How to "read" a school's match list?

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I mean I think the inbreeding is often because they want their own students, not just because they have to rescue them and take them when nobody else will.

But to the first point yeah I imagine there are at least a handful of brilliant people that could do anything but happen to fall in love with something less competitive. Hell you don't even need to be that much of an outlier, the upper quartile for Path is about the same as the medians for things like Derm, RadOnc, ENT etc:

ryvmt6m.png
Yeah, but is the bottom of that confidence interval the patrician t-20 folks staying on at their home residencies and is the top chunk reserved for the plebeian state school applicants fighting gladiator style for those positions?
 
Yeah, but is the bottom of that confidence interval the patrician t-20 folks staying on at their home residencies and is the top chunk reserved for the plebeian state school applicants fighting gladiator style for those positions?
I can't imagine a home institution would want to shelter its students that badly, that they would pass up amazing candidates elsewhere for their own dregs
 
I can't imagine a home institution would want to shelter its students that badly, that they would pass up amazing candidates elsewhere for their own dregs
You forget the power of a good phone call or a sub I. The student may have subpar numbers but everyone liked him during his rotation.
 
You forget the power of a good phone call or a sub I. The student may have subpar numbers but everyone liked him during his rotation.
Man I need to get me some powerful friends so I can dgaf my way through med school and still match at home
 
*sigh* I have to make dinner, but I will write out a long post tonight because I know I won't be able to help it, but there is a lot wrong with everything you have posted here. Which underlies why trying to analyze match lists is silly. In short, you know nothing about the NRMP or residency applications. Generating a hypothesis, developing a methodology for analysis is difficult to do when you don't have a grasp of the most basic variables.

Is it? I count 17 from schools in the top ~20-25, 5 international, and the remaining dozen come from the other ~115 MD schools in the country

Edit: ^ It's actually even worse than that because I didn't notice the top was multiple per line. So really it is like ~30 from the top, and a dozen from the 100+ other schools out there

And there are much more skewed examples, e.g. their neurosurg for whatever year this page is from is collectively from Harvard, Vandy, Duke, Stanford, UCSF, Penn, Yale, UCLA and...Ohio state (one). You can probably find a wide range of diversity depending exactly what you look at and where.

None of that takes into consideration any of the match factors, geography, couples matching, never mind the hundreds of personal reasons that dictate how people go about the residency application process. If nothing else that list demonstrates the folly of looking at match lists.

Don't you think there's overlap in the specialty ranges tho? Like sure normally Derm >> Path but I'd guess the people going Path at Hopkins could have gone for whatever specialty they wanted but loved path!

This is flat out wrong. Again, it ignores the residency application process, the variability of quality of pathology programs, never mind the minuscule sample sizes.

AAMC survey and PD survey have shown that where you come from can be important as its own factor, though where you're trying to go will determine a lot of its significance (e.g. aiming for private med school, aiming for certain specialties). And yeah there are also a bunch of other significant factors that can drown it all out.

MCAT to Step 1 score has a correlation of about ~0.6 iirc

I've read the PD survey fairly thoroughly, I'd like to see where it comes across that school is an important factor.
 
I am not trying to be mean or bash you personally. I have a hefty background in data analytics and spent the better part of 2 years doing research analyzing data like this. I have spent years interacting with the NRMP, mostly from the NRMP and institution side. I understand the wanting to put together numbers and look for patterns. But, the reality is that you will always find patterns and you can always put together big tables and come up with 'results'. But, without insight into the process and where the data comes from, it is all meaningless.
 
I am not trying to be mean or bash you personally. I have a hefty background in data analytics and spent the better part of 2 years doing research analyzing data like this. I have spent years interacting with the NRMP, mostly from the NRMP and institution side. I understand the wanting to put together numbers and look for patterns. But, the reality is that you will always find patterns and you can always put together big tables and come up with 'results'. But, without insight into the process and where the data comes from, it is all meaningless.
In your opinion what can applicants from outside the top 50 do to set themselves apart for landing some of these competitive residencies at the name brand institutions?
 
I look forward to the wall of text. Not being sarcastic, this is a topic I need to learn a lot about.

None of that takes into consideration any of the match factors, geography, couples matching, never mind the hundreds of personal reasons that dictate how people go about the residency application process. If nothing else that list demonstrates the folly of looking at match lists.
I didn't put it forth as evidence of favoring the top. I was just commenting it didn't look like evidence to the contrary.

This is flat out wrong. Again, it ignores the residency application process, the variability of quality of pathology programs, never mind the minuscule sample sizes.
What about the step 1 data I just put up, showing being even 1 quartile up puts you around the median for the traditionally competitive specialties? Is Hopkins not an example path program you'd expect to be top quartile peeps?

I've read the PD survey fairly thoroughly, I'd like to see where it comes across that school is an important factor.
A bunch of specialties have a majority of PDs listing "Graduate of highly‐regarded U.S. medical school", in some cases even up to like 75%? One of many factors they list as important tho as I said above

Plus I imagine there's a lot of variation in there, with some places caring a lot more than others, sort of like how some private MD schools are fed by certain undergrads a lot more than others?
 
In your opinion what can applicants from outside the top 50 do to set themselves apart for landing some of these competitive residencies at the name brand institutions?
It sounds like in his opinion you don't have to do anything to overcome being outside the top 50, because it isn't a disadvantage
 
As a plebian that will end up going to my state school that is not top 50.
7e3.jpg

Mine is..
I hope I am able to even get in...

Heck I wouldn't be surprised to see it go top 30 soon either...
 
How do you already know where you're headed? Don't you gotta wait to see costs?
I have narrowed it down to three, but my state school will probably be the cheapest provided I dont get a massive scholarship from the other options.
 
Thanks everyone for the replies. I was definitely not expecting this thread to turn into such a passionate discussion but I enjoyed hearing both sides.

So in your opinion, in order to objectively compare different mid-tier schools in terms of their training potential, would it be wiser to compare their class average Step 1 and 2 scores over the last couple of years instead of their match list? If so, is there a centralized database/website that provides this info for each school or should I ask each school individually?
 
Thanks everyone for the replies. I was definitely not expecting this thread to turn into such a passionate discussion but I enjoyed hearing both sides.

So in your opinion, in order to objectively compare different mid-tier schools in terms of their training potential, would it be wiser to compare their class average Step 1 and 2 scores over the last couple of years instead of their match list? If so, is there a centralized database/website that provides this info for each school or should I ask each school individually?
No.
Look at your personal fit.
Clinical rotations
Residency programs at the school
Cost
Location
Curriculum
 
So in your opinion, in order to objectively compare different mid-tier schools in terms of their training potential, would it be wiser to compare their class average Step 1 and 2 scores over the last couple of years instead of their match list? If so, is there a centralized database/website that provides this info for each school or should I ask each school individually?
Everyone I've ever asked about step 1s and different schools has said its a reflection of the individual much more than your school's curriculum or mentors. And the match lists are probably not crazy different
 
Everyone I've ever asked about step 1s and different schools has said its a reflection of the individual much more than your school's curriculum or mentors. And the match lists are probably not crazy different

I agree with you on the match list part since there are lots of personal and subjective factors that affect it.
However, step 1 is a knowledge-based exam. I agree that it is unfair to compare class average step 1 of Harvard to some mid-tier school since in addition to the different methods of teaching at these schools, students at Harvard are typically smarter on average. However, when comparing two mid-tier schools with similar accepting MCAT and GPA, it would say a lot if one of the schools consistently had a much higher class average step 1 score. Don't you agree?
 
However, when comparing two mid-tier schools with similar accepting MCAT and GPA, it would say a lot if one of the schools consistently had a much higher class average step 1 score. Don't you agree?
I suppose I just haven't heard of two very similar places having wildly different step averages, but sure if it was some huuuuge gap then I'd wonder if one place wasn't giving its students enough time off to prepare or something.
 
Okay, here we go...

A school's match list on face value should be the single most important thing when figuring out which medical school to go to. While we can quibble about medical education and where/when you 'learn' medicine, the end result of medical school is the ability to enter the NRMP and match at a program. For the vast majority of students, ie. those that are pursuing a career in clinical medicine of some flavor, this becomes the single most important aspect of medical school: attaining a residency position. Where a student ultimately matches is the sum of many components which I will try to explain as objectively and broadly as I can. A school's match list therefore is the sum of that sum. In my personal opinion because of the sheer number of variables that goes into each match, their non-linearity and the many personal factors that go into it, trying to analyze the sum of the sum is foolhardy.

#1 How successful an individual match is determined by how far down on your rank list you had to go. At the end of the day, it is the ONLY measure of success, it is the sum of all the hard to figure out variables. This is not publicly available information. It is also far from a perfect variable since it is of course confounded by the fact that you can only rank a program that you interview at. It isn't fair to talk about pre-interview rank lists because people learn a ton about programs as they interview and their rankings will obviously shift as the interview trail goes on.

#2 You can only match somewhere if, a) You apply to their program, b) The program invites you for an interview, c) You decide to rank the program and d) The program decides to rank you. Unlike medical school admissions, where there are 141 MD-granting medical schools currently accredited by the LCME, there are 4,200+ residency programs administered by the ACGME. The largest specialty (Family Medicine) has 514 programs. While in smaller specialties, there are some applicants that apply to all the programs in the discipline, the reality is that the majority will not even come close. The 'top' students or the best students, regardless of what school they go to do not apply to programs based on a well publicized list provided by US News. The application process is far more personal and focused. It is easy to appreciate parts b, c and d as a pre-med, but understanding part (a) is non-trivial.

#3 How people decide on their rank list is personal. Everyone has their own priorities and what you need to understand is that those priorities are incredibly varied. It is something that is incredibly difficult to appreciate as a traditional applicant to medical school. I certainly did not understand it until I was well into residency. A big factor is AGE. You aren't talking about people in their early/mid 20s. You are talking about people in their mid-late 20s. The number who are married is significantly higher. The number with kids is significantly higher. The number who were, "academics all the way!" is much lower. The jadedness is much higher. You get my point. Simply put, it is a fundamentally different population that values things on average differently. There are plenty that haven't changed, but my point is that the population is much more heterogeneous. There are many more "real world" factors that come into play. For example, there is a thread by @cbrons in allo that highlights the importance of healthcare benefits to him when looking for a residency. Never in a million years would I have ever guessed that that was a variable. But, it is for him. One can debate how important it should be (you can see the thread), but at the end of the day, it matters to some applicants. You can find dozens, if not hundreds of these reasons. One of the biggest of which...

#4 Geography. Do not underestimate the power of geography. Whatever you imagine it's influence on medical school admissions, multiply this by 100. Whether it be from family issues (see #3), ease of away rotations, school connections, faculty mentor cross appointments, geography influences how people apply to and rank residencies. Which brings me back to #1. Just because someone from the Midwest didn't apply to or rank programs at big name medical schools, doesn't mean that their match didn't go perfectly. This affects a very large number of graduating medical students. A couple years back, I knew a student at a non-ranked school in the Midwest applying to pediatrics, she was the only one that applied to CHOP of the 20+ that went into pediatrics, she ended up matching there. Very strong academically, likely the strongest of those going into pediatrics, but certainly didn't have something special that made her an obvious, gotta have. She was the ONLY one who applied.

#5 Program quality. As a pre-med, you can not possibly assess a program's quality from the outside. Applicants as MS4s can barely do it. Name of an associated medical school means very little. Do you know which Harvard/Yale associated programs were on ACGME probation in the last 5 years? I know of 2. I guarantee that there are more. I haven't seen a correlation with probation and name of medical school and doubt there is one. Matching into one of those programs, never mind the programs not on probation that should be (because the residents are coached on how to answer the ACGME survey, see thread in surgery sub-forum) or not on probation but because they aren't bad enough yet, is bad news. Having several world class faculty doesn't fix a dysfunctional training program. Typically, people only get wind of this on the trail and it simply drops the program to the bottom of their rank list, which brings me back to #1, the only thing that really matters.

#6 Program desirability. There is a correlation between strong residencies and big name medical schools. Some of this is funding, some of it is faculty recruitment. But, it is far from perfect. I interviewed at all 3 Harvard programs, JHU and Yale. Only one of those 5 were in my top 8. Above them were many programs which unless you are in vascular surgery would fly completely under your "competitive" radar, yet for me and for many of my colleagues is perfectly rational. Further, many people rank community, non-big name programs higher or don't even apply to the big academic programs, regardless of specialty (unless that specialty doesn't really have non-academic programs).

In summary, match lists reflect the school. Yes, schools that traditionally have stronger pre-meds are going to have MS4s with more options. People stay local. There is tremendous home institution bias, but also geographic clustering. Can school name matter? Of course it can. But, for the vast majority (95%+) of applicants, it means little to nothing. If you are a strong student with good credentials and a desire to end up at a powerhouse program in whatever specialty, you can get there and no, you don't have to stick out in some amazing way. At the tip-tip top of academic programs and in the super competitive specialties, you may get crowded out, but again, we are talking about a very small number of total students affected.
 
Okay, here we go...

A school's match list on face value should be the single most important thing when figuring out which medical school to go to. While we can quibble about medical education and where/when you 'learn' medicine, the end result of medical school is the ability to enter the NRMP and match at a program. For the vast majority of students, ie. those that are pursuing a career in clinical medicine of some flavor, this becomes the single most important aspect of medical school: attaining a residency position. Where a student ultimately matches is the sum of many components which I will try to explain as objectively and broadly as I can. A school's match list therefore is the sum of that sum. In my personal opinion because of the sheer number of variables that goes into each match, their non-linearity and the many personal factors that go into it, trying to analyze the sum of the sum is foolhardy.

#1 How successful an individual match is determined by how far down on your rank list you had to go. At the end of the day, it is the ONLY measure of success, it is the sum of all the hard to figure out variables. This is not publicly available information. It is also far from a perfect variable since it is of course confounded by the fact that you can only rank a program that you interview at. It isn't fair to talk about pre-interview rank lists because people learn a ton about programs as they interview and their rankings will obviously shift as the interview trail goes on.

#2 You can only match somewhere if, a) You apply to their program, b) The program invites you for an interview, c) You decide to rank the program and d) The program decides to rank you. Unlike medical school admissions, where there are 141 MD-granting medical schools currently accredited by the LCME, there are 4,200+ residency programs administered by the ACGME. The largest specialty (Family Medicine) has 514 programs. While in smaller specialties, there are some applicants that apply to all the programs in the discipline, the reality is that the majority will not even come close. The 'top' students or the best students, regardless of what school they go to do not apply to programs based on a well publicized list provided by US News. The application process is far more personal and focused. It is easy to appreciate parts b, c and d as a pre-med, but understanding part (a) is non-trivial.

#3 How people decide on their rank list is personal. Everyone has their own priorities and what you need to understand is that those priorities are incredibly varied. It is something that is incredibly difficult to appreciate as a traditional applicant to medical school. I certainly did not understand it until I was well into residency. A big factor is AGE. You aren't talking about people in their early/mid 20s. You are talking about people in their mid-late 20s. The number who are married is significantly higher. The number with kids is significantly higher. The number who were, "academics all the way!" is much lower. The jadedness is much higher. You get my point. Simply put, it is a fundamentally different population that values things on average differently. There are plenty that haven't changed, but my point is that the population is much more heterogeneous. There are many more "real world" factors that come into play. For example, there is a thread by @cbrons in allo that highlights the importance of healthcare benefits to him when looking for a residency. Never in a million years would I have ever guessed that that was a variable. But, it is for him. One can debate how important it should be (you can see the thread), but at the end of the day, it matters to some applicants. You can find dozens, if not hundreds of these reasons. One of the biggest of which...

#4 Geography. Do not underestimate the power of geography. Whatever you imagine it's influence on medical school admissions, multiply this by 100. Whether it be from family issues (see #3), ease of away rotations, school connections, faculty mentor cross appointments, geography influences how people apply to and rank residencies. Which brings me back to #1. Just because someone from the Midwest didn't apply to or rank programs at big name medical schools, doesn't mean that their match didn't go perfectly. This affects a very large number of graduating medical students. A couple years back, I knew a student at a non-ranked school in the Midwest applying to pediatrics, she was the only one that applied to CHOP of the 20+ that went into pediatrics, she ended up matching there. Very strong academically, likely the strongest of those going into pediatrics, but certainly didn't have something special that made her an obvious, gotta have. She was the ONLY one who applied.

#5 Program quality. As a pre-med, you can not possibly assess a program's quality from the outside. Applicants as MS4s can barely do it. Name of an associated medical school means very little. Do you know which Harvard/Yale associated programs were on ACGME probation in the last 5 years? I know of 2. I guarantee that there are more. I haven't seen a correlation with probation and name of medical school and doubt there is one. Matching into one of those programs, never mind the programs not on probation that should be (because the residents are coached on how to answer the ACGME survey, see thread in surgery sub-forum) or not on probation but because they aren't bad enough yet, is bad news. Having several world class faculty doesn't fix a dysfunctional training program. Typically, people only get wind of this on the trail and it simply drops the program to the bottom of their rank list, which brings me back to #1, the only thing that really matters.

#6 Program desirability. There is a correlation between strong residencies and big name medical schools. Some of this is funding, some of it is faculty recruitment. But, it is far from perfect. I interviewed at all 3 Harvard programs, JHU and Yale. Only one of those 5 were in my top 8. Above them were many programs which unless you are in vascular surgery would fly completely under your "competitive" radar, yet for me and for many of my colleagues is perfectly rational. Further, many people rank community, non-big name programs higher or don't even apply to the big academic programs, regardless of specialty (unless that specialty doesn't really have non-academic programs).

In summary, match lists reflect the school. Yes, schools that traditionally have stronger pre-meds are going to have MS4s with more options. People stay local. There is tremendous home institution bias, but also geographic clustering. Can school name matter? Of course it can. But, for the vast majority (95%+) of applicants, it means little to nothing. If you are a strong student with good credentials and a desire to end up at a powerhouse program in whatever specialty, you can get there and no, you don't have to stick out in some amazing way. At the tip-tip top of academic programs and in the super competitive specialties, you may get crowded out, but again, we are talking about a very small number of total students affected.

this could be one of your biggest text walls yet! nicely done
 
Okay, here we go...

A school's match list on face value should be the single most important thing when figuring out which medical school to go to. While we can quibble about medical education and where/when you 'learn' medicine, the end result of medical school is the ability to enter the NRMP and match at a program. For the vast majority of students, ie. those that are pursuing a career in clinical medicine of some flavor, this becomes the single most important aspect of medical school: attaining a residency position. Where a student ultimately matches is the sum of many components which I will try to explain as objectively and broadly as I can. A school's match list therefore is the sum of that sum. In my personal opinion because of the sheer number of variables that goes into each match, their non-linearity and the many personal factors that go into it, trying to analyze the sum of the sum is foolhardy.

#1 How successful an individual match is determined by how far down on your rank list you had to go. At the end of the day, it is the ONLY measure of success, it is the sum of all the hard to figure out variables. This is not publicly available information. It is also far from a perfect variable since it is of course confounded by the fact that you can only rank a program that you interview at. It isn't fair to talk about pre-interview rank lists because people learn a ton about programs as they interview and their rankings will obviously shift as the interview trail goes on.

#2 You can only match somewhere if, a) You apply to their program, b) The program invites you for an interview, c) You decide to rank the program and d) The program decides to rank you. Unlike medical school admissions, where there are 141 MD-granting medical schools currently accredited by the LCME, there are 4,200+ residency programs administered by the ACGME. The largest specialty (Family Medicine) has 514 programs. While in smaller specialties, there are some applicants that apply to all the programs in the discipline, the reality is that the majority will not even come close. The 'top' students or the best students, regardless of what school they go to do not apply to programs based on a well publicized list provided by US News. The application process is far more personal and focused. It is easy to appreciate parts b, c and d as a pre-med, but understanding part (a) is non-trivial.

#3 How people decide on their rank list is personal. Everyone has their own priorities and what you need to understand is that those priorities are incredibly varied. It is something that is incredibly difficult to appreciate as a traditional applicant to medical school. I certainly did not understand it until I was well into residency. A big factor is AGE. You aren't talking about people in their early/mid 20s. You are talking about people in their mid-late 20s. The number who are married is significantly higher. The number with kids is significantly higher. The number who were, "academics all the way!" is much lower. The jadedness is much higher. You get my point. Simply put, it is a fundamentally different population that values things on average differently. There are plenty that haven't changed, but my point is that the population is much more heterogeneous. There are many more "real world" factors that come into play. For example, there is a thread by @cbrons in allo that highlights the importance of healthcare benefits to him when looking for a residency. Never in a million years would I have ever guessed that that was a variable. But, it is for him. One can debate how important it should be (you can see the thread), but at the end of the day, it matters to some applicants. You can find dozens, if not hundreds of these reasons. One of the biggest of which...

#4 Geography. Do not underestimate the power of geography. Whatever you imagine it's influence on medical school admissions, multiply this by 100. Whether it be from family issues (see #3), ease of away rotations, school connections, faculty mentor cross appointments, geography influences how people apply to and rank residencies. Which brings me back to #1. Just because someone from the Midwest didn't apply to or rank programs at big name medical schools, doesn't mean that their match didn't go perfectly. This affects a very large number of graduating medical students. A couple years back, I knew a student at a non-ranked school in the Midwest applying to pediatrics, she was the only one that applied to CHOP of the 20+ that went into pediatrics, she ended up matching there. Very strong academically, likely the strongest of those going into pediatrics, but certainly didn't have something special that made her an obvious, gotta have. She was the ONLY one who applied.

#5 Program quality. As a pre-med, you can not possibly assess a program's quality from the outside. Applicants as MS4s can barely do it. Name of an associated medical school means very little. Do you know which Harvard/Yale associated programs were on ACGME probation in the last 5 years? I know of 2. I guarantee that there are more. I haven't seen a correlation with probation and name of medical school and doubt there is one. Matching into one of those programs, never mind the programs not on probation that should be (because the residents are coached on how to answer the ACGME survey, see thread in surgery sub-forum) or not on probation but because they aren't bad enough yet, is bad news. Having several world class faculty doesn't fix a dysfunctional training program. Typically, people only get wind of this on the trail and it simply drops the program to the bottom of their rank list, which brings me back to #1, the only thing that really matters.

#6 Program desirability. There is a correlation between strong residencies and big name medical schools. Some of this is funding, some of it is faculty recruitment. But, it is far from perfect. I interviewed at all 3 Harvard programs, JHU and Yale. Only one of those 5 were in my top 8. Above them were many programs which unless you are in vascular surgery would fly completely under your "competitive" radar, yet for me and for many of my colleagues is perfectly rational. Further, many people rank community, non-big name programs higher or don't even apply to the big academic programs, regardless of specialty (unless that specialty doesn't really have non-academic programs).

In summary, match lists reflect the school. Yes, schools that traditionally have stronger pre-meds are going to have MS4s with more options. People stay local. There is tremendous home institution bias, but also geographic clustering. Can school name matter? Of course it can. But, for the vast majority (95%+) of applicants, it means little to nothing. If you are a strong student with good credentials and a desire to end up at a powerhouse program in whatever specialty, you can get there and no, you don't have to stick out in some amazing way. At the tip-tip top of academic programs and in the super competitive specialties, you may get crowded out, but again, we are talking about a very small number of total students affected.
Very informative; Thank you for the post.
That puts a lot into perspective.
 
Thanks everyone for the replies. I was definitely not expecting this thread to turn into such a passionate discussion but I enjoyed hearing both sides.

So in your opinion, in order to objectively compare different mid-tier schools in terms of their training potential, would it be wiser to compare their class average Step 1 and 2 scores over the last couple of years instead of their match list? If so, is there a centralized database/website that provides this info for each school or should I ask each school individually?

Everyone I've ever asked about step 1s and different schools has said its a reflection of the individual much more than your school's curriculum or mentors. And the match lists are probably not crazy different

A few unrelated things.

Re: PD survey. This all comes down to methodology and how you ask people the questions. It lacks controls. I'm pretty sure that if you put "Preference for black over brown shoes", you would get 30%+ of PDs that said it was important. When you see how the residency application process looks from the institution side, you realize how quickly the school disappears from the equation.

Re: Step 1 scores. There is no centralized database. Schools generally don't report them and there is zero regulation about reporting. I've seen posts on SDN and on other websites of schools that I actually KNOW the raw numbers for (as in I ran the calculation with a dean) that were simply wrong. People make stuff up, pure and simple. The reality is that your step 1 score is a reflection of you as a student. Not the school that you go to. Be incredibly skeptical of ANY resource that points you to analysis of Step 1 scores.

Re: Similarly ranked schools. It all comes down to where YOU will prosper. If you have an interest in a particular specialty, having a residency training program at your institution is important. Having a curriculum that works for you is important. Proximity to support structures is important. Etc etc. None of this metadata based on other people matters. I promise you. Internal factors >>>>> External factors of individual success.

And with that, my wife is yelling at me to go to sleep because I have a first start case tomorrow. Not sure why I gave her access to my OR calendar -.-. So, happy to continue this, but tomorrow 😉
 
I mean I think the inbreeding is often because they want their own students, not just because they have to rescue them and take them when nobody else will.
Wait, really? I'm the exact opposite; high levels of inbreeding in a match list to me, especially for lower tier schools/lower mid tier schools raises a gazillion red flags for me.

Personally, I don't agree that reading match lists is time wasted. It may not be conclusive or entirely objective, but you certainly can use it to get a sense of different specialties/programs especially coupled with fact that most of said programs have reviews somewhere here on SDN. The only caveat is I'd probably compare specialty to specialty or program to program not the entire thing from one school to another.
 
#1 How successful an individual match is determined by how far down on your rank list you had to go. At the end of the day, it is the ONLY measure of success, it is the sum of all the hard to figure out variables. This is not publicly available information. It is also far from a perfect variable since it is of course confounded by the fact that you can only rank a program that you interview at. It isn't fair to talk about pre-interview rank lists because people learn a ton about programs as they interview and their rankings will obviously shift as the interview trail goes on.
Doesn't that make it like, a terrible variable? Someone that applies to only the top and gets one of their less favorite among great options, can't really be called less successful than someone who matched their top rank because their top rank was a local community center.

understanding part (a) is non-trivial.
Is it not common for people to say "I'll be happy enough wherever, I just want to aim high" and apply to a list of generally best regarded places?

Geography. Do not underestimate the power of geography.
Why does geography become so powerful at the residency level, for a bunch of people that were happy to move across the country for college and/or medical school to go somewhere "da best" ?

#6 Program desirability
Do you think most people are like you, or are a huge chunk still like the crowd applying to medical schools and happy to live somewhere cold/hot, expensive etc as long as it is regarded extraordinarily well?

And the biggest question: how much does your residency matter for fellowships and/or the job afterwards? Is the standout student that matches Podunk Community Hospital to be near family on even grounds with the MGH grad for that competitive fellowship, or job? Do the program directors agree that nobody cares about prestige any more and they probably only went to Podunk for personal reasons?
 
Why does geography become so powerful at the residency level, for a bunch of people that were happy to move across the country for college and/or medical school to go somewhere "da best" ?
Probably because some of them are married or have children.
 
I suppose I just haven't heard of two very similar places having wildly different step averages, but sure if it was some huuuuge gap then I'd wonder if one place wasn't giving its students enough time off to prepare or something.
This is based on a very questionable data source.
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Inbreeding is only a "red flag" for low mid-tier schools because their residencies are also deemed low to mid-tier, not because of the inbreeding alone. WashU, Penn and UF had a ton of inbreeding last year, for example, but I would consider their match lists pretty strong, would you not?
Well, they also are the some of the best programs and have some of the best students so not really a fair comparison. Why would anyone leave any of those programs except for personal reasons. They are literally at the top with no where else to go.
 
Well, they also are the some of the best programs and have some of the best students so not really a fair comparison. Why would anyone leave any of those programs except for personal reasons. They are literally at the top with no where else to go.
I think you are discounting inertia. It is a PITA to move , and even a bigger pita to move with family. Plus people have friends and family or plain old familiarity at Thier current institutions.
 
I think you are discounting inertia. It is a PITA to move , and even a bigger pita to move with family. Plus people have friends and family or plain old familiarity at their current institutions.
All of which are personal reasons, hence my except for personal reasons caveat.
 
All of which are personal reasons, hence my except for personal reasons caveat.
I guess how can you look down on inbreeding anywhere if you can't tell what matches were due to personal reasons and which weren't
 
I guess how can you look down on inbreeding anywhere if you can't tell what matches were due to personal reasons and which weren't
Regardless of the school, same rules apply. There are people there who have already settled there, have friends etc etc so same rules generally apply so I don't really buy that year after year after year high level of inbreeding at the same schools (lower level schools) is mostly for personal reasons.
 
Regardless of the school, same rules apply. There are people there who have already settled there, have friends etc etc so same rules generally apply so I don't really buy that year after year after year high level of inbreeding at the same schools (lower level schools) is mostly for personal reasons.
You can't say it wasn't
Only the ones who apply can...

Besides, prestige only really matters in academics. Not everyone wants to be an academic, some just want to be strictly clinical.. Not everyone wants to be in a level 1 trauma center, some want to be in a mid size community where they can have that white picket fence and typical suburban life..
 
Regardless of the school, same rules apply. There are people there who have already settled there, have friends etc etc so same rules generally apply so I don't really buy that year after year after year high level of inbreeding at the same schools (lower level schools) is mostly for personal reasons.

There are high levels of inbreeding across many if not most of the Top 20-40. WashU sticks out to me as a school that had a large proportion last year stay at their home institution. UF also. If inbreeding is a "red flag" at low tiers its because their home institutions are also low tier, not because they have a greater proportion of inbreeding. Would it really be better if most of their grads went to "low-tier" residencies away from home instead of staying?
 
I think folks on SDN place too much value on the whole top tier and prestige thing.
The fact is, a lot of people probably hate research and want nothing to do with it. Why go to a top school if you don't want to do research?
Why go to a big academic hospital to train if all you want to do is be a doc at some level II in a mid size city?

There are a lot of different career paths in medicine, being an academic is only one of them.

This whole conversation is pretty much centered around what would be ideal for an aspiring academic physician.
 
You can't say it wasn't
Only the ones who apply can...

Besides, prestige only really matters in academics. Not everyone wants to be an academic, some just want to be strictly clinical.. Not everyone wants to be in a level 1 trauma center, some want to be in a mid size community where they can have that white picket fence and typical suburban life..
Didn't say anything about prestige. I think it is a red flag that the same (low tier) schools inbreed more than others year after year. It is a shame we don't have access to step scores, because especially for low tier schools I think they may want to stay but some also have to. What we don't know is what percentage falls where.

There are high levels of inbreeding across many if not most of the Top 20-40. WashU sticks out to me as a school that had a large proportion last year stay at their home institution. UF also. If inbreeding is a "red flag" at low tiers its because their home institutions are also low tier, not because they have a greater proportion of inbreeding. Would it really be better if most of their grads went to "low-tier" residencies away from home instead of staying?

Wash U has an average step one score of what, lets say 245, so sure people want to stay, because what better place academically is there to go. If you move from wash u, chances are you want a change of scenery, or expose yourself more, because for most people, don't get much better. I don't know why inbreeding is high for them (lower tiers), I just know it is, and personal reasons is just not reason enough. What school doesn't have students with personal reasons?
 
I think folks on SDN place too much value on the whole top tier and prestige thing.
The fact is, a lot of people probably hate research and want nothing to do with it. Why go to a top school if you don't want to do research?
Why go to a big academic hospital to train if all you want to do is be a doc at some level II in a mid size city?

There are a lot of different career paths in medicine, being an academic is only one of them.

This whole conversation is pretty much centered around what would be ideal for an aspiring academic physician.
No. Research is one aspect .
The reality is that these places have money for toys , new technology, ancillary staffing, in house specialists of every stripe, you get to see some of the rarer medical conditions since they tend to be national referral centers and the benefits could go on. You are also training with academics so you will probably be up to date on the latest treatments etc. The benefits of training on this level are probably non trivial.
 
Didn't say anything about prestige. I think it is a red flag that the same (low tier) schools inbreed more than others year after year. It is a shame we don't have access to step scores, because especially for low tier schools I think they may want to stay but some also have to. What we don't know is what percentage falls where.



Wash U has an average step one score of what, lets say 245, so sure people want to stay, because what better place academically is there to go. If you move from wash u, chances are you want a change of scenery, or expose yourself more, because for most people, don't get much better. I don't know why inbreeding is high for them (lower tiers), I just know it is, and personal reasons is just not reason enough. What school doesn't have students with personal reasons?
I actually treat affiliated residencies as a plus. That means I can rotate through there and kiss some behind /beg /plead to stay on. At the end of the day I will be board certified in the specialty I want and no patient or payer cares where you went to medical school let alone where you did your residency
 
I actually treat affiliated residencies as a plus.

It is, but it is also an almost universal plus.

That means I can rotate through there and kiss some behind /beg /plead to stay on. At the end of the day I will be board certified in the specialty I want and no patient or payer cares where you went to medical school let alone where you did your residency

And everything you wrote is true for pretty much all MD schools, so still doesn't answer why it is higher in some than others.
 
It is, but it is also an almost universal plus.



And everything you wrote is true for pretty much all MD schools, so still doesn't answer why it is higher in some than others.
I was implying that even after going to a "red flag school" I would have a higher chance to staying on with the residency program. So even if there are problems with placing graduates in competitive specialties outside their programs I would have landed in the competitive specialty at the home institution.
 
I was implying that even after going to a "red flag school" I would have a higher chance to staying on with the residency program. So even if there are problems with placing graduates in competitive specialties outside their programs I would have landed in the competitive specialty at the home institution.
True but beside the point. With the right app, most schools will get you were you need to go but not my point. My entire point was inbreeding at low/er tier schools is a red flag to me, when reading multiple match lists for the same school.
 
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