Number for Match

[Mye Eye]

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Hi y'all
I think this would be a good forum for people who already matched into Ophthalmology to post for those of us currently applying. It could certainly give some of us peace of mind.

For those that did match, how many places did you interview at (just number, not the name of all the places)?

Additionally (if you want), where did you match?

Best of luck to all my future colleagues applying this year and see you on the interview trail!!!

 

[twintiger32]

seems like a good idea, and i don't wanna burst your bubble, but i believe this has been addressed in the FAQ...average comes out to 8-10 and on the "where did you match" threads, people post how many and where they interviewed at.

anyways, best of luck!

 

[Mye Eye]

I understand this...I've even read those posts before...I just thought this could possibly help people feel a little better if they were less than that number to see some people (for example) getting 3 interviews and still matching (even at a good place, etc).

this could be more concise (as just a number) and a match location...helping to alleviate the fears for those that are still sitting at 0-3 interviews at this time

 

[JMK2005]

I doubt that it'll alleviate fears. Those who get a few interviews will worry no matter what. I'm sure there are people out there who interview at 1 place and are fortunate enough to match. There are stories of people who interview at 10 places and don't match.

I say, interview at as many places you can, and hope for the best.

 

[Wolverine98]

The other problem is there can be a lot of variability from year to year.
"Way back" when I applied, most people were applying to around 35 programs. Now I hear a lot about people applying to 50 or 60. At the time, the "magic number" was 8 interviews.
To give you my numbers, I applied to 30, got invited for 17, went to 14, ranked all of them.

 

[jbloggs]

All of the above posts are true...variability can be a big factor. There are never any guarantees, but in truth, you can ROUGHLY calculate your chances of matching. If you get 10 interviews and at each program you have a 1 in 10 (0.1) chance of matching there, you have hit your "magic number." There were a couple places I interviewed at, however, that had less than a 1 in 10 chance of matching - like accepting 3 out of 60 (0.05) or something like that. So if you had 9 interviews with a 0.1 probability and 1 interview with a 0.05 probability, your total is 0.95 and you might feel "safer" with that 11th interview.

But basically, "magic numbers" obviously will vary based on these numbers...when I went on the interview trail, many programs mentioned they interviewed more candidates simply because they got so many more applications that it was hard to decipher whom to interview. So, I would think the magic number would have gone up over the last few years. Also, every applicant is of course different and so we can't reduce this all to randomness and sheer probability, but believe me, going through the process definitely made it feel that way sometimes!
Looking back at this reminds me how much anxiety the ophtho match caused and these antics that I did to relieve anxiety while I waited for interview offers. Good luck to everyone!