Today, March 20th, is a very special day for about fifteen thousand medical school graduating students in the U.S. (and for about ten thousand people from abroad, via the USMLE). Today is Match Day, when a computer system processes the preferences stated by these graduates regarding their desired medical specialty and hospital residency program and matches the data with the preferences submitted by the hospitals about the candidates. It's a somewhat complicated system but it works remarkably well and it's been in place since the fifties. Most of the students match to their desired options. From what I can gather from the advance data tables for 2008 published by the National Resident Matching Program about 85% of the graduates will go to one of their top three choices (about 45% for foreigners).
If you want a first person account of the process, check out this interview with Graham Walker, a medical student from Stanford. He's matched to his first choice :-)
This matching system is very different from the approach used in Spain, which is pretty straigthforward and fair: everybody does an exam whose grades serve to rank all of the candidates who will then choose residency program (hospital and medical specialty) based on their position in the ranking.
The main advantage that I see in the American matching program is that it gives the hospitals a (direct) say in what kind of residents they'll get. And if you look at the hard numbers, I think is fair to assume that more people go where they want than with the Spanish system of a single national exam.
Anyway, congratulations to everyone that matched today and get ready for those grueling 80-hour work weeks! Use the remaining 88 wisely (i.e. preparing for the boarding exams).
If you want a first person account of the process, check out this interview with Graham Walker, a medical student from Stanford. He's matched to his first choice :-)
This matching system is very different from the approach used in Spain, which is pretty straigthforward and fair: everybody does an exam whose grades serve to rank all of the candidates who will then choose residency program (hospital and medical specialty) based on their position in the ranking.
The main advantage that I see in the American matching program is that it gives the hospitals a (direct) say in what kind of residents they'll get. And if you look at the hard numbers, I think is fair to assume that more people go where they want than with the Spanish system of a single national exam.
Anyway, congratulations to everyone that matched today and get ready for those grueling 80-hour work weeks! Use the remaining 88 wisely (i.e. preparing for the boarding exams).
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