Tips on ranking residency programs

When you build your rank list, be honest with yourself. While there are many great training programs in the US, not every residency program is ideal for you in the same way that not every applicant is ideal for all programs. The residency match is a binding contract, and if you match at a program, you are obligated to begin training there on July 1 st.

This is intuitive — the longer a rank list is, the more institutions in play and, therefore, your chance of a successful match is maximized.

Of course, stronger candidates tend to receive more interviews, and therefore, have more options when building their rank order lists. According to NRMP data , the average length of a rank order list for successfully-matched candidates across all specialties is This is the highest average length to date.

Conversely, the average length for candidates that did not match was 4. This means that you should not rank programs based on where you think you are most likely to get in. If you do, you are putting yourself at a significant disadvantage! Be bold and put your top choice as 1, the next as 2, and so on! We also use third-party cookies that help us analyze and understand how you use this website.

These cookies will be stored in your browser only with your consent. You also have the option to opt-out of these cookies. But opting out of some of these cookies may affect your browsing experience. Necessary Necessary. I am from Alexandria, Virginia and I did med school and undergrad in Virginia. I know deep down that I want to be close with my family later on where I practice medicine.

So, residency was the perfect time to escape for a little bit and get to experience a new city on my own and really just do my own thing! Getting to meet the attendings and residents and seeing how everyone functions on a day to day basis helped me fall in love with the program. I loved everything about it. It came down to general feel at the end of the day, but I did have to take a systematic approach to get to that point.

It was pretty much where my heart led me. Of course, I talked to my boyfriend about it because he wanted me to be in Dallas and be close to him. But, it was three years of my life, so I had to make the best decision for me. I did take other people's perspectives in mind, but it ultimately came down to where I found myself the most. Weather was also a factor. During a Zoom interview, I would have wanted to see how innovative a program would be to make themselves stand out.

On our end [being an interviewer,] it is very difficult to try to interview a whole bunch of people! We want them to realize that we know that it's hard to talk to a camera and not see us in real life.

We incorporated activities via Zoom and ways to socialize with residents without the program director. We tried to make it as chill as possible and make them feel comfortable. In your rubric you may want to add a category for this. When a program can take a difficult experience and make it better, that would lead me to give them a higher score. If the experience is really stressful over Zoom, I would lower the score. If you're headed into — residency interview season, keeping these tips in mind can help you during your this tough year.

My heart really goes out to 4th years, but knowing what's important to you and creating a rubric with those important factors can really streamline your ranking experience.