Radiology programs by the numbers

[peehdee]

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hello there,

does anyone know if there is a website that actually has comparison of the Rad programs in the US. you know like they have for med school with gpa, class rank, mcat score etc... of their applicants. i know that the AAMC FRIEDA has some numbers, but they're not that useful. it would be helpful/useful is there was a place where one could look at how many applicants they took, from where, what kinds of numbers they had.. etc...

also, does being 'instate' help at all? i haven't heard anything about instate v out of state like you hear in med school application. so i assume they don't care, but just wanted to ask.

i guess what i am saying that there are 193 places in the US that have Rad programs. so how does one go about finding which programs take in applicants of 'lower' caliber. as a rule of thumb is it safe to say that the 'usual' med school who were very competitive med schools are 'hard' ones to get into? e.g. penn, harvard, duke, etc... or is that not so true?

Thanks guys

cheers

 

[peehdee]

geez,

lots of view and no replies. 😛

 

[Docxter]

hello there,

does anyone know if there is a website that actually has comparison of the Rad programs in the US. you know like they have for med school with gpa, class rank, mcat score etc... of their applicants.

I don't think there is any.

 

[ears]

These data are not public; in fact, most programs keep them very close to the vest (except when they tell you they went down five on their rank list to fill five spots). So there isn't going to be such a web site.

As for the "in-state" thing... Programs tend to informally prefer candidates who have some kind of tie to their area (be it med school, college, high school, family, whatever). Residents with a good support system are happier residents. So there isn't an official "in-state", but geography definitely matters.

As for competitiveness... there are university programs and community programs. Some university programs are very high prestige (the ones you'd imagine, mostly), and these are certainly very hard to get into. Almost all of the rest of the university programs are very solid; the competition for these is driven largely by geography. Community programs also have a gamut, also driven partly by geography; as a rule, community programs are less competitive than university programs. However, for any given community program, the competition can be quite fierce, as they may have only two spots per year.

Be aware though, that radiology is very competitive everywhere right now. But university programs more than community programs, nice places more than less-nice places, and cool hospitals more than crummy hosptials. So if you're an American allopathic graduate with reasonable board scores, you can probably match somewhere, but it may be at a dingy community hospital in the middle of nowhere. But, as Dr. Cuts would point out, it'll still be radiology!

Good luck.

 

[ktat72]

I had a question regarding family ties to a certain area. In my personal statements to some programs, I mentioned how I have really close family members in the city. Will that help? There are a couple other places which I also have family in but I forgot to mention this in my PS. How do I approach a program about this?

 

[jhadow]

The "word on the street" is that programs that accept many IMG's are less desirable and thus less competitive for US MD students. These programs are also supposed to have worse training and to be less friendly to their students.