how many interviews total to go on?

[flipflopsnsnow]

While it is still early (pre-dean's letter arrival) I am starting to wonder at what number of interviews (in total, not neccesarily in a row) will I start to go nuts and want to be done with all of this?
How many interviews should one go on? I know it kinda depends on how spectacular/not you are as an applicant, and I am average joe.

Any thoughts?

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[Adam_K]

While it is still early (pre-dean's letter arrival) I am starting to wonder at what number of interviews (in total, not neccesarily in a row) will I start to go nuts and want to be done with all of this?
How many interviews should one go on? I know it kinda depends on how spectacular/not you are as an applicant, and I am average joe.

Any thoughts?

I would take a look at the Match Outcomes PDF for a guesstimate. http://www.nrmp.org/matchoutcomes.pdf

Find your specialty, see how competitive it is and how you stack up. Then figure out how successful applicants were with a given number of contigous ranks. If your stats are below the average for the specialty go on additional interviews and be sure to rank them.

 

[orientedtoself]

it depends which specialty you are applying to. IM- ten max!!!! i did eleven and it was definitely excessive. plastics, ENT, urology- i think people did 15-20 interviews

 

[ekydrd]

As many as you can afford.

 

[raspberry swirl]

i say 10. there's a statistic somewhere that says if you have 6-8 interviews, you have above a 90% chance of matching ... if you do more than 10, you'll start to go crazy. i've had 4 interviews and im already totally sick of the process.

 

[mig26x]

i say 10. there's a statistic somewhere that says if you have 6-8 interviews, you have above a 90% chance of matching ... if you do more than 10, you'll start to go crazy. i've had 4 interviews and im already totally sick of the process.

yep, last year they showed some statistics that show that if you go to more than 8 interviews your chances of matching are close to 100%, in IM (it was in the IM forum). It was a very interesting thread.

 

[sbdoc]

what about neurology? Its about as competative as IM right?

 

[Shah_Patel_PT]

what about neurology? Its about as competative as IM right?

Neuro is much easier, although getting a prelim spot is harder.

 

[GoodMonkey]

it depends which specialty you are applying to. IM- ten max!!!! i did eleven and it was definitely excessive. plastics, ENT, urology- i think people did 15-20 interviews

i'm a not-superstar-caliber ortho applicant (i.e. barely average for such a competitive specialty.) if i'm fortunate to get 15 interviews, i'm going to do my damnedest to go on them all.

 

[Faebinder]

When you look at that statistic link, remember that the DOs and the fifth pathway and US allopathic students who graduated last year are not counted as US grads... therefore if you are a DO, don't panic while looking at the non US grad statistics cause you are mixed in that pile despite the fact that most residencies favor DO over IMGs.

Now if you are an IMG, I would look at those statistics as skewed towards optimism because the DOs and fifth pathways are mixed in the pile and I bet they make the outcome better because they are more likely to match. I approximated that improvement to be by 22% give or take 5%.

 

[Adam_K]

When you look at that statistic link, remember that the DOs and the fifth pathway and US allopathic students who graduated last year are not counted as US grads... therefore if you are a DO, don't panic while looking at the non US grad statistics cause you are mixed in that pile despite the fact that most residencies favor DO over IMGs.

Now if you are an IMG, I would look at those statistics as skewed towards optimism because the DOs and fifth pathways are mixed in the pile and I bet they make the outcome better because they are more likely to match. I approximated that improvement to be by 22% give or take 5%.

I agree that the study has flaws, but I think that it is a good guesstimate, which I why I posted it.

One of its flaws is the Step 1 data and the author admits this on page 12:

There are some limitations in the available data for All Others. Osteopathic graduates would rarely take the USMLE, but there also is a serious limitation to available scores for graduates of foreign medical schools. AAMC does not receive these scores until the international medical graduates pass Step 3. As a result, Step 1 scores are missing for more than 5000 applicants in the All Others category. This fact may bias the resulting statistics, because an applicant who already has completed the full set of licensure examinations may not be representative of all applicants in the All Others category.

As far as the groups of different applicants go, I'm not sure it is as clear cut as you make it out to be. For 2005, the match year of the study, DOs (68.6% matched) did do better than USIMGs (54.7%) and FMGs (55.6%). But, past US grads did worse (44.3%) and Fifthpathways did comparably (60.4%) but only represent a tiny percentage of applicants. Remember also that DOs only account for about 15% of the overall 'All Others' active NRMP applicant pool, presumably diluting their influence on the overall 'All Other' numbers.

 

[Faebinder]

As far as the groups of different applicants go, I'm not sure it is as clear cut as you make it out to be. For 2005, the match year of the study, DOs (68.6% matched) did do better than USIMGs (54.7%) and FMGs (55.6%). But, past US grads did worse (44.3%) and Fifthpathways did comparably (60.4%) but only represent a tiny percentage of applicants. Remember also that DOs only account for about 15% of the overall 'All Others' active NRMP applicant pool, presumably diluting their influence on the overall 'All Other' numbers.

This is easy to test with Chi-square analysis or Fisher's exact test, with the only draw back is multiple comparisons.

Here are the p values.

FMGs vs IMGs (p = 0.5, so no difference)
FMGs vs DO (p < 0.0001, so yes DO did better for sure)
FMGs vs US physicians ( p < 0.0001, so yes they did worse. Interesting)
FMGs vs Fifth Pathway (p = 0.4, so no difference)

but...

What this doesn't take into account is what these people applied to...

If 1000 FMGs applied to Family Medicine and 500 matched... vs 500 DOs applying to Radiology and only 100 matched.... it doesn't mean that FMGs did better... it means that assuming FMGs and DO are equal then it's easier to match into FM than radiology.

 

[Adam_K]

This is easy to test with Chi-square analysis or Fisher's exact test, with the only draw back is multiple comparisons.

Here are the p values.

FMGs vs IMGs (p = 0.5, so no difference)
FMGs vs DO (p < 0.0001, so yes DO did better for sure)
FMGs vs US physicians ( p < 0.0001, so yes they did worse. Interesting)
FMGs vs Fifth Pathway (p = 0.4, so no difference)

but...

What this doesn't take into account is what these people applied to...

If 1000 FMGs applied to Family Medicine and 500 matched... vs 500 DOs applying to Radiology and only 100 matched.... it doesn't mean that FMGs did better... it means that assuming FMGs and DO are equal then it's easier to match into FM than radiology.

Agreed. Getting that data would be key. I'm sure that the AAMC has it, but doesn't want to provide it, as they would be breaking down USMDs vs. DOs. I also noticed that the ERAS statistics which were available last year are now behind a firewall.

 

[idiotpathic]

Nice post. Another thing not being taken into account is the vast numbers of out of match positions picked up by FMGs and past graduated USIMGs and US Grads in specs like IM / Ped / FP which dont go to the match. Hence the cumulative matched data for these 2 categories should be closer to 65% - which is not a bad number..

However the ball game changes entirely if u need a visa. Then 12-15ish iviews is a safe number even in a supposedly "lesser competitive" speciality like IM. Because at present IM is rivalling Categ Surg (not yet there though) for most competitive (and achievable) speciality for F/IMGs. Yes there are people who get into Rads, etc despite their F/IMG status - but they are the exceptions rather than the norm.

Just MHO.

 

[Faebinder]

Nice post. Another thing not being taken into account is the vast numbers of out of match positions picked up by FMGs and past graduated USIMGs and US Grads in specs like IM / Ped / FP which dont go to the match. Hence the cumulative matched data for these 2 categories should be closer to 65% - which is not a bad number..

However the ball game changes entirely if u need a visa. Then 12-15ish iviews is a safe number even in a supposedly "lesser competitive" speciality like IM. Because at present IM is rivalling Categ Surg (not yet there though) for most competitive (and achievable) speciality for F/IMGs. Yes there are people who get into Rads, etc despite their F/IMG status - but they are the exceptions rather than the norm.

Just MHO.

Nope.... disagree with regards to the visa issue. The visa issue is tackled with the FMG vs IMG comparison it seems that there is no difference in those two matching.... meaning the need to get the visa _AFTER_ the match does not impact the outcome of the match. This is assuming green cards are counted as IMGs (which they are I believe). Of course not needing a visa is a lot less stressful and allows you to apply to fewer places but obviously this is not enough to make a difference.

 

[idiotpathic]

There is a slight bias in the above study. Because Green Cards go to the match. They are the ones the PD arent afraid to rank. For the folks needin a Visa - a greater percentage take a prematch as the PD is anxious to resolve the visa issue.

For the same creds - GC is a deal breaker. You need to apply to fewer programs. Can selectively apply to only top rung programs - without need to keep bad NY community programs as backup.

 

[mig26x]

how does the prematch offer works? Im a US grad and they have told me (med students friends) that I can receive a pre match offer. Do most programs offer it the same day of the interview? do you have to decide on that day or do they give you some time to think about it? How common is this pre match thing?