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Actually, I think there IS a correlation between having a "good" IM match and having a "good" match in the other specialties. If you look at the match lists of places like Harvard, Hopkins, Yale and Penn over the past 3-4 years you'll see that in addition to sending their IM students to the "top" IM programs(MGH, BWH, Hopkins, UCFS, Penn etc.) and "top" PEDS (CHOP, Boston Childrens etc.), they are the ones sending their students to "top" rad-onc (MSKCC, MDACC, Harvard etc.), top ophthalmology ( MEEI, Wills, Wilmer etc.)
top neurosurgery (BNI, UCSF, MGH etc..). Just take a look at the lists, there is a correlation.....
See Gutshot's point on correlation -- could be small, confounding and not something you would base a decision on.
Also, my argument is in part that few people know what all the top programs are in every specialty and without the aid of a mentor in that field you aren't really capable of "just taking a look". If it were that easy, there would already be such a list, and all this would be moot.
But putting that aside, I suspect this analysis may hold true for a few schools (particularly at the top) but not for most. That would give you your observed "correlation" but make the analysis lack utility. If the presumption is that IM tracks US News and good IM equals good match list (which we are presuming arguendo is true, but may not be), you are taking a huge and unsubstantiated leap further to then say good match list means good in most or every specialty. You are going too far out onto that limb. Even if you did know what clinicians consider good programs in various specialties, you cannot say that every school with a good IM list, or even most, also has a good list in surgery, rads, gas, peds, optho, etc. Certainly some good IM schools do well with some of those, but others won't. Which makes this lack utility.