2026 Match Day

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ramsesthenice said:
I don’t know the data or claim to be an expert, but my best friend is a urologist who completed training about 6 years ago. He did 5 interviews and got 4 offers in the span of about 2 months. Mind you, his wife is a breast surgeon and hers was really the limiting factor as that is also a small field. His ability to quickly get good positions after she landed interviews was impressive and would have been a tall order for us. He also started getting countless recruiters and ads for positions going into his last year of training. I don’t doubt that he could have had double digit offers if he wanted.

Caveat: he’s a generalist that mostly treats stones. My understanding is that oncology focused urology positions are a bit more competitive. Better than us, but still fewer positions than general community urologists.
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I also think they can get double digit offers. But if yield rates are somewhere between 60-80%, we are talking about half or more residents going away on 30-50 interviews. These are usually 2 day affairs. That is 60-100 days off for interviewing. That is a lot. I got two offers out of 5 and it was at least 12 days of interviewing+travel. I was impatient and very picky about where I wanted to live, so I accepted in December of PGY5. SERO was like 2.5-3 days if IIRC. And then a second visit. It's not that I don't think a urologist could get 30 offers, it's that to actually get 30 terms sheets is a lot. Maybe the way the survey was designed, the radoncs that answered yes meant they had paper in hand, while urologists may have felt that a phone call discussing salary was an offer.

So much of this is subjective, I suppose. If the young folks you know are getting several offers, then it seems like all is well. If you're faculty and your residents are struggling, it probably seems very bad out there.
 
TheWallnerus said:
Darn it, my bad, I was off by one; in fact, it is median 2 offers per rad onc resident (~20% get one).
View attachment 416856

I was picking on urology, but I don't have urology data per se. I'm making assumptions about which specialties are "inundated" with the job opportunities (narrator's voice: it's not rad onc).

View attachment 416857
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Fairly certain the Medicare coding and reimbursement changes this year will not improve the job market one bit
 
medgator said:
Fairly certain the Medicare coding and reimbursement changes this year will not improve the job market one bit
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Isn’t it amazing that ~200 jobs appear every year for the graduates. Less reimbursement, less fractions, less on beam, less indications, greater competition in larger markets… and yet the jobs keep appearing. Maybe time to give up “sky is falling” talk because it seems hard to make predictions (especially about the future) and in fact every negative metric seems to be met with an improvement in the job market and our salaries. It’s like rad onc has a Maxwell’s demon forestalling the universe’s attempts to disorder us!
 
drowsy12 said:
I think many of us are treating way more metastatic patients (and multiple times, with advanced techniques) than 5 years ago, let alone the massive difference from 10 years ago.
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I need the data not the anecdotes to know how to answer. I don’t doubt the truth obv, but it doesn’t factor in the breast and prostate hypofx etc. All we have are data showing the majority of US centers are low volume, that indications are in fact falling, etc etc.
 
M

Thread 'Job Market'

I am a MS1 interested in entering in radiation oncology but I have been told by several recent graduates that the job market is deteriorating. I know of one person who finished his residency a few years ago from a NorCal program who can't find a full time position in NorCal or the state of CA all together. He said the field is too specialized and the demand far exceeds the supply unless you want work in North Dakota or some small town in Indiana or Alabama. I know I have a long way to go in regards of my education but I don't want to shoot for a specialty that offers few positions and is...

Kind of interesting to read job market descriptions from 20 years ago, sounds more similar than different
 
radiation said:
M

Thread 'Job Market'

I am a MS1 interested in entering in radiation oncology but I have been told by several recent graduates that the job market is deteriorating. I know of one person who finished his residency a few years ago from a NorCal program who can't find a full time position in NorCal or the state of CA all together. He said the field is too specialized and the demand far exceeds the supply unless you want work in North Dakota or some small town in Indiana or Alabama. I know I have a long way to go in regards of my education but I don't want to shoot for a specialty that offers few positions and is...

Kind of interesting to read job market descriptions from 20 years ago, sounds more similar than different
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Great find! I think you're right. Same story about geographic issues. That was 20 years ago! Wild.
 
WildRivers said:
I also think they can get double digit offers. But if yield rates are somewhere between 60-80%, we are talking about half or more residents going away on 30-50 interviews. These are usually 2 day affairs. That is 60-100 days off for interviewing. That is a lot. I got two offers out of 5 and it was at least 12 days of interviewing+travel. I was impatient and very picky about where I wanted to live, so I accepted in December of PGY5. SERO was like 2.5-3 days if IIRC. And then a second visit. It's not that I don't think a urologist could get 30 offers, it's that to actually get 30 terms sheets is a lot. Maybe the way the survey was designed, the radoncs that answered yes meant they had paper in hand, while urologists may have felt that a phone call discussing salary was an offer.

So much of this is subjective, I suppose. If the young folks you know are getting several offers, then it seems like all is well. If you're faculty and your residents are struggling, it probably seems very bad out there.
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I agree with your math. I don't know why anyone would do that. I suspect people are conflating phone contacts and soft offers with firm contracts. Those are very different. Im a physician scientist. I was 99% sure my home program was going to offer me a job and had 2 other places securing cancer center funding to make a position for me when the place I signed with made me an exceptional offer that I accepted in September. Technically, I only had one contract in hand. I have since confirmed that my home program was going to present me with a contract the following week as was another program (I still collaborate with that chair). If I were given that survey, I would say that I had one offer since I only had one contract. But I could see other people saying 3. These things can get squishy.
 
ramsesthenice said:
I agree with your math. I don't know why anyone would do that. I suspect people are conflating phone contacts and soft offers with firm contracts. Those are very different. Im a physician scientist. I was 99% sure my home program was going to offer me a job and had 2 other places securing cancer center funding to make a position for me when the place I signed with made me an exceptional offer that I accepted in September. Technically, I only had one contract in hand. I have since confirmed that my home program was going to present me with a contract the following week as was another program (I still collaborate with that chair). If I were given that survey, I would say that I had one offer since I only had one contract. But I could see other people saying 3. These things can get squishy.
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That's amazing. I wanted to be a physician-scientist, but I was rejected for both research fellowships and physician-scientist positions. I took a 100% clinical position with no startup package that I converted to multi-R01 funding. So, did I get 1 offer or 0? I count it as 1.

I could have pushed for some other clinical positions though since I was willing to go anywhere in the country. Ultimately, I guess I did have a few options. I agree, it's fuzzy sometimes. Flexibility is a good thing since there were absolutely zero positions in the state where I wanted to practice when I graduated.

medgator said:
They have 4 positions in 2026? 🤦🏾🤦🏾🤦🏾🤦🏾
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Maybe the strategy is to keep expanding to prevent the stronger department on the other side of town from getting their own residency program.
 
Neuronix said:
That's amazing. I wanted to be a physician-scientist, but I was rejected for both research fellowships and physician-scientist positions. I took a 100% clinical position with no startup package that I converted to multi-R01 funding. So, did I get 1 offer or 0? I count it as 1.
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Flexibility. If we want to get really technical, I did the same thing you did. My first job was 65% clinical (about half way between full clinical and true PS) because that i what they could offer at the time but they liked my vision and had the infrastructure and funding to make it happen. I was able to get funding pretty quick and move to 40% clinical. Since so much of what I was doing was trials, I never pushed to go further. There are nuances you can't learn in training and honestly I got lucky. The main reason to be a full on PS with 80% protected research is to secure enough funding for your personal employees in the lab and yourself. Another approach which I prefer, is to have a small lab space of your own with 1-2 full time employees embedded in a larger established space. Rather than needing 1-2 RO1 equivalents at all times to keep people employed, I buy portions of peoples times from the larger lab to keep things moving forward. Its much more doable when a lot of your revenue is from industry. I personally like being in clinic and the added clinical revenue makes me much more appealing to the institution. I've had people quip over whether I am technically a PS or not based on my research FTE. I don't honestly care what you call me. I like my arrangement 🙂
 
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Neuronix said:
That's amazing. I wanted to be a physician-scientist, but I was rejected for both research fellowships and physician-scientist positions. I took a 100% clinical position with no startup package that I converted to multi-R01 funding. So, did I get 1 offer or 0? I count it as 1.

I could have pushed for some other clinical positions though since I was willing to go anywhere in the country. Ultimately, I guess I did have a few options. I agree, it's fuzzy sometimes. Flexibility is a good thing since there were absolutely zero positions in the state where I wanted to practice when I graduated.



Maybe the strategy is to keep expanding to prevent the stronger department on the other side of town from getting their own residency program.
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Miami has been at 4 since at least I was an applicant
 
drowsy12 said:
Miami has been at 4 since at least I was an applicant
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Depends on the year. I don't recall them ever at 16 residents (4 per year). They wanted to expand during the COVID days, but did not fill for a few years in the first round of the match so were not allowed by the institution. My understanding was after filling consistently for a few years they were allowed to add a slot to get to 4 this year instead of 3.
 
Neuronix said:
Depends on the year. I don't recall them ever at 16 residents (4 per year). They wanted to expand during the COVID days, but did not fill for a few years in the first round of the match so were not allowed by the institution. My understanding was after filling consistently for a few years they were allowed to add a slot to get to 4 this year instead of 3.
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maybe it was my year then yeah. alternating.
 
Neuronix said:
I hear different things from different people. It was before my time. Our old program director used to say that they had seven job offers in South Florida when they finished their training. Was it an exaggeration?
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Anyone graduate 2007- 2009? Jobs in Los Angeles, nyc, Miami,sf. Not always good jobs, but available nevertheless. Best jobs were partnership tracts in good locations such as the Princeton or coia groups.
 
drowsy12 said:
sounds like now.
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This is what I was thinking too. There was job openings in LA just a few months ago that I posted about for 550k (2 openings at kaiser). Multiple residents I know took offers in and around NYC/Philly. There's multiple hirings at Miami/Ft. Lauderdale. One hired in SF.
I will admit every resident I talk to is from a "good" residency, so I'm not entirely sure how accessible this is to all rad oncs. But there definitely are openings in those areas.
 
Yes, I think there is a bit of a disconnect. I came in right after 2008 crash, nobody retired and my hiring year kind of stunk. But it picked back up and it seem relatively stable.

There are differences, though.

Employment at a hospital has become the norm. Something around 550-650k with incentives for RVU usually around $55-65/rvu. The starting salaries at hospitals will always be higher than freestanding or partnership track PSA groups, so for the vast majority of younger docs, they are starting at salaries way higher than I did. I was at $240k for year 1. SERO was right around that number in 2010. Now, everyone starts at $450k+ at a community job, closer to 500k plus, probably.

There are very few PSA only or freestanding partnership opportunities available. Some are good. Some will never truly lead to partnership and the very good ones are pretty hard to get. Without technical ownership, as alluded to above, PSA only jobs are probably less financially optimal compared to a busy hospital practice. Plus, hospital salaried employees have a floor. A bad year for a pro fee only group could be brutal for the partners. It happens from time to time.

Seems like most people have an opportunity for an admin day or a 4 day work week. This is new from when I started. Those were golden opportunities back in the day. Seems routine now.

I think the "band" of salaries has narrowed. Most people make the median due to monopolistic usage of FMV with bonuses to be busy. I know multiple people crossing the $1m line, but it's not many people these days. Seems easiest at a busy hospital practice, plus you get benefits and covered vacation and 401k matches and such. I don't hear too many people making sub 500 that are more than a few years out.

I've not heard of anyone not able to find a job. No breadlines, yet. I know several people looking and almost immediately finding opportunities, albeit not in the desirable places for elites, but very desirable to them. SE Michigan is not a great market we all are about the same and there is no way to grow the pie, only to cannibilize each other. I presume it gets worse as University of Michigan is finally entering Oakland County and I heard putting in 2-3 linacs. That will hurt all of us.

That being said, 4 day work weeks, 15 on beam, 6-8 weeks ff... it's not too bad. Particularly as we experience occupational feminization, this will be desirable for most graduates. Did you see the match pictures this year? The first 25 I saw, I think 20 were women. I wonder what the final ratio will be.

But it is not great for those with ambition to earn a lot or to be a very busy doctor. I'd take a consult or two each day this week extra if they were available.
 
totally agree. I would add that I observed the same. will wait to see what the stats show to be objective about it but it does seem that a higher proportion of US MD women are attracted to the field
 
is RadOnc really going through occupational feminization? that is a negative if true
 
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WildRivers said:
Yes, I think there is a bit of a disconnect. I came in right after 2008 crash, nobody retired and my hiring year kind of stunk. But it picked back up and it seem relatively stable.

There are differences, though.

Employment at a hospital has become the norm. Something around 550-650k with incentives for RVU usually around $55-65/rvu. The starting salaries at hospitals will always be higher than freestanding or partnership track PSA groups, so for the vast majority of younger docs, they are starting at salaries way higher than I did. I was at $240k for year 1. SERO was right around that number in 2010. Now, everyone starts at $450k+ at a community job, closer to 500k plus, probably.

There are very few PSA only or freestanding partnership opportunities available. Some are good. Some will never truly lead to partnership and the very good ones are pretty hard to get. Without technical ownership, as alluded to above, PSA only jobs are probably less financially optimal compared to a busy hospital practice. Plus, hospital salaried employees have a floor. A bad year for a pro fee only group could be brutal for the partners. It happens from time to time.

Seems like most people have an opportunity for an admin day or a 4 day work week. This is new from when I started. Those were golden opportunities back in the day. Seems routine now.

I think the "band" of salaries has narrowed. Most people make the median due to monopolistic usage of FMV with bonuses to be busy. I know multiple people crossing the $1m line, but it's not many people these days. Seems easiest at a busy hospital practice, plus you get benefits and covered vacation and 401k matches and such. I don't hear too many people making sub 500 that are more than a few years out.

I've not heard of anyone not able to find a job. No breadlines, yet. I know several people looking and almost immediately finding opportunities, albeit not in the desirable places for elites, but very desirable to them. SE Michigan is not a great market we all are about the same and there is no way to grow the pie, only to cannibilize each other. I presume it gets worse as University of Michigan is finally entering Oakland County and I heard putting in 2-3 linacs. That will hurt all of us.

That being said, 4 day work weeks, 15 on beam, 6-8 weeks ff... it's not too bad. Particularly as we experience occupational feminization, this will be desirable for most graduates. Did you see the match pictures this year? The first 25 I saw, I think 20 were women. I wonder what the final ratio will be.

But it is not great for those with ambition to earn a lot or to be a very busy doctor. I'd take a consult or two each day this week extra if they were available.
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I’m glad you mentioned feminization. I checked the match lists of my top 10 ranks. Only 1 place was majority men. One place had equal amounts men and women. 8/10 places were either majority women or entirely women. I think like 4/10 were literally solely women.

Does anyone know the gender stats? Did way more women apply this year or is this an internal initiative?

The PD at a very top program literally told my friend “you may notice far more women here are interviewing than men. That’s on purpose. We need more women in this field.”

I’m frankly surprised more women weren’t interested in this field historically considering its lifestyle/salary.
 
55% of matriculants to medical school in 2025 were women, so statistically we would start to expect more women than men in the field sooner rather than later. In my experience radonc has always had pretty balanced numbers when it comes to sex representation. My residency was about 50/50 the whole time I was there.

"You may notice far more women here are interviewing than men. That's on purpose." - Admission of sex-based discrimination in hiring for a training program which is sponsored by federal dollars. Not legal. Doubt they care.
 
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As a guy I’d be very happy if more women applied to rad onc. I’m not a huge fan of gyn cases so I’d love to have a woman in my future practice to treat them. Also, on average, women work less hours which means more opportunities for me. All in all, women are very welcome in rad onc.
 
55% / 45% is what it's been last few years for med school. 60/40 for undergraduate. My friends' sons tell me the ratio is phenomenal at parties. But ... the young kids don't really party, so ... anyway...

There's a tipping point. It is much more likely to go to 60/40 or even more lopsided than the other way. Once an industry goes in that direction, it rarely comes back to middle. Same for specialties, too. It is not really a judgment, but as ProtonX says, there will need to be some adjustments with less work hours and flex schedules that come with the extra responsibilities that woman have outside of work.

I really am curious based on the social media profiles how much it has swung or if it was just sampling. I thought it had been 2/3 men and 1/3 women for most of the last several years.

It is interesting when this sort of thing happens, there aren't affinity groups like "Society for Male Pediatricians" that pop up to increase recruitment. And, maybe it would be good for other specialties to have balance, instead of only looking to change the demographics of male heavy specialties.

Any program directors here any more and have the data?
 
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For too long, radonc has been a sclerotic bastion of cis hetero Caucasian males. It now seems that virtually none of them are matriculating into the club. Where are they going? - ortho
 
DrProtonX said:
As a guy I’d be very happy if more women applied to rad onc. I’m not a huge fan of gyn cases so I’d love to have a woman in my future practice to treat them. Also, on average, women work less hours which means more opportunities for me. All in all, women are very welcome in rad onc.
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I’m dying I never even thought of that 😭😭😭
 
WildRivers said:
55% / 45% is what it's been last few years for med school. 60/40 for undergraduate. My friends' sons tell me the ratio is phenomenal at parties. But ... the young kids don't really party, so ... anyway...

There's a tipping point. It is much more likely to go to 60/40 or even more lopsided than the other way. Once an industry goes in that direction, it rarely comes back to middle. Same for specialties, too. It is not really a judgment, but as ProtonX says, there will need to be some adjustments with less work hours and flex schedules that come with the extra responsibilities that woman have outside of work.

I really am curious based on the social media profiles how much it has swung or if it was just sampling. I thought it had been 2/3 men and 1/3 women for most of the last several years.

It is interesting when this sort of thing happens, there aren't affinity groups like "Society for Male Pediatricians" that pop up to increase recruitment. And, maybe it would be good for other specialties to have balance, instead of only looking to change the demographics of male heavy specialties.

Any program directors here any more and have the data?
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I think a lot of it is just due to the nature of the field. The field men aren’t in (as a whole, in and outside of medicine) are fields that don’t pay well and aren’t prestigious. What’s the worst paying specialty? Pediatrics.

My first year of med school, a group of women asked me why I wouldn’t do optho. There were multiple reasons, but one I mentioned was that there’s substantial planned cuts to cataract reimbursement on top of the significant cuts already. And cataracts make up a massive percentage of many optho volume.

Most women criticized me for even knowing that or factoring that in. But every man I’ve ever mentioned that to has thanked me for letting them know lol. Different priorities.

Truthfully, if rad onc’s salary got cut in half, I probably wouldn’t have picked this field. Meanwhile the women I know didn’t really even google rad onc salaries.
 
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TheWallnerus said:
I need the data not the anecdotes to know how to answer. I don’t doubt the truth obv, but it doesn’t factor in the breast and prostate hypofx etc. All we have are data showing the majority of US centers are low volume, that indications are in fact falling, etc etc.
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Here are some data from our clinic.

In 2019 we treated 304 patients for metastatic sites.

In 2025 we treated 402 patients for metastatic sites.

Overall, our total numbers of patients rose by about 81 in this period, meaning that we are treating more patients for metastatic disease and slightly less for other scenarios.
 
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Palex80 said:
Most of the males in this age group are white in Europe.
There will be a shift in the coming decades.
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I haven’t spotted a white male in a cursory review of twitter posts. Maybe they are applying to other specialties or this is representattive of the current graduating medical class.
 
allseasons said:
Even that doesn’t seem true because when supply was through the roof a few years ago, salaries rose every year per mgma and doximity.
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My anecdote is that in my first job I was the lowest paid in the practice for several years. They hired according to AAMC 25th percentile assistant professor which did keep going up, but existing faculty basically never got pay raises.

I got promoted to associate professor, and that was supposed to trigger a pay raise to 25th percentile associate professor. After several months of asking the department admin for the pay raise, I got a sternly worded email from the chair telling me they didn’t know when, if, or how much pay raise I would get so stop asking.

Well over the next year I got an offer elsewhere, several faculty had quit in the interim, and those two things led to me getting a substantial pay raise. Otherwise, I probably would have been told to just leave as had been told to other faculty in the past.

Supply and demand.
 
Neuronix said:
My anecdote is that in my first job I was the lowest paid in the practice for several years. They hired according to AAMC 25th percentile assistant professor which did keep going up, but existing faculty basically never got pay raises.

I got promoted to associate professor, and that was supposed to trigger a pay raise to 25th percentile associate professor. After several months of asking the department admin for the pay raise, I got a sternly worded email from the chair telling me they didn’t know when, if, or how much pay raise I would get so stop asking.

Well over the next year I got an offer elsewhere, several faculty had quit in the interim, and those two things led to me getting a substantial pay raise. Otherwise, I probably would have been told to just leave as had been told to other faculty in the past.

Supply and demand.
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This is exactly why the number of residency spots needs to be cut significantly ideally by 50% but realistically 20-30% would be good enough. There’s a whole debate on twitter about physician shortage in US… it’s utter bs. There’s no shortage, it’s just that many physicians don’t wanna work in bum**** iowa for slightly higher pay. Offer any non NSGY/CTS physician $1M+ and very quickly you’ll find out there’s no shortage at all
 
DrProtonX said:
This is exactly why the number of residency spots needs to be cut significantly ideally by 50% but realistically 20-30% would be good enough. There’s a whole debate on twitter about physician shortage in US… it’s utter bs. There’s no shortage, it’s just that many physicians don’t wanna work in bum**** iowa for slightly higher pay. Offer any non NSGY/CTS physician $1M+ and very quickly you’ll find out there’s no shortage at all
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Exactly. Not that long ago, Astro was using the rural bs to justify our residency expansion.
 
DrProtonX said:
This is exactly why the number of residency spots needs to be cut significantly ideally by 50% but realistically 20-30% would be good enough. There’s a whole debate on twitter about physician shortage in US… it’s utter bs. There’s no shortage, it’s just that many physicians don’t wanna work in bum**** iowa for slightly higher pay. Offer any non NSGY/CTS physician $1M+ and very quickly you’ll find out there’s no shortage at all
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Sheriff of sodium did a video on this and showed how even according to the aamc’s own projections, the doctor shortage wouldn’t be real past 2050.
 
oh one thing to add that no one mentioned- the number of MD applicants to rad onc rose from 142 to 157 this year. I think it might be the highest percentage of any specialty (though admittedly that's a lot easier to achieve in this field than most others because of the small size).
 
allseasons said:
oh one thing to add that no one mentioned- the number of MD applicants to rad onc rose from 142 to 157 this year. I think it might be the highest percentage of any specialty (though admittedly that's a lot easier to achieve in this field than most others because of the small size).
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Still way more spots than MD applicants right? Doesn't sound competitive
 
allseasons said:
oh one thing to add that no one mentioned- the number of MD applicants to rad onc rose from 142 to 157 this year. I think it might be the highest percentage of any specialty (though admittedly that's a lot easier to achieve in this field than most others because of the small size).
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The highest percentage of anything that is the highest percentage of a thing doesn't get there "easily."

There is a "tremendous gulf" between 96% and 99% no matter the sample size.

For all practical purposes it is not easier to toss 190/200 heads vs 1,900,000/2,000,000 heads.

When a study with sample size n=12 gives 12/12 unexpected results, it shows a sui generis thing, even with n=12.
 
Is there any data released on applicants by gender for each specialty? I haven't been able to find it for 2025 or 2026.
 
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