Lowest Match on ROL

[bcoak]

So SDN says that 86.6% of US grads get one of their top 3 choices, but as we all know categorical Gen Surgery is one of the more competitive programs to match into.

What do people usually hear about how far down their ROL residents have matched at? Do most seem to get their top 3 or have people heard of lots of residents going below #5?

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[dynx]

I'll tell you tomorrow.

 

[jihu]

I personally know of a gen surg applicant last year who went down to #9. Granted, this applicant's list was top-heavy with monster programs all over the east and west coasts. I don't know how the average gen surg applicant matches, but I hope no one has to go down that low this year. Good luck everyone...let's regroup with some info on the match once we sober up.

 

[Dock In A Box]

This is obviously totally dependent on the applicant and the applicant's ROL. If you're good on paper, but have no social skills (i.e. suck at interviewing), you might have a lot of great programs on your list but not match at any of them. If you rank MGH, BW, Hopkins, Duke, U Wash, Vandy, Columbia, UCSF, etc, you will probably go deeper on your list than putting other schools. If you rank your home program 1st, you probably have a better chance at getting your 1st choice. Bottom line...there are many factors that determine how deep down a rank list a candidate must go to match.

 

[cilia2007]

I matched at my 13th choice. Out of 14. Of course, the program I'll be at is one of the top in the country; just nowhere NEAR where I wanted to be geographically (and probably only two or three of the 12 programs I ranked above the one I matched at are actually better than the program I matched at...I don't understand it!) I'll get great training, of course.

 

[vicodanny]

Cilia, the same thing happened to me! I'm AOA, top of my class, published, etc, and went down to my 12th choice! It's the Cleveland Clinic, which I know is amazing and I'll get great training. I know all my programs were competitive, but so am I. I don't understand how other candidates all matched in their top 3. The lesson to reiterate is not to put anything on your ROL that you don't want. Now I have to work on my wife being excited for Cleveland!

 

[Auscultate]

Cilia, the same thing happened to me! I'm AOA, top of my class, published, etc, and went down to my 12th choice! It's the Cleveland Clinic, which I know is amazing and I'll get great training. I know all my programs were competitive, but so am I. I don't understand how other candidates all matched in their top 3. The lesson to reiterate is not to put anything on your ROL that you don't want. Now I have to work on my wife being excited for Cleveland!

I think probably the bigger lesson is not to rank too few programs - imagine if you took into consideration all you heard about most people matching in their top 3 and decided to rank only 7 programs (thinking you'd be alright given your record), you would have gone unmatched! I believe that in most cases, a program you accepted an interview at will be better than one that has spots available in the scramble.
Anyway, congratulations on CC