is psych really the new radiology?

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freudianslip908

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I was browsing the interview invites/rejection thread on this site and someone posted that they believe that psych is the new radiology and becoming a lot more competitive. I just wanted some insight from some program directors/residents if that is really the case, or is going to be for the next couple of years.

As a US IMG with a red flag, I'm pretty worried. There is no other specialty I'd rather do than psych, but if that's the case, I'm starting to wonder if I should apply to another specialty as well. I applied to 100 psych programs on 09/15/2015, haven't heard back from anywhere yet. ECFMG certified. Have a ton of interest/background in psych, but have one attempt on CK and a low step 1 score.

Any insight or information is greatly appreciated.
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I heard radiology was the new psychiatry.
 
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freudianslip908 said:
I was browsing the interview invites/rejection thread on this site and someone posted that they believe that psych is the new radiology and becoming a lot more competitive. I just wanted some insight from some program directors/residents if that is really the case, or is going to be for the next couple of years.

As a US IMG with a red flag, I'm pretty worried. There is no other specialty I'd rather do than psych, but if that's the case, I'm starting to wonder if I should apply to another specialty as well. I applied to 100 psych programs on 09/15/2015, haven't heard back from anywhere yet. ECFMG certified. Have a ton of interest/background in psych, but have one attempt on CK and a low step 1 score.

Any insight or information is greatly appreciated.
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I hope psychiatry never becomes the new radiology- that field has taken a nosedive in the past decade in quality of applicants, and their job market is horrendous (although it has improved slightly in the past year).

Psych is likely becoming more competitive, from the sound of it, people are applying to a lot more programs now than before, probably out of concerns of not matching.

100 programs is a lot. I hope interviews start rolling in for you soon. It's likely that aside from people applying to more psych programs, all medical specialties are getting more competitive to get into for IMGs/FMG's because of the AOA/ACGME merger, which will likely favor US graduates (MD's and DO's)
 
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It's only early October. As an IMG, I interviewed at about 19 programs, many in the "top 10." I like to travel and I was paranoid of not matching. I didn't get my first invite until November. Got my first choice, and that was a pretty competitive year (2009-10).
Relax.
 
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Last time I checked I couldn't work in a dark room while eating Doritos and drinking a Pepsi. What the hell was I thinking *smack*
 
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For about 30 seconds of med school I considered going into radiology. Sooooooooo glad I didn't.

For the OP, it's hard to know until the year is over. Even feedback from individual programs won't tell you enough. Go for what you'd enjoy. Hedge your bets if you have to.
 
I'm afraid to say anything because I don't want this great lifestyle to end.
 
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The question needs a context. Satisfaction, compensation, fit for a particular personality/lifestyle.
A particular individual may have difficulty because of a specific issue. Competitiveness for one particular year will be known only after data is available.
 
Well I'm a big cheerleader for psych, and I'll refer you to my post in the summer of why psych is on the boom:

http://forums.studentdoctor.net/threads/why-is-psych-not-competitive.1137424/page-4#post-16835889

Post #177 specifically. Enjoy.

And there is also an ongoing poll right now for salary: http://forums.studentdoctor.net/threads/so-can-we-talk-money.1162751/page-2#post-16988828

I personally think. Its impressive that with a n=32, 40% earn >300k (25%>300k, 18%>400k).

My favorite stat is Medscape 2013 salary survey:

70% of psychiatrists work <40 hours, 90% <50 hours, but 20% earn >300k. So essentially if you work 45 hours/week you should be able to hit around 300k. Not bad for no on calls or weekends.

Aside from the $ talk, neuroscience is just exciting. And whether you like it or not, psych is hitting the mainstream, from the mass shootings in Oregon (unfortunately) to Jim Carey's wife death (sadly) to Tom Intel joining Google. Mental Health is becoming a hot topic.

Last year psych saw highest increase from 660 to 770 US MD students (13%). So I'm gonna predict this year will be 850.

For the OP, I think its too early to stress, only start sweating bullets if you don't hear anything by December. Good luck!
 
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It's also the case that psych has increased the number of total slots available in the match substantially over the past few years (1097 in 2011 to 1353 in 2015). In fact, the %US senior md match was higher in 2011 (58%) than it was in 2015 (57%), although it was as low as 52% in 2014. Since 2011, most major specialties see a range in US senior % match of ~7% with no clear trend.

The possible exceptions are anesthesia trending down from 80% to 73%, IM from 57% to 49% (with a *ton* of added slots), OB up from 74% to 80%...

And the real kicker: Radiology going 79%, 76%, 74%, 69% to 58%.

Basically, radiology as a specialty is tanking for applicants. Psych has basically kept pace with the increased number of slots over the past few years. The real question is... OB??? (Personally, I kinda loved OB)...
 
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Everybody shut up about how good psych is. I've got 5 years before i'm up to bat and that's a lot of time for psych to become more competitive by word of mouth.
 
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I don't get why anyone would want to do OB when your malpractice premiums are over 180k and your lifestyle is arguable the worst in medicine.

But hey, to each to their own :)


downwithDTB said:
It's also the case that psych has increased the number of total slots available in the match substantially over the past few years (1097 in 2011 to 1353 in 2015). In fact, the %US senior md match was higher in 2011 (58%) than it was in 2015 (57%), although it was as low as 52% in 2014. Since 2011, most major specialties see a range in US senior % match of ~7% with no clear trend.

The possible exceptions are anesthesia trending down from 80% to 73%, IM from 57% to 49% (with a *ton* of added slots), OB up from 74% to 80%...

And the real kicker: Radiology going 79%, 76%, 74%, 69% to 58%.

Basically, radiology as a specialty is tanking for applicants. Psych has basically kept pace with the increased number of slots over the past few years. The real question is... OB??? (Personally, I kinda loved OB)...
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Psychiatry is the worst field in medicine. Everyone this year please withdraw your applications and head into the other great fields.

The best kept secret in medicine is out. I just wish it wasn't this year when I'm in the application cycle.
 
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flight24 said:
Psychiatry is the worst field in medicine. Everyone this year please withdraw your applications and head into the other great fields.

The best kept secret in medicine is out. I just wish it wasn't this year when I'm in the application cycle.
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Nothing to see here... move along to those actual cushy specialties... remember ROADS not PROADS when 4th year comes around.
 
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It's also worth noting that there has been a 9% increase in matched US seniors to pgy1 spots between 2011-2015 (while spots available for psych went up 23%. Basically, there are just more people.
 
As I have said before there is no evidence that psychiatry is getting more competitive. what we are seeing is people over-applying or double-applying and there are more med students because of the expansion of medical schools, new medical schools, and the osteopathic schools which also increases the number. but the overall proportion has been fairly stable over the past few years. we're certainly not back to the 1940s-1960s when up to 10% of students chose psychiatry and general practitioners were paid bonuses to train in psychiatry.

Unfortunately this phenomena of overapplying does adversely affect IMGs and I have to say I do think things are going to get a little harder for IMGs. That said, 40% of psychiatry residents will likely continue to be IMGs for some time. that said, failing step 2 and a poor step 1 score are going to make it harder for an IMG to match. the comparisons to radiology (which is on the decline anyway) are hyperbolic.
 
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Haha, yeah, move along people, nothing to see here... Let's keep psychiatry not very competitive till the current crop of Psychiatry-minded forum members matches well.

Seriously though, I like the fact that psychiatry attracts some strong students who are very much into it (eg., some of the strongest students from my school typically match into psychiatry each year, and they are genuinely interested in the field), but I shudder at the thought of gunner/lifestyle types getting attracted to psychiatry for all the wrong reasons (as in - and I actually heard it from someone - "so I busted my hump to go into ortho, but then I had my psych rotation and it was so chill"). Also, I think that people attracted to psychiatry because of lifestyle are often under the false impression that not only do psychiatrists work fewer hours, but that psychiatry is also inherently easier to practice than other fields.
 
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Amygdarya said:
Haha, yeah, move along people, nothing to see here... Let's keep psychiatry not very competitive till the current crop of Psychiatry-minded forum members matches well.
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Pretty much. :laugh::laugh:
 
flight24 said:
Psychiatry is the worst field in medicine. Everyone this year please withdraw your applications and head into the other great fields.
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I've got to say I'd agree with this. Psychiatry really is terrible. Low pay. No respect. Your patients hate you. PM&R is the P you were looking for. Save yourselves while you still can.
 
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If I'm not mistaken, according to 2014 charting outcomes psych has the 2nd highest number of PhDs after derm.


Amygdarya said:
Haha, yeah, move along people, nothing to see here... Let's keep psychiatry not very competitive till the current crop of Psychiatry-minded forum members matches well.

Seriously though, I like the fact that psychiatry attracts some strong students who are very much into it (eg., some of the strongest students from my school typically match into psychiatry each year, and they are genuinely interested in the field), but I shudder at the thought of gunner/lifestyle types getting attracted to psychiatry for all the wrong reasons (as in - and I actually heard it from someone - "so I busted my hump to go into ortho, but then I had my psych rotation and it was so chill"). Also, I think that people attracted to psychiatry because of lifestyle are often under the false impression that not only do psychiatrists work fewer hours, but that psychiatry is also inherently easier to practice than other fields.
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Not sure where you got that idea... There were 35 PhDs in anesthesia, 17 in derm and > 100 in IM, 32 in adult neuro, ~50 in path, 61 in peds and only 28 in psych. Definitely not the least phd heavy field, but derm doesn't have a ton... And neither does psych. In fact... Even radiology had more... at 33!
 
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Will double check charting tomorrow. I might have been delirious at the time!

Maybe I was thinking %?
 
100+ applicants per spot at my place currently. This will obviously need to be weaned down. Not everyone is competitive (A result of my not well known community program). Lots of overseas folks, some of whom show up at the office personally to beg for an interview.
 
clausewitz2 said:
One way that appears to have changed is that the early interviews seem to be going overwhelmingly to people with high Step 1 scores specifically.
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Earliest interviews probably, but I can confirm not all early interviews are to high step 1 scores. Each residency must have a different methodology, judging by when I received invites vs. people on the invites thread; only constant is that my ERAS was not submitted on the first day.
 
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FlowRate said:
Earliest interviews probably, but I can confirm not all early interviews are to high step 1 scores. Each residency must have a different methodology, judging by when I received invites vs. people on the invites thread; only constant is that my ERAS was not submitted on the first day.
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You're right, not every single early interview, but it seems to be true of the majority of early-invitee applicants this year.

Edit: I'll put it this way. Everyone I have talked to with a strong application in other respects and who submitted the day ERAS opened and are allopathic who had average Step 1 scores has not gotten much love yet. I suppose the other factor uniting many of them is not coming from name-brand schools, but I guess I had hoped that kind of prejudice was not so powerful outside of surgery.
 
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clausewitz2 said:
You're right, not every single early interview, but it seems to be true of the majority of early-invitee applicants this year.

Edit: I'll put it this way. Everyone I have talked to with a strong application in other respects and who submitted the day ERAS opened and are allopathic who had average Step 1 scores has not gotten much love yet. I suppose the other factor uniting many of them is not coming from name-brand schools, but I guess I had hoped that kind of prejudice was not so powerful outside of surgery.
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Potentially not. I'm coming from a name brand. :\ Sorry, I don't think it should really matter, either.
 
clausewitz2 said:
You're right, not every single early interview, but it seems to be true of the majority of early-invitee applicants this year.

Edit: I'll put it this way. Everyone I have talked to with a strong application in other respects and who submitted the day ERAS opened and are allopathic who had average Step 1 scores has not gotten much love yet. I suppose the other factor uniting many of them is not coming from name-brand schools, but I guess I had hoped that kind of prejudice was not so powerful outside of surgery.
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I'm allopathic and submitted Day 1, had what I would call a below average step 1 (or maybe that's just how I feel cause of SDN haha). Definitely not from a name-brand school. I've done fine getting interviews in my home state, but haven't seen much from out of state.

Honestly I think the over applying is getting a little crazy, the schools don't want people unmatched because that doesn't look good for them so they pressure students to apply to more and more residencies, which means residencies receive more and more applications to sift through, slowing down the process and making it harder to figure out if candidates are truly interested in their program. I think by next week I'm going to send "Yes I'm one of those nutso Texans who might be willing to leave the state and I'm interested in your program because XYZ" emails.

As for the name brand thing, yeah it stinks that it's a thing, but if you're a non-brand name US MD you're 2nd in line in terms of privileged applications, so you (and I) still benefit from the system compared to a lot of people.
 
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Psych is already an amazing field and I think that it has the potential to become a moderately to highly competitive speciality at some point in the not too distant future. That said, I don't yet see indicators that the level of competition has changed a lot in the past few years. We are still around the least competitive medical specialty, probably somewhere near FM and PM&R.
 
I really don’t think the number of psych slots jumped up all that much. A few years ago the “all in” policy made a lot of hidden out of match positions get counted. These were always there, they just didn’t show up in the data. I remember three years ago, everyone was saying that psych was in trouble because their IMG % went from 1/3 to ½. The truth was that the invisible just became visable.
 
The consensus around my program seems to be that the # of psych applicants in total is not changed significantly, but the number of programs they apply to is higher. This makes it much harder for programs to select the right people to interview, as increasing the number of interview slots is not a very practical approach.
 
thoffen said:
The consensus around my program seems to be that the # of psych applicants in total is not changed significantly, but the number of programs they apply to is higher. This makes it much harder for programs to select the right people to interview, as increasing the number of interview slots is not a very practical approach.
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On that topic, the view from the trenches:
Our applicant count topped 1300 this week. We've reviewed and prioritized for interview just about all of the US MD school grads, and are slogging through the DO grads. My team is sifting through the hordes of Caribbean grads looking for discernible ties to our region. It is SO hard to tell whether an applicant is just shotgunning every possible program, or if they're hoping for just a residency--any residency. We still have more than 20 times more candidates than we have interview slots, and I'd sure like to fill them with folks who really want to be here.
This is where that email to a program truly helps--if you sincerely want that program. Tell us who you are and why you want to be here specifically, and we'll try to fish you out of the pile. Hopefully when we do, your PS will make the case that you really want to care for the mentally ill, and most of your LORs will say you're destined to be an excellent psychiatrist (not just "a competent resident in the field he/she chooses"), and you'll have followed up that 198 Step I with a 220+ on Step II. Good luck out there...
 
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OldPsychDoc said:
On that topic, the view from the trenches:
Our applicant count topped 1300 this week. We've reviewed and prioritized for interview just about all of the US MD school grads, and are slogging through the DO grads. My team is sifting through the hordes of Caribbean grads looking for discernible ties to our region. It is SO hard to tell whether an applicant is just shotgunning every possible program, or if they're hoping for just a residency--any residency. We still have more than 20 times more candidates than we have interview slots, and I'd sure like to fill them with folks who really want to be here.
This is where that email to a program truly helps--if you sincerely want that program. Tell us who you are and why you want to be here specifically, and we'll try to fish you out of the pile. Hopefully when we do, your PS will make the case that you really want to care for the mentally ill, and most of your LORs will say you're destined to be an excellent psychiatrist (not just "a competent resident in the field he/she chooses"), and you'll have followed up that 198 Step I with a 220+ on Step II. Good luck out there...
Click to expand...

If I may ask, would the best approach be an email to the PD directly (from FRIEDA, etc) or the coordinator (with a kind forwarding request) be the best bet? I'm an East Coast med student who really wants to move to the Midwest (wife's family), and unsurprisingly, that is where I've gotten the least interview offers.
 
LTPpowered90 said:
If I may ask, would the best approach be an email to the PD directly (from FRIEDA, etc) or the coordinator (with a kind forwarding request) be the best bet? I'm an East Coast med student who really wants to move to the Midwest (wife's family), and unsurprisingly, that is where I've gotten the least interview offers.
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Send it to both, or go directly to the PD with cc: to the coordinator.
I like the "kind request" part.
 
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From a brand name med school, decent scores, applied to 10 programs, and I felt that was too many... just some perspective.
 
OPD is right, We have an ability to accept about 1.3% of our applicants and interview about 15% of them. This is twice as bad (good) as last year. Psych isn't that much better as much as the flock is just twice as scared. This is a huge problem. I feel like I should become like some of the casting calls and just mass tour everyone with little content and let the odds fly. I suspect that psych has become the safety back up for many other specialties. It makes sense since we have one of the lowest %AMGs and everyone is being scared to death. I never thought I would play the local interest game or the second application question list, but it is now making sense. too bad. At least the scramble should be more interesting this year. I suspect some very unpredicted results.
 
MacDonaldTriad said:
OPD is right, We have an ability to accept about 1.3% of our applicants and interview about 15% of them. This is twice as bad (good) as last year. Psych isn't that much better as much as the flock is just twice as scared. This is a huge problem. I feel like I should become like some of the casting calls and just mass tour everyone with little content and let the odds fly. I suspect that psych has become the safety back up for many other specialties. It makes sense since we have one of the lowest %AMGs and everyone is being scared to death. I never thought I would play the local interest game or the second application question list, but it is now making sense. too bad. At least the scramble should be more interesting this year. I suspect some very unpredicted results.
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I feel like restrictions on the maximum number of apps will -have- to be put in place at some point. There must come a point in the future when rural FM programs are receiving 1000+ applications for three slots because of "extra-double-backup" and there is broad consensus that something needs done.
 
Yes, it sucks eliminating highly qualified, or even moderately qualified applicants because you don't believe they are not serious even though you have no concrete reason to think this. Unfortunately, that is what this has become. We should charge $100 per interview and then pay applicants 1K when they match with us. That would fix everything except the obvious unethical advantage this would the rich. I agree, something is going wrong.
 
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so since applications has doubled, it's within my interest to escalate this, and triple the amount of places i applied...

ok good plan, thanks guys!!!!
 
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OldPsychDoc said:
Send it to both, or go directly to the PD with cc: to the coordinator.
I like the "kind request" part.
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As a follow up question, when would be a good time to send one of those emails? Is it too early to do that now because I've heard some say Oct 15th on as the magic number.
 
Monocles said:
As a follow up question, when would be a good time to send one of those emails? Is it too early to do that now because I've heard some say Oct 15th on as the magic number.
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[Note to self: call in sick on Oct 16...]

Oh, anytime between now and Halloween is OK.
After Nov 1, you'll likely be needing to hope that your email hits the coordinator's inbox 10 seconds after one of those cancellations comes in.
 
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MacDonaldTriad said:
Yes, it sucks eliminating highly qualified, or even moderately qualified applicants because you don't believe they are not serious even though you have no concrete reason to think this. Unfortunately, that is what this has become. We should charge $100 per interview and then pay applicants 1K when they match with us. That would fix everything except the obvious unethical advantage this would the rich. I agree, something is going wrong.
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How about we get the entire DGME that we come with when we match and then get paid half the hourly salary of the PA/NP that we're replacing? It's already $30 for each application over 10 and more per application over 20 and the cost of not matching is so high that high interest loans of $10,000 would be worth it to prevent that risk. If applications become insanely expensive, people would end up shooting low out of fear... is that really fair to us? The simple way to fix the problem of having to turn down great applicants would be to make your program insanely awesome and compete for them. The match does not satisfy the assumptions that its built upon because of the work required to assess and interview applicants and programs and therefore it will continue to lead to people applying to more and more programs and become unsustainable.
 
Thanks for the responses everyone. I knew before I started this thread that I should obviously take what I read on forums with a grain of salt, but seeing the statement "I was told today that psych is the new radiology, tbh" admittedly made me freak out a little bit. But now after reading all of these responses, my feelings have vacillated from reassured, to freaked again, to feeling ok, to thinking I may need to apply to a back up specialty. Gah. Still too early to tell I know, but I guess it's just frustrating all around if psych is being used as a backup and many genuine but less than stellar applicants get shut out.
 
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