Logic behind the "regionalness" of most schools Forum

[DoubleChecks]

Not to derail the thread, but this isn't true. Last year was the first year in history where there were not enough residency slots available for all the US medical school graduates. It's actually a crisis in the making, but one that has largely gone unnoticed.

Source?

Every year there are ~25,000 residency spots in the US.

http://www.nrmp.org/about_nrmp/index.html

There were ~16,900 US MD grads in 2010.

http://www.statehealthfacts.org/compare ... =434&cat=8

There were ~3,900 US DO grads in 2010.

http://www.aacom.org/news/releases/Pages/062310-pr.aspx

Total of ~20,800. My 6000 shortage figure is outdated but that is still a shortage of 4,200 grads for available residency spots. More than enough to cover every US MD and DO grad.

I'm using "US" to indicate US based MD and DO schools.

EDIT: Added source for the DO figure.

My source was dinner conversation with a personal acquaintance who is the head of a fairly prestigious medical residency program, who I'm inclined to believe.

You're numbers look about right, but we'd need to know how many of those residencies are entry-level and how many are limited-entry specialty residencies for them to be meaningful. If there are ten million spots open for emergency ultrasonography, that's meaningless if there are only twelve spots for entry-level emergency medicine. (as an example). That number from the Match program doesn't separate the two out.

And im still curious about the DO bit. I heard you had to do well in DO school to score a residency spot.

[xyzbca]

And im still curious about the DO bit. I heard you had to do well in DO school to score a residency spot.

My best friend graduated from DO school last year. My impression is that the most competitive/prestigous residencies don't look at DO candidates. Top DO candidates are competive for everything below that tier. Lower qualified DO candidates end up in the least competitive residencies. My friend did well in his school but he and his wife wanted to go back to the more rural area they were from and he had no problem getting into the program he wanted. His program had to go to IMG's to fill the final three spots.

[drummerboy]

in some specialties eg dermatology, no formal residency exists and DO students simply go to different drs offices to acquire clinical training. then they can sit for the specialty boards.

[Lwoods]

And im still curious about the DO bit. I heard you had to do well in DO school to score a residency spot.

My best friend graduated from DO school last year. My impression is that the most competitive/prestigous residencies don't look at DO candidates. Top DO candidates are competive for everything below that tier. Lower qualified DO candidates end up in the least competitive residencies. My friend did well in his school but he and his wife wanted to go back to the more rural area they were from and he had no problem getting into the program he wanted. His program had to go to IMG's to fill the final three spots.

DOs have their own match, prior to the MD match. So, they only enter the MD match if they don't participate in the DO match or don't match through the DO match. When you look at statistics for the MD match, DO participants are lumped together with the statistics for IMGs (which include both Americans from foreign schools and foreigners from foreign schools) and those who didn't match the prior year. That's a pretty diverse group in terms of ability and strength of education, so it's difficult to judge just how difficult it is for DOs specifically.

Here's the statistical document to which I'm referring, if anyone's curious:
--LinkRemoved--

[SupraVln180]

I get this, however, I don't see how a school like Notre Dame or UNC isn't considered national in this respect. People from Utah know what Notre Dame and UNC are and they would consider them top schools, maybe to a lesser extent than the T14, but still.

Notre Dame maybe, although lay prestige =/= JD portability, but the University of North Carolina?

I was thinking more sports prestige, ND, UNC, UT, etc. I do feel like it is a bit of self selection to why schools 14-30 seem so regional. I just think it requires a bit of leg work.