Comparing Schools' Residency Placement

[TommyJohnMD]

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Fellow SDNers:

I know this might be a tough question, but I was wondering if other than looking at Match lists, if there was a way to determine how well a school places its students into top residencies as well as places them into the residency of their choice (or top 2). I guess my situation is a little peculiar because I know that I really want to go into ortho and it's where my passion is. I'm deciding between a couple schools and quite honestly, I love them both and am having a difficult time deciding. I really just want to weigh out the pros and cons of the two schools and this would help with my decision making,

If it matters to anyone, the schools are Tufts and Georgetown. And if anyone has more input beyond just residency placement on these schools, I would appreciate it as well. Thanks

-TJ

 

[rhesuspieces]

Fellow SDNers:

I know this might be a tough question, but I was wondering if other than looking at Match lists, if there was a way to determine how well a school places its students into top residencies as well as places them into the residency of their choice (or top 2). I guess my situation is a little peculiar because I know that I really want to go into ortho and it's where my passion is. I'm deciding between a couple schools and quite honestly, I love them both and am having a difficult time deciding. I really just want to weigh out the pros and cons of the two schools and this would help with my decision making,

If it matters to anyone, the schools are Tufts and Georgetown. And if anyone has more input beyond just residency placement on these schools, I would appreciate it as well. Thanks

-TJ

The AAMC generally gives a statistic on the percentage of students at any given school who match into one of their top 3 choices. They no longer distinguish between #1 vs 2 vs 3 in the match.

Also, most schools publish their match lists, so you can take a look at those. Don't put too much weight on the number of students that place into a given field, though, because that varies a lot year to year.

 

[lord_jeebus]

I wonder how useful this statistic is, given that people will not rank the programs that denied them interviews. #2 on the rank list could be #10 of all programs they applied to.

 

[DoctwoB]

The AAMC generally gives a statistic on the percentage of students at any given school who match into one of their top 3 choices. They no longer distinguish between #1 vs 2 vs 3 in the match.

This is a very misleading statistic. It is about how many match within their top 3 of the programs they interviewed at. Meaning if you do very poorly in getting interviews and only interview at poor program but still match highly on your list this counts as worse then the guy who interviews at all top 10 programs and goes 4th or 5th (as these programs are tougher to match at) on their list.

EDIT: Damn, Jeebus beat me to it.

Also, most schools publish their match lists, so you can take a look at those. Don't put too much weight on the number of students that place into a given field, though, because that varies a lot year to year.

Agree with this for the most part. I find it most informative to look at where people match at within a given specialty, not the numbers in any specialty.

That being said, certain schools have a stellar reputation within a given specialty that may outstrip their overall reputation. For example columbia is always a top school, but is probably #1 when it comes to matching in neurosurgery. For Ortho, I would definitely pick georgetown as they consistently match pretty well in ortho and have a stronger ortho department then tufts.

 

[NickNaylor]

And I would venture to say that an overwhelming majority of pre-meds don't know what to make of a match list. The big name, powerhouse schools aren't necessarily the most well-reputed places to complete your residency depending upon the field.

 

[TommyJohnMD]

I figured looking at the ortho matches for the past 3-4 years would be the best way to go. I also looked up what residencies are grouped into an upper tier or echelon, but it's still just an approximation. Maybe the way to go is to see how the schools have been trending over the past few years.

Thanks for the input so far everyone.

 

[fahimaz7]

I figured looking at the ortho matches for the past 3-4 years would be the best way to go. I also looked up what residencies are grouped into an upper tier or echelon, but it's still just an approximation. Maybe the way to go is to see how the schools have been trending over the past few years.

Thanks for the input so far everyone.

Go to the cheapest school that you can. What you don't realize now is that it won't matter what medical school you go to, but what matters is how you do with grades/clerkship scores/letters/and board scores. Go look at the MCG match list that I posted in the other thread. We are ranked 60th or something, and we continue to put ~10 people/year into ortho, optho, radiology, derm, etc.

Every single person that applied to the four fields above matched this year. We had 2 neurosurgery guys (one at Children's in boston and the other at Emory) and a Diagnostic Rad guy at Brigham and Woman's hospital.

 

[90minIPA]

As an aside, here's a great resource for understanding match results if you're interested in ortho:

http://www.orthogate.org/forums/viewtopic.php?t=7138

This thread is currently in its infancy, but once it starts to grow, it will contain A LOT of information regarding A) what helps one match into ortho and B) what the best ortho programs are. The analogous thread from 2010 is phenomenal. I also find this reasonably useful when interpreting match lists, since many folks from certain geographical regions are vying for the same programs.