how far are IM applications down this year

[exjersey]

Anybody have any reliable or anecdotal information on the number of IM applicants this year? Any idea how far they are down?

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[ckent]

I don't recall seeing any statistics published by the ACP, but my program director did tell me they have seen a ~5% drop over the past few years. I hope that it will be more substantial this year with the advent of the 80 hr work week and more people who wanted to do surgery going for it. I definitely haven't seen that in my class though, out of my class, apparently, ~40 students have met with my IM program director expressing an interest in IM. I think that my class is an anomoly though, I haven't heard of this jump in IM interest at other schools. Actually, a friend of mine who is going to a top 5 school told me that only 3 people in his entire class were applying to IM, and that his school's IM program wants to recruit ~10 students to go to their IM program alone, so they are all essentially guarenteed a spot in IM at their top school. I think that ER, radiology, derm, anesthesiology, and hopefully surgery and it's subspecialties will be up this year drawing away top notch candidates from IM making the field a little less competetive. I haven't observed that the applicant field has actually become less competetive though, I know that many in my class who are AOA, top board scores want to do IM (at my school too, which will probably result in me not matching here) and some of the stats that people have been posting here on this website have been incredible. We will see though, these trends can be tricky to predict as lifestyle and salary fluctuate (probably the two most correlating factors when it comes to competetiveness of a specialty).

 

[Hop Toad]

CKent,

I truly enjoy reading your responses. You have an excellent way of expressing yourself that is easy to follow and to the point. Thanks for making such an effort on this board. It is appreciated and noticed.

 

[ckent]

Originally posted by Hop Toad
CKent,

I truly enjoy reading your responses. You have an excellent way of expressing yourself that is easy to follow and to the point. Thanks for making such an effort on this board. It is appreciated and noticed.

No problem! I really enjoy this student doctor network, it's a great place to get good info and discuss medical topics. I've actually found that oftentimes my classmates aren't as into discussing medical current events (politics and medicine) as I am, and this is a great place to do that as well. Even though I like writing on this board, I get even more out of reading what everybody else has to say and I've actually learned pertinent patient care info from this board before. Like one time, we had an SLE patient that had no peripheral line, so the intern that I was with wanted to do a subclavian central line. I stopped him, and told him that I had read on sdn that you shouldn't do subclavians on patients who may need dialysis later (because of the potential stenosis), so I may have saved access for one potential dialysis patient by reading SDN.