March 21, 2014—(BRONX, NY)—At noon today, members of the class of 2014 at Albert Einstein College of Medicine of Yeshiva University continued a time-honored medical school tradition when they ripped open their personalized envelopes and learned where they will launch their careers as a doctors. On Match Day, fourth-year students at Einstein – and at medical schools around the country – discover where and in what specialty they will conduct their residency training. Residency begins after medical school graduation. 

"This is one of the two or three most exciting days in the life of a medical student," said Stephen Baum, M.D., senior associate dean for students at Einstein. "Fortunately the vast majority of our graduates are overjoyed at the results of the Match."

Seventy-five of the 176 Einstein students who matched will be entering the three specialties that comprise primary care medicine: 44 matched to internal medicine residencies, 26 to pediatrics and 5 to family medicine. In addition to internal medicine (#1) and pediatrics (#2), the top 10 matches were: psychiatry (12), emergency medicine (12), obstetrics & gynecology (10), neurology (9), diagnostic radiology (9), surgery (9), anesthesiology (8) and orthopeadics (6).

Of note for this class was the spike in the proportion matching to neurology (5.1 percent, up from 1.5 percent last year), psychiatry (6.8 percent, up from 4.1), and physical & rehabilitation medicine (2.3 percent, up from .5).

This year, the Match offered 29,761 first- and second-year positions, 500 more than last year and an all-time high. More than half of the additional positions were in primary care specialties of internal medicine and family medicine.

Match Day has been a rite of passage for medical students since the National Resident Matching Program (NRMP) was established in 1952. It uses a computerized mathematical algorithm to align the preferences of applicants with the preferences of residency programs in order to fill the residency training positions available at U.S. hospitals. NRMP is a private, not-for-profit organization established at the request of medical students to provide an orderly and fair mechanism to match applicants and open residency positions.