Thalamus and The American Medical Student Association (AMSA) Announce Educational Collaboration to Promote Candidate Insight into the Residency Application, Interview, and Match Process.

Thalamus and AMSA have partnered up to leverage their respective expertise. Together they will provide educational materials aimed at increasing candidate awareness and insight into the graduate medical education (GME) interview and selection process.  

The partnership will initially take the form of a bimonthly seminar series, to commence summer 2019 and continue to Match Day 2020. Topics will include streamlining the application process, managing interviews and travel, optimizing rank list strategies, and other useful tips and resources specially designed for medical graduates entering the Match in this coming cycle. Materials will be targeted to both US and internal medical graduates (IMGs).

This new program aims to alleviate the significant financial and emotional burden on candidates during their final year of medical school, so that medical students may better focus on preparing for the transition to residency.

Why a Thalamus and AMSA partnership now? 

Over the last 20 years the cost of the residency application, interview, and match process have increased fivefold, eclipsing $80 million in application fees and totaling $1 billion dollars when factoring in travel and other related costs which account for 3% of all medical education debt. Applications have followed suit, with the average US grad applying to >60 programs and IMGs applying to >150 programs on average across all specialties. To pay for this process, candidates are further burdened financially with loans of up to an additional $25 thousand on top of their educational debt.

As a result of this application inflation, residency programs are interviewing more candidates than ever in order to ensure that they fill their match lists and eventual residency positions. The increase in interviews places an additional burden on hospital systems, costing upwards of $5 billion per annum collectively when factoring in the administrative and unbillable clinical hours faculty must spend reviewing applications and interviewing candidates.

What does this mean for medical students? 

Applying to residency is a challenging experience. What is often viewed as the most critical transition point in a physician’s career is fraught with anxiety, cost, and uncertainty. Candidates are presented with a number of choices but given limited insight into the process. 

“How many programs should I apply to? How many interviews should I attend? Where am I even competitive to match?” 

With this educational series, AMSA and Thalamus are here to help answer these questions and make the process more approachable and easier to understand.

For more information on the new AMSA Residency Prep Program powered by Thalamus please visit the program page

 About the collaborators: 

Thalamus is the premier cloud-based interview management platform specifically designed for application to graduate medical education training programs. Thalamus was created through a grassroots collaboration of program directors, program coordinators, and applicants/medical students to address the inefficiencies in the residency and fellowship interview process. Founded by physicians, it provides a comprehensive online interview reservation and travel experience via a real-time scheduling system—both on desktop and mobile. It allows residency and fellowship applicants to instantly confirm interview dates and take full control of their schedules while streamlining interview management for program administrators and directors. The American Medical Student Association is the oldest and largest independent association of physicians-in-training in the United States. Founded in 1950, AMSA is a student-governed, non-profit organization committed to representing physicians-in-training, advocating for quality and affordable health care for all, and building the next generation of physician leaders.