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    AAMC Research and Innovations Supporting the Residency Application Process

    The AAMC regularly explores ways to improve the residency application process through initiating its own research, supporting research led by other stakeholders in the academic medicine community, and making improvements to the Residency Explorer™ and ERAS® programs. Not all research yields changes to the application process, but each project has the potential to inform the AAMC — and its partners — in creating future innovations.   

    Active AAMC research and innovations 

    • New Data Dashboard Now Available on the ERAS Statistics Page: The AAMC added a dashboard to the ERAS Statistics webpage, offering new insights into signal-to-interview trends across participating specialties. It incorporates Thalamus interview data from residency and fellowship programs that accept applicants’ program signals. The dashboard provides insight on how signals shaped interview offers, compares signaling approaches, and explores trends across MD, DO, and international medical graduate applicants. The dashboards will continue to be updated monthly.

    • 2025-26 Resident Readiness Survey Open for Programs: The 2025-26 Resident Readiness Survey is a national standardized survey for program directors to share the preparedness of PGY-1 residents with their respective graduating medical schools. All residency programs with 2025-2026 graduates from the 185 participating medical schools (153 MD schools and 32 DO schools) are invited to complete the surveys in GME Track® by February 20. For more information, visit the Resident Readiness Survey Program webpage or email ResidentReadiness@aamc.org.

    • Responsible AI in Medical School and Residency Selection: 

      Many medical schools, residency and fellowship programs are exploring the use of artificial intelligence (AI) in their admissions and selections processes. The AAMC, together with its AI in Admissions and Selection Technical Advisory Committee, has developed resources to assist schools and programs in their journey to AI implementation, including:  

      • Guide to Assessing Your Institution’s Readiness for Implementing AI in Selection  

      • Guide to Evaluating Vendors on AI Capabilities and Offerings  

      • Essential AI Terms and Definitions for Implementing AI in the Selection Process

    Learn more about the AAMC’s new AI resources and how your medical school or residency program can use them at Artificial Intelligence Resources for Admission and Selection Processes.

    • Foundational Competencies Available: The AAMC, the American Association of Colleges of Osteopathic Medicine (AACOM), and the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education (ACGME) have published Foundational Competencies for Undergraduate Medical Education. The three organizations collected input through forums and focused sessions with a community of more than 1,000 medical educators, physicians, medical students, residents, caregivers, patients, and patient advocates from 47 U.S. states, Washington, D.C., Puerto Rico, and 15 countries. This shared competency framework for both DO and MD medical students establishes six foundational competencies —Professionalism, Patient Care and Procedural Skills, Medical Knowledge, Practice-Based Learning and Improvement, Interpersonal and Communication Skills, and Systems-Based Practice—complemented by 45 subcompetencies for MD and DO students and four additional subcompetencies for DO students. 
    • Successful Launch of the National Collaborative to Improve the Transition to Residency (NCITTR) Lays Groundwork for Continued Progress: No single organization can make significant progress on improving the transition to residency. This is why the AAMC created the National Collaborative to Improve the Transition to Residency (NCITTR) and on December 5, 2024, over 50 forward-thinking representatives from national medical organizations, specialty societies, and learners came together to identify and accelerate progress on shared priorities and enhance communications across the transition to residency ecosystem. For more information email ttr@aamc.org. 
    • The Future of Careers in Medicine® and the Residency Explorer™ Tool: Advisors and students reported that while the Careers in Medicine (CiM) program and the Residency Explorer tool are both powerful resources, the experience can feel disconnected. Learners often move between tools to explore specialties, complete self-assessments, and research individual residency programs. To address this feedback, the AAMC will integrate CiM and the Residency Explorer tool into one learner-first platform that connects the journey from self-discovery to residency exploration. This transition will take place gradually over the next two years in two phases (Note: Timelines may evolve as planning progresses).
      • Phase 1 — Anticipated for Summer 2026: The Residency Explorer tool will expand while CiM keeps its core tools. Specialty profiles will move into the Residency Explorer tool (previously in CiM) with refreshed, source-verified data and new personalization features.
      • Phase 2 — Anticipated for Summer 2027: CiM and the Residency Explorer tool will both be hosted on a single platform to streamline the experience for aspiring physicians.
    • AAMC and Thalamus Introduce New Application Programming Interface: Programs in the 2025 ERAS July fellowship program cycle were the first to use the new AAMC-Thalamus application programming interface (API) when they began reviewing applications on July 17. The API streamlines data and document transfer between the ERAS Program Director’s WorkStation (PDWS) and Thalamus products and provides a single sign-on (applicants and program users will be able to use their AAMC username and password, and Thalamus credentials, to log in to Thalamus products).
    • Updates to the Program Directors Association Guide for Residency Applicants: Members of the Organization of Program Directors Association (OPDA), the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC), and American Medical Association (AMA) collaborated to improve the process and clarity of information collected in the annual guide for residency applicants, which is designed to increase transparency in the residency application process and provide guidance on key specialty-specific application information and resources for the upcoming residency application cycle. Survey questions were reviewed, revised, and adapted to a standardized web form. The information was shared in both specialty-specific reports and a condensed summary table. Twenty-six specialties participated in the 2026 application cycle survey. All guides for participating specialties can be found on the ERAS 2026 Participating Specialties and Programs webpage .  
    • New research study on the impact of research and publications: The AAMC has a forthcoming research study on examining the impact of research and publications on residency interview invitations, challenging common myths about the “research arms race.” Through data analysis, our work aims to provide medical students and advisors with evidence-based guidance, reframing research from a perceived requirement to a purposeful and meaningful academic pursuit. Findings were shared with the community during a recorded webinar on June 18, 2025.
    • Program Signaling: The AAMC’s longitudinal evaluation of program signals is ongoing. Research continues to show that both applicants and program have positive reactions to signals and that sending a signal increases probability of interview invitations in all three approaches to signaling. Results are summarized on the ERAS Statistics page and in multiple publications. The AAMC, NRMP®, and NBME have also partnered to examine multiple years of signaling data across specialties as it relates to match outcomes. Preliminary results also show that sending a signal increases the probability of matching in all three approaches to signaling.

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    Past AAMC research and innovations 

    The following projects are no longer active, though relevant resources remain available. 

    • USMLE Step 1 Exam and COMLEX-USA LEVEL 1 Pass-Fail Transition Collaborative Research: In February 2020, the National Board of Medical Examiners (NBME) announced that it would only report pass/fail outcomes for USMLE Step 1 exams taken on or after January 26, 2022, with the National Board of Osteopathic Medical Examiners (NBOME) following with a similar announcement for COMLEX-USA LEVEL 1 exam scores. This, in part, led the AAMC, NBME, National Resident Matching Program® (NRMP®), American Association of Colleges of Osteopathic Medicine (AACOM), and NBOME to collaborate on a research program that evaluates the impact of this change both during and after the transition to residency. The multi-year research agenda will establish a baseline before pass/fail outcomes are reported for all applicants and explore changes over time. Research results will provide the community with information about current and planned future practices for students and advisors and identify any need for training and guidance regarding best practices for appropriate use, fairness, and validity in selection.
    • Virtual interviews and anti-bias training: The AAMC’s team of selection experts developed training materials and best practices to help applicants and program directors navigate virtual interviews. These free resources included strategies to help applicants prepare for virtual interviews and guidance for program directors about setting up and implementing a fair virtual interview process. These resources continue to help students and program directors.
    • Interview Resources: The AAMC developed interview resource hubs that will help both applicants and programs prepare for residency interviews.
      • The Interview Resources for Residency Applicants page shows applicants what they can expect throughout the interview process, including tips for preparing for interviews, a guide to virtual interviews, and advice from current residents.
      • The Interview Resources for Residency Programs page helps program directors and faculty participating in interviews to prepare for, conduct, and review interviews to ensure an experience that is beneficial, fair, and consistent for both programs and applicants.

    • Research study on a curricular resource to prepare students for surgery residency: AAMC staff, along with staff at the American College of Surgeons and other surgical educators, co-authored a study, Piloting a National Curricular Resource for the Transition to Surgical Residency: Characteristics of Participating Schools and Their Students, that was published in the Journal of Surgical Education in March 2024. The study showed that a high proportion of U.S. MD-granting schools chose to pilot this curricular resource, which proved equally accessible among students planning to enter surgery residency.

    • Supplemental ERAS Application: For the 2024 ERAS cycle, content from the Supplemental ERAS Application was moved into the main ERAS application. This updated application content is designed to help students share more about themselves and assist program directors in finding applicants that fit their programs’ setting and mission.  

    • Supplemental ERAS Application Data: The current analysis of the supplemental ERAS application for Year 2 is available on the Data and Reports page including resources to assist in understanding interview yield. 

    • July 2022 Transition to Residency Workshop: In July 2022, the AAMC convened a two-day workshop to create evidence-based action plans for four complex and urgent challenges during the transition to residency: away rotations, the GME interactive informational database, holistic review in residency selection, and interview protocols. This report summarizes the proceedings, discussions, priority activities, and next steps from the workshop. 

    • Data to help students reduce number of applications: From 2017-2021, the AAMC provided annual data to help students anchor their initial thinking about the number of residency programs they should apply to. There is a point of diminishing returns (which varied by specialty, USMLE Step 1 score, and applicant type) where submitting one more application did not necessarily increase the student’s likelihood of entering a residency program. The association also provided data showing overall entrance rates for each specialty, the portion of applicants who enter training in another specialty, and entrance rates for applicants who fail their first attempt of the USMLE Step 1 exam.  

    • Video or virtual interviewing: The AAMC completed a multiyear Standardized Video Interview pilot project to explore how to create a uniform video interview process for residency applicants and programs. The project informed future work supporting unbiased virtual interview experiences.  

    • Application caps: Using archival data, the AAMC has been modeling the implications of different levels of application caps on the probability of entering training in general and for specific demographic groups. The goal of this work is to identify any unintended consequences of application caps and to use empirical evidence to inform changes to the residency application process. In 2022, this research has been extended to a broader sample of specialties, and work will continue to refine preliminary models. Despite certain limitations regarding model fit and available data, preliminary findings show that it is possible to reduce the number of applications submitted without impacting estimated entry rates, although implementing caps may disadvantage DO and IMG applicants. Further details on these preliminary findings were shared at the Learn Serve Lead meeting in 2022.  

    Recent AAMC studies on the Core EPAs 

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    Resources from Academic Medicine 

    Below are some recent highlights of the transition to residency resources published in Academic Medicine. Visit our website and follow us on LinkedIn, Bluesky, and Twitter for more.

    Program Director Perspectives on the Utility of the Medical Student Performance Evaluation Shared During the Transition to Residency 
    In this study, the authors analyzed deidentified open-ended comments from the Association of American Medical Colleges’ 2020 and 2021 Resident Readiness Survey (RRS), an annual survey for program directors (PDs) to provide standardized feedback to U.S. medical schools regarding their graduates’ readiness for their first year of postgraduate training, that includes questions on the Medical Student Performance Evaluation (MSPE). The PDs identified several ways in which the MSPE provided useful information about individual learners and identified MSPE limitations that can be considered for quality improvement. These findings can inform future MSPE practices institutionally and nationally to improve its utility for the transition to residency. 

    The Landscape of Transition to Residency Courses in the United States: Results of a National Survey 
    This study examined the current landscape of transition to residency (TTR) courses in the United States. The survey, which was distributed to 187 accredited U.S. medical schools, inquired about the presence of a TTR course or plans for implementation. For schools with a course, respondents were asked about course requirements, content, structure, duration, resources used, assessment framework, grading, remediation, professionalism concerns, and faculty support. 

    Getting Ready for Residency: A Qualitative Analysis of Fourth-Year Medical Student Learning Plans Mapped to Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education Residency Competencies 
    The authors found that within a portfolio review process, fourth year medical students, with coaching support, identified diverse learning goals to support their readiness for the residency transition. The variety of subcompetencies addressed within these goals speaks to the need for individualization in the approach to preparing learners for residency. 

    Artificial Intelligence Meets Holistic Review: Promises and Pitfalls of Automating the Medical Education Admissions Process 
    While AI may have the potential to improve the holistic admissions process in undergraduate and graduate medical education by increasing efficiency and adding some measure of standardization among reviewers, the authors caution that this promise does not come without certain pitfalls. The authors call for the medical education community to establish clear regulations to govern the acceptable use of AI in the admissions process and for a principled adoption of AI tools in a way that is sustainable for applicants and reviewers in the future. 

    Implementing Core Entrustable Professional Activities in Undergraduate Medical Education: A Psychometric Study 
    This study examines the feasibility and psychometric results of an assessment of EPAs as a core component of the clinical program of assessment in undergraduate medical education, assesses the learning curves for each EPA, explores the time to entrustment, and investigates the dependability of the EPA data based on generalizability theory (G theory) analysis.  

    U.S. Medical School Graduates’ Placement in Graduate Medical Education: A National Study
    This study describes graduate medical education (GME) placement outcomes for recent U.S. medical school graduates, including examining differences identified between demographic groups.

    Application in Parallel to U.S. Residency Training Programs in Multiple Specialties: Trends and Differences by Applicant Educational Background, 2009–2021
    This article discusses research on the prevalence or contributions of parallel applications (application to residency in multiple specialties) toward the growth in the number of residency applications per applicant and application costs.

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    ERAS data supporting transition to residency research initiatives 

    ERAS data are used to support a variety of internal and external research initiatives, including studies promoting equal opportunity in graduate medical education.   

    • The AAMC continues to work with national organizations and agencies, including the National Institutes of Health, which has leveraged ERAS data by conducting specialty-specific analyses. These analyses examined ERAS applicant trends for specific specialties to determine applicant characteristics that are correlated with successful matriculation. Studies thus far have included specialties of urology, pediatric surgery, colon and rectal surgery, thoracic surgery, and complex general surgical oncology. 

    • ERAS data are also used to identify inequities in the medical education continuum. For example, Dowin Boatright, MD, MBA, MHS, analyzed ERAS data to determine racial disparities in Alpha Omega Alpha honor society selection.  

    • The AAMC makes data available that display historical and current ERAS data for applicants, GME programs, and researchers. These tables, which present data by applicant type, medical school type, and other identifiers, are used to understand applicant trends by specialty as well as the total applicant population as a whole. For example, research examined data in surgery residency and fellowship programs. 

    • Other AAMC data, such as GME Track® and Faculty Roster information, are used by academic medicine researchers to examine issues in residency related to the diversity of backgrounds and viewpoints. For example, recent articles examined the effect of surgery faculty diversity on general surgery resident attrition and women in leadership and their influence on gender diversity in plastic surgery programs. 

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