Abstract
International Medical Graduate (IMG) physicians applying to residency training programs in a country different from where they completed medical school, bring beneficial diversity to a training program, but also face significant challenges matching into an Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education (ACGME)-accredited residency program. Despite the growing number of IMG applications in Emergency Medicine (EM), there is a paucity of targeted recommendations for IMG applicants. As a result, the Council of Residency Directors (CORD) Advising Students Committee in EM (ASC-EM) created a dedicated IMG Advising Team to create a set of evidence-based advising recommendations based on longitudinal data from the National Residency Match Program (NRMP) and information collected from EM program directors and clerkship directors. IMG applicants should obtain at least two EM standardized letters of evaluation (SLOEs), review IMG matched percentages for programs-of-interest, analyze their objective scores with the previous matched cohorts, and rank at least 12 programs to maximize their chances of matching into EM.
Highlights
International Medical Graduates (IMG) can offer a wealth of medical knowledge, as well as cultural and academic diversity to a domestic emergency medicine (EM) residency program
Upon reviewing all available medical literature and collective data from on-line resources through numerous iterative consensus national Council of Residency Directors (CORD) conference meetings, the CORD Advising Students Committee in EM (ASC-EM) IMG Advising Team developed six recommendations as a task force, soliciting comments, revision, and approval as part of a collaborative effort to improve the advising of IMG applicants
Identify the Challenges: While U.S IMG and non-U.S IMG are slightly different cohorts, it is challenging for EM program directors to be familiar with the myriad of international medical schools; for this reason, IMG may be considered higher academic risks and held at a higher level of scrutiny
Summary
International Medical Graduates (IMG) can offer a wealth of medical knowledge, as well as cultural and academic diversity to a domestic emergency medicine (EM) residency program. The number of available EM residency positions has exceeded the number of U.S senior applicants, allowing IMG, and other “non-traditional” applicants to fill in these gaps [3]. Recent data suggest that the number of IMG applications has tapered off in the last few years despite the fairly stable rate of EM spots filled by U.S seniors [1]. 71% of those spots were matched to U.S seniors and 21% were filled by osteopathic applicants. In the past five years, only 4.2% of available EM positions were filled by U.S citizen IMG and 1.7% by non-U.S citizen IMG on average [1]
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