Does State residency matter when applying for residencies?

[Hifey]

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Basically, say I'm currently a resident of state X but I end up going to an oos school in state Y which will offer me instate admission after the first year once I become a resident of State Y. When it comes time to apply for residencies, if I want to match back into state X, will my new status as resident of state Y affect anything?

Also, are there any real advantages to going to a school that has matched a good number of its students in the state ( in this case state X) that you want to match into over another school that has not?

thanks!

 

[bannie22]

Interesting thread.

Someone please fill us in.

What if I'm international? Am I fighting another uphill battle again!? 🙁

 

[alibai3ah]

Agreed, very interesting question. I would like to know the answer to this also!!

To the OP,
I am completely guessing. But I think even if you change your state residency, in your residency application (ERAS or something), I'm sure you write down your undergraduate institution. So they will see that you have some "connection" to the state or that program. Again I'm completely guessing, but I get a more informative answer to this....

 

[Parts Unknown]

Basically, say I'm currently a resident of state X but I end up going to an oos school in state Y which will offer me instate admission after the first year once I become a resident of State Y. When it comes time to apply for residencies, if I want to match back into state X, will my new status as resident of state Y affect anything?

Also, are there any real advantages to going to a school that has matched a good number of its students in the state ( in this case state X) that you want to match into over another school that has not?

thanks!

Short answer: No, state residency has no formal impact on the match.

Longer answer: Residency programs have a limited number of interview spots, and have to balance offering them to people who 1) are well qualified, and 2) likely to come to the program.

Example: if you are a residency program director in Minneapolis, and you receive an application from a stellar candidate in Miami, you may think "What are the odds of this guy wanting to come freeze his ass off up here?" and pass him over for someone regional. In that sense, your school's location can help or harm you.

Exception 1: Some programs are so competitive that they can accept anyone from anywhere and rest assured they will relocate to train.

Exception 2: Sometimes people can make a good case for distant programs. Going from the East Coast to San Francisco can be understood in the context of San Francisco just being a really cool city. Or the guy from Miami in my example may be couples matching with his fiancée who is from Minneapolis. That would help.

Confused yet?

 

[bannie22]

Short answer: No, state residency has no formal impact on the match.

Longer answer: Residency programs have a limited number of interview spots, and have to balance offering them to people who 1) are well qualified, and 2) likely to come to the program.

Example: if you are a residency program director in Minneapolis, and you receive an application from a stellar candidate in Miami, you may think "What are the odds of this guy wanting to come freeze his ass off up here?" and pass him over for someone regional. In that sense, your school's location can help or harm you.

Exception 1: Some programs are so competitive that they can accept anyone from anywhere and rest assured they will relocate to train.

Exception 2: Sometimes people can make a good case for distant programs. Going from the East Coast to San Francisco can be understood in the context of San Francisco just being a really cool city. Or the guy from Miami in my example may be couples matching with his fiancée who is from Minneapolis. That would help.

Confused yet?

Any input on international students?

 

[alibai3ah]

Short answer: No, state residency has no formal impact on the match.

Longer answer: Residency programs have a limited number of interview spots, and have to balance offering them to people who 1) are well qualified, and 2) likely to come to the program.

Example: if you are a residency program director in Minneapolis, and you receive an application from a stellar candidate in Miami, you may think "What are the odds of this guy wanting to come freeze his ass off up here?" and pass him over for someone regional. In that sense, your school's location can help or harm you.

Exception 1: Some programs are so competitive that they can accept anyone from anywhere and rest assured they will relocate to train.

Exception 2: Sometimes people can make a good case for distant programs. Going from the East Coast to San Francisco can be understood in the context of San Francisco just being a really cool city. Or the guy from Miami in my example may be couples matching with his fiancée who is from Minneapolis. That would help.

Confused yet?

Interesting. So does that mean if you have a "connection" to a certain state (say through undergrad or you were a previous resident there), it wouldn't matter.

Say I'm from San Francisco area but I got into medical school Out of State. If I were to apply to San Francisco residencies, would I be looked at the same way as somebody who is from Miami or just as any other OOS? I hope this question makes sense....

 

[Biscuit799]

Interesting. So does that mean if you have a "connection" to a certain state (say through undergrad or you were a previous resident there), it wouldn't matter.

Say I'm from San Francisco area but I got into medical school Out of State. If I were to apply to San Francisco residencies, would I be looked at the same way as somebody who is from Miami or just as any other OOS? I hope this question makes sense....

I applied broadly for residency, and at every interview, I was asked, "Why do you want to leave ___ and come here?" It was definitely important to have a good answer, and places where I had a legitimate answer definitely helped ("I'm originally from here and want to come back home" will definitely work greatly, but "I really love your program" works too).

Short answer: yes, coming back home will be a plus come interview time.

 

[Hifey]

Thanks guys!

Any more thoughts as to the second part of the question about PDs picking people from schools they're more familiar with/ have had grad students from before?

I'm also trying to keep in mind while looking at any match list, that people who were IS for the school I was oos for might very well have wanted to stay in that area and thats why there weren't many matches into State X in this example.

 

[Law2Doc]

Interesting. So does that mean if you have a "connection" to a certain state (say through undergrad or you were a previous resident there), it wouldn't matter.
.

Yes. Residencies want to rank folks who (1) are exceptionally qualified, and (2) will actually come to them over the competition. So the dude who spent his whole life and schooling in NYC and then applies for residency in San Antonio is going to have to do a good job of selling why it is he interested in changing venues; does he have family there, a fiancee who relocated there, used to live there, whatever. Not that this is a major part of the residency determination, but the program may well not waste their time interviewing someone who can't make at least a basic case as to why this region. And not just residencies -- jobs do this as well. As far as simply being able to say you are a resident of a state, however, that's pretty meaningless (it may be meaningful for med schools who get funded by taking X% of in-staters, but that doesn't hold true at the residency level, which isn't school).

 

[Law2Doc]

...

I'm also trying to keep in mind while looking at any match list, that people who were IS for the school I was oos for might very well have wanted to stay in that area and thats why there weren't many matches into State X in this example.

Trying to read match lists is a waste of time for premeds. You don't know why people chose what they did. Everyone has different reasons, motivations. It's like watching the last 2 minutes of a movie without the sound and trying to figure out what happened in the previous 2 hours -- you can't do it. Total waste of time. Did the person who picked Peds in Juno simply not have the stats, or did he get his top choice. You'll never know from the list and the conclusions you draw are more likely wrong than right. Lists that may look amazing may actually be lists of folks who ended up getting places low on their choice list -- you can never know. So steer clear of match lists.

 

[ThaliaNox]

Another factor to keep in mind is whether or not a residency has taken students from your med school in the past. While this is not directly based on residency, closer residency programs, on average, will have taken more students from your school. If the residency program has had good experiences with students from school X, they're more likely to pick students from school X than school Y in the future.

 

[Law2Doc]

... If the residency program has had good experiences with students from school X, they're more likely to pick students from school X than school Y in the future.

The converse is also true -- a prior bad apple can ruin it for everyone. This isn't a factor you can control, but definitely if a residency program feels certain folks are better trained to be interns (which sometimes doesn't jibe with the higher ranked places whose training may be more cerebral and less hands on), those folks have a leg up.

 

[Hifey]

The converse is also true -- a prior bad apple can ruin it for everyone. This isn't a factor you can control, but definitely if a residency program feels certain folks are better trained to be interns (which sometimes doesn't jibe with the higher ranked places whose training may be more cerebral and less hands on), those folks have a leg up.

Thanks Law2Doc. I wasn't particularly interested in exactly what medical centers they matched at (prestigious or their specialities), but more in physical location. I am aware that people from the east coast are more likely to want to match there etc. and that is why I was specifically wondering if a residency program has prior experience with a certain school vs. none with another school, is there an advantage to going to the first school. And the above just answered my question about it.