Motzkus Christine, Frey Casey, Humbert Aloysius
Indiana University School of Medicine, Department of Emergency Medicine, Indianapolis, Indiana.
Boone County Emergency Medicine, Indianapolis, Indiana.
West J Emerg Med. 2025 Mar;26(2):285-289. doi: 10.5811/westjem.21292.
Incorporating virtual interviews into residency recruitment may help diversify access to residency programs while reducing the cost involved with travel and lodging. Programs may be more likely to rank students they have met in person at an interview when compared to unknown virtual applicants. Our objective was to characterize home institution, in-state, and in-region match rates to emergency medicine (EM) residency programs for fourth-year medical students.
We used National Residency Matching Program data available to the program director to identify medical school and match location of fourth-year medical students who interviewed at a large EM residency program in the Midwest from 2018-2023. Students' medical schools and ultimately matched programs were mapped to Electronic Residency Application Service geographic regions; subgroup analyses evaluated allopathic and osteopathic medical students separately. We used chi-square tests to compare proportions of students matching to home, in-state, or in-region programs across years.
There were 1,401 applicants with match information available. The percentage of students matching to a home institution remained stable over the course of the study. The percentage of students matching to an in-state institution increased over the first two years of virtual interviews rising from 23.2% in the 2020 match to 30.8% in-state matches for the 2022 match. Chi-square tests did not reveal any significant differences among groups for all applicants. Allopathic medical students demonstrated a significant increase in matches to home institutions. In-region matches stayed relatively stable over the study time frame regardless of subgroup.
Virtual interviews changed the landscape of residency interviews. Home institution and in-state matches may be more likely for applicants from allopathic schools who participated in a virtual interview as both programs and applicants are more familiar with each other; however, our study did not find convincing evidence of this possibility among all applicants. Additional study is needed to determine ongoing effects of the transition to virtual interviews.
将虚拟面试纳入住院医师招聘过程，可能有助于增加获得住院医师培训项目的机会多样性，同时降低与差旅和住宿相关的成本。与不认识的虚拟申请者相比，住院医师培训项目可能更倾向于将在面试中亲自见过的学生列入排名。我们的目的是描述四年级医学生进入急诊医学（EM）住院医师培训项目的本校、本州和本地区匹配率情况。
我们使用了项目主任可获取的全国住院医师匹配项目数据，以确定2018 - 2023年在中西部一个大型EM住院医师培训项目中参加面试的四年级医学生的医学院校及匹配地点。将学生的医学院校和最终匹配的项目映射到电子住院医师申请服务地理区域；亚组分析分别评估了攻读全科医学和骨科医学的学生。我们使用卡方检验来比较各年份学生匹配本校、本州或本地区项目的比例。
有1401名申请者具备匹配信息。在研究过程中，匹配本校的学生百分比保持稳定。在虚拟面试的前两年，匹配本州机构的学生百分比有所增加，从2020年匹配中的23.2%升至2022年本州匹配中的30.8%。卡方检验未显示所有申请者组间存在任何显著差异。攻读全科医学的学生匹配本校的比例显著增加。在整个研究时间段内，无论亚组如何，本地区匹配情况相对稳定。
虚拟面试改变了住院医师面试的局面。对于参加虚拟面试的攻读全科医学的学校的申请者来说，匹配本校和本州项目的可能性可能更大，因为项目和申请者彼此更加熟悉；然而，我们的研究在所有申请者中未找到支持这种可能性的令人信服的证据。需要进一步研究以确定向虚拟面试过渡的持续影响。
