Residency competitiveness

[hye345]

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I'm wondering if there is a way to gauge how competitive a particular residency is; so far, the only things that come to mind are the # of spots (the more spots, the more popular the residency is, and thus the more competition for said spots), location (those clustered around urban areas are probably more competitive), and accreditation status (candidate and pre-candidate are less competitive). Is there anything else I'm missing?

 

[KARM12]

Reputation of the institution.

 

[stark3]

If they offer PGY2s or not.

 

[deleted205891]

Spots do not necessarily equate to competitiveness. For example, Johns Hopkins has a ton of spots, but is also super competitive. The main ways to gauge are reputation and the amount of people present at the program's Midyear booth.

 

[mfdoom]

I agree that reputation and the number of people at the program's Midyear booth are pretty good signs of a program's popularity, but I think it's harder to judge competitiveness. For example, Kaisers or standalone hospitals might interview 25-30 people for 2 spots, but large academic institutions might interview 40-50 people for 7-10 spots. (I'm super ballparking numbers here.) However, academic institutions probably receive way more applications, so landing an interview in the first place is more competitive. Depends on how you look at it.