Are there really only 12 residency vacancies around the country? Have things changed that much since I was a resident?

[tennis1980]

Back when I was a resident I had the impression there were lots of unfilled positions around the country in various specialties. Spots would remain unfilled even after the match/scramble/soap, some would open up during the year as residents resigned for various reasons, etc.

I was looking into this recently and I was surprised to see that there are only 12 open positions around the country, according to the findaresident site.

Is this true? Findaresident seems like the “official” place where positions would be listed, I’m not sure if vacancies get posted elsewhere.

Do programs these days prefer to leave spots empty rather than fill them outside the match/soap, or maybe spots get filled up more quickly?

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[mvenus929]

Not sure everyone's mentality, but we had residents leave for various reasons during my residency, and none of the openings were listed on Findaresident. They just remained empty.

 

[Iamnew2]

Not sure everyone's mentality, but we had residents leave for various reasons during my residency, and none of the openings were listed on Findaresident. They just remained empty.

Had the same issue at my former residency. Two people left, the program director didn't bother to find replacements so they remained empty. Seems nonsensical.

 

[mvenus929]

Had the same issue at my former residency. Two people left, the program director didn't bother to find replacements so they remained empty. Seems nonsensical.

Eh. We had one person quit after 2nd year (of a 3 year residency) and another have issues and left during third year. Hard to replace senior level residents.

 

[Taddy Mason]

We’ve roughly averaged 1 vacancy per class (outside of people fast-tracking into CAP) over the past 5-6 years for a variety of reasons (switching programs within the specialty, switching specialties, formal dismissal for professional and competency issues, medical/personal issues, leaving medicine altogether, etc.). The vacancies were never advertised on Findaresident and were filled almost immediately via word of mouth or through advertisement on the APA website.

 

[Vandalia]

Not sure everyone's mentality, but we had residents leave for various reasons during my residency, and none of the openings were listed on Findaresident. They just remained empty.

Would you trust anyone who was out there who didn't even find a position through SOAP and was working at McDonald's in October?

Even if by a miracle you did find a qualified person, it would be tough to integrate them into a residency program in the middle of the year.

It is far easier to rely on mid-levels to cover the basic patient care, and given the behemoths that academic institutions have become, you can always bring in a board certified physician from an outlying site for procedures, and/or fill that with a locum.

You are far, far, better off advertising a new spot in the match the next year than trying to find someone sitting around in October.

 

[instantkarma]

finished my pgy training nearly 30 years ago. seems today there is no lack of docs that are fully residency trained from their country and quite competent but did not get a residency slot in US maybe due to usmle score not high enough but respectable. i trained with such docs and they were way ahead of the eight ball.

 

[Redpancreas]

Back when I was a resident I had the impression there were lots of unfilled positions around the country in various specialties. Spots would remain unfilled even after the match/scramble/soap, some would open up during the year as residents resigned for various reasons, etc.

I was looking into this recently and I was surprised to see that there are only 12 open positions around the country, according to the findaresident site.

Is this true? Findaresident seems like the “official” place where positions would be listed, I’m not sure if vacancies get posted elsewhere.

Do programs these days prefer to leave spots empty rather than fill them outside the match/soap, or maybe spots get filled up more quickly?

Think of the unfilled spots you were aware of that led you to form this impression when you were a resident. Is that residency spot on the list of 12 of the website/list you're looking at? Why not?

In short, the system is in a state of equilibrium between residents leaving and residents filling gaps. As a thought experiment, imagine that programs had to document every resident that left a program at some point. That list would be enormous.