RadOncs who are DOs

[Anthodite]

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How's the job market for DO Rad Oncs? Residency match rates? Do you exist past like one "day in the life" article I found? Please I know this sounds silly but I have no idea how to look it up.

I have premed advisor that's insistent on making a school list of about 30 schools(I literally just started intro-bio, gen chem, and stats). The topic of looking up match rates came up per school and I was like "okay sure", but then I realized I can't find anything super reputable on my own for how many DO med students matched into residencies and how easily those residents are employed after training. I know it's probably buried in this sub somewhere so I apologize if it seems silly to ask, I am still learning how to use the search function on here.

 

[xrt123]

If you are affable, care about patients and work hard you can easily find a rural job with good QoL and high pay. If you want to live in a major city you can have a lower QoL, less pay and a harder time finding a job. People generally do not care where you were trained or what your degree is (DO vs MD vs MD/MBA/PhD/JD all in one). Smart docs can sniff out lazy or dumb doctors pretty quickly.

 

[evilbooyaa]

Being a DO will allow you to match into residency in Rad Onc. However, it may not be as 'good' of a residency as a similarly qualified 'MD'. Most jobs won't care whether you are a DO or a MD, but rather where you did training. A small fraction of people (that you would not want to work for if you were a DO) will prefer MDs over DOs.

Sounds like you're an undergrad student? Right now, I would prioritize doing well enough to get into a USMD school. If not that, then a US DO school. If not that, then consider NP/PA, unless you want to do Rad Onc (minimal creep thus far in Rad Onc). I would not recommend US IMG unless your heart is set on Rad Onc which has had a much lowered bar to entry over the past 5 years.

 

[CurbYourExpectations]

Small n, but the handful of DOs I have known got good jobs in locations they wanted. The issue is, I have no idea how competitive RadOnc will be in 6ish years when you apply? I think it's stupid to discriminate, but competitive specialties def lean towards USMD. Good luck guy/gal.

Also recommend when you get in to medical school you don't have a mind set of "this is the specialty I am going to do", most people change, be open minded and do what feels right.

 

[NotMattSpraker]

Small n, but the handful of DOs I have known got good jobs in locations they wanted. The issue is, I have no idea how competitive RadOnc will be in 6ish years when you apply? I think it's stupid to discriminate, but competitive specialties def lean towards USMD. Good luck guy/gal.

Also recommend when you get in to medical school you don't have a mind set of "this is the specialty I am going to do", most people change, be open minded and do what feels right.

The paths to "competitiveness" seem impossible for Rad Onc in 6 years.

You all love to compare to radiology, that is a demand effect. Massive demand, million dollar jobs. We have modeled this for Rad Onc, and seems to be an extremely low probability of a massive increase in demand for Rad Oncs in 6 years given that the current training pipeline is 5 years long. If you were to bet off the model data, you should bet neutral to oversupply IMO in 2030. Certainly I could see AI "correct" the boom we had with IMRT. I am already hearing of some practices deciding to hire a midlevel instead of a physician, or just no one at all.

Im not sure any field's pay is going to go up. Either way, our imaginative leaders have given us the choice between a historical trend of medicare cuts and a "stable" ROCR cut haha. So theres that.

For jobs, the number of graduating DOs will go up, but how can one even judge? These trainees will no doubt cluster outside the famous programs and so will face a harder job market at graduation anyway. Hopefully someone is watching this to better counsel DOs (and FMGs) 10 years from now.

 

[voxveritatisetlucis]

There are probably not too many since it used to be a very difficult specialty to match on par with surgical subs. In coming years there may be a lot of DOs given the decrease in competitiveness

 

[DrProtonX]

last year, 8 DOs applied, 6 matched. This year 21 DOs applied and 13 matched. However, it’s unclear how many of those who didn’t match had rad onc as their primary choice vs. rad onc as their backup and ended up matching into their primary specialty.

 

[allseasons]

There's no way we both ended up interested in rad onc lmao. I remember you from the pre-med SDN threads YEARS ago.

There are probably not too many since it used to be a very difficult specialty to match on par with surgical subs. In coming years there may be a lot of DOs given the decrease in competitiveness

 

[evilbooyaa]

There's no way we both ended up interested in rad onc lmao. I remember you from the pre-med SDN threads YEARS ago.

That user is banned now tho my dude/dudette

 

[allseasons]

That user is banned now tho my dude/dudette

Frankly, I'm less surprised that he was banned than that he was in RadOnc 😂