Match Day (medicine)

Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine student celebrating Match Day

Match Day is a term used widely in the graduate medical education community to represent the day when the National Resident Matching Program or NRMP releases results to applicants seeking residency and fellowship training positions in the United States. Match Day for the NRMP Main Residency Match is on the third Friday of March each year, and Match Day ceremonies occur at many of the 155 medical schools in the United States where those results are announced. Match Days for the NRMP Fellowship Matches occur throughout the year because each Fellowship Match has its own schedule of dates. Other matching plans like the American Urological Association, and the San Francisco Match (Ophthalmology and Plastic Surgery) have dates on which they release their results. By participating in a national matching plan, applicants contractually agree to attend the residency, internship or fellowship programs to which they match. The same agreement applies to the programs; they are obligated to train the applicants who match to them. In 2017, Match Day hit a record-high as 35,969 U.S. and international medical school students and graduates vied for 31,757 residency positions.[1]

  1. ^ "Med Page Today". 2017-03-17.