that would mean ~32% of DO students match into an allopathic program. Correct?

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Correct (1400/4000), although 70% of DO students who ranked an allopathic residency matched. So half the DO class applied for an allo residency, of that 70% matched into one.

These people will give you advice based on their experiences. If they themselves did the AOA match, and did just fine, they may tell you that you don't need to bother with the ACGME match. If they went the military route, they may not be as familiar with the other processes, having not gone through them.

But remember that these people are in the profession, and they've got some experience. So listen to what they have to say, and then make up your own mind.

womp said:

Correct (1400/4000), although 70% of DO students who ranked an allopathic residency matched. So half the DO class applied for an allo residency, of that 70% matched into one.

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I also noticed that the other 30% either didn't make a rank list or they withdrew from the match. Would that mean that 100% of those who wanted to match, did indeed match?

JRjcu08 said:

I also noticed that the other 30% either didn't make a rank list or they withdrew from the match. Would that mean that 100% of those who wanted to match, did indeed match?

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No.

There were a total 2875 osteo applicants to ACGME residencies.

So 2015 DO students finished the process and submitted a rank order list. Of that, only 70% matched.

Additionally, 700 withdrew... some because they were automatically withdrawn when they matched osteo some because of other reasons. Also 150 didn't submit a ROL.

womp said:

All the 2009 ACGME match data is available here:
http://www.nrmp.org/data/resultsanddata2009.pdf

Here's a summary of allo matches secured by DO grads across the country in 2009:

Dermatology: 0
Urology: 0
ENT: 0
Radiation oncology: 0 (1 PGY2)
Neurosurgery: 1
Plastic Surgery: 1
Orthopedic Surgery: 5
Diagnostic Radiology: 8 (31 PGY2)
Neurology: 10 (35 PGY2)
PM&R: 15 (86 PGY2)
General Surgery: 31
Pathology: 34
Anesthesiology: 53 (48 PGY2)
Psychiatry: 102
OBGYN: 108
Emergency Medicine: 163 (8 PGY2)
Pediatrics: 190
Family Medicine: 244
Internal Medicine: 306

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I must be reading this wrong. Are you saying that only 8 DO's matched in radiology last year? That seems awfully low when this year PCOM has 6.

those numbers are only referring to allopathic radiology spots taken by DOs

goozoo said:

those numbers are only referring to allopathic radiology spots taken by DOs

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Yes, but this doesn't seem to square with the results posted elsewhere on this forum. If I remember correctly, weren't 5 of those 6 PCOM radiology matches supposedly allopathic?

majority are advanced positions (pgy2)

womp said:

All the 2009 ACGME match data is available here:
http://www.nrmp.org/data/resultsanddata2009.pdf

Here's a summary of allo matches secured by DO grads across the country in 2009:

Dermatology: 0
Urology: 0
ENT: 0
Radiation oncology: 0 (1 PGY2)
Neurosurgery: 1
Plastic Surgery: 1
Orthopedic Surgery: 5
Diagnostic Radiology: 8 (31 PGY2)
Neurology: 10 (35 PGY2)
PM&R: 15 (86 PGY2)
General Surgery: 31
Pathology: 34
Anesthesiology: 53 (48 PGY2)
Psychiatry: 102
OBGYN: 108
Emergency Medicine: 163 (8 PGY2)
Pediatrics: 190
Family Medicine: 244
Internal Medicine: 306

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This cannot be accurate. I know for a fact that our class (NSU 2009) had 1 allopathic Dermatology match and 1 allopathic Urology match (the latter of which signed outside the match).

IMDoc607 said:

I must be reading this wrong. Are you saying that only 8 DO's matched in radiology last year? That seems awfully low when this year PCOM has 6.

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GA-PCOM got two radiology spots at Medical College of Georgia last year, and I thought they had another allopathic radiology match somewhere else too, but I can't remember for sure.