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Corresponding author. Department of Surgery, Washington University in St Louis School of Medicine, 660 S Euclid Avenue, Campus Box 8109, St Louis, MI, 63110.
Department of Surgery, Washington University in St Louis School of Medicine, St Louis, MissouriDepartment of Surgery, Oregon Health & Science University, Portland, Oregon
Graduate Medical Education, Washington University in St Louis School of Medicine, St Louis, MissouriDepartment of Medicine, Washington University in St Louis School of Medicine, St Louis, Missouri
Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the recruitment cycle for the 2021 Match was performed virtually. This Association for Surgical Education (ASE)-sponsored survey set out to study applicants’ ability to assess the factors contributing to fit through video interviews.
Methods
An IRB-approved, online, anonymous survey was distributed to surgical applicants at a single academic institution and through the ASE clerkship director distribution list between the rank order list certification deadline and Match Day. Applicants used 5-point Likert-type scales to rate factors for importance to fit and their ease of assessment through video interviewing. A variety of recruitment activities were also rated by applicants for their perceived helpfulness in assessment of fit.
Results
One hundred and eighty-three applicants responded to the survey. The three most important factors for applicant fit were how much the program cared, how satisfied residents seem with their program, and how well residents get along. Resident rapport, diversity of the patient population, and quality of the facilities were hardest to assess through video interviews. In general, diversity-related factors were more important to female and non-White applicants, but not more difficult to assess. Interview day and resident-only virtual panels were the most helpful recruitment activities, while virtual campus tours, faculty-only panels, and a program's social media were the least helpful.
Conclusions
This study provides valuable insight into the limitations of virtual recruitment for surgical applicants’ perception of fit. These findings and the recommendations herein should be taken into consideration by residency program leadership to ensure successful recruitment of diverse residency classes.
Video interviews offer potential advantages including reduced costs for both applicants and programs, improved efficiency, increased scheduling flexibility, and the opportunity for increased diversity and representation.
National Resident Matching Program (NRMP) Applicant and Program Director Survey Findings: Impact of the Virtual Experience on the Transition to Residency Research Brief.
However, there are also significant disadvantages. The removal of the cost and time-constraints of travel can result in “interview-hoarding,” a phenomenon of interview maldistribution where applicants accept more interviews than they would have accepted otherwise in years prior.
National Resident Matching Program (NRMP) Applicant and Program Director Survey Findings: Impact of the Virtual Experience on the Transition to Residency Research Brief.
Shifting the surgical residency match to a 100% virtual interview format during the COVID-19 pandemic, how has it affected placement into surgical training programs?.
Disadvantaged applicants might lack the technology for videoconferencing, while applicants caring for family might find it impossible to find private, disturbance-free spaces for video interviews.
Without in-person interviews, programs might find it more challenging to perform holistic application review and increase their reliance on metrics such as USMLE scores.
Shifting the surgical residency match to a 100% virtual interview format during the COVID-19 pandemic, how has it affected placement into surgical training programs?.
There are also concerns that a video interview format might limit applicants' ability to assess their own “fit” to the programs at which they interview. The National Residency Matching Program (NRMP) reported recently that applicants experience increased stress during video interviews, and have greater difficulty assessing program culture and determining fit with faculty and current residents.
National Resident Matching Program (NRMP) Applicant and Program Director Survey Findings: Impact of the Virtual Experience on the Transition to Residency Research Brief.
This is consistent with prepandemic research from Chandler et al. (2018) who piloted video interviews for pediatric surgery fellowship programs as a cheaper and more flexible alternative for busy senior surgical residents.
In their study, the majority of applicants reported feeling the video format prevented them from assessing program fit and disagreed that video interviews could successfully replace onsite visits.
These findings are concerning, since applicant perception of “fit” has consistently been ranked as one of the most important factors in an applicant's decision of which programs to apply to and, subsequently, the respective rank order of that program at the end of the cycle.
National Resident Matching Program (NRMP) Data Release and Research Committee. Results of the 2019 NRMP Applicant Survey by Preferred Specialty and Applicant Type.
National Resident Matching Program,
Washington, DC2019
Video interviewing might be particularly challenging for women and applicants from underrepresented minorities in medicine (URM). Their definition of “fit” is tightly linked to their perception of program diversity, which may be difficult to evaluate via video interviewing.
The main purpose of this study was to investigate how surgical applicants assessed “fit” to the programs at which they interviewed during the virtual recruitment cycle. Through this Association for Surgical Education (ASE)-sponsored survey, we sought to identify what factors were most important to the participants of this unprecedented cycle, and whether virtual recruitment affected their ability to assess those factors.
Methods
This was a multidisciplinary survey that was reviewed and approved by our institutional IRB and the ASE Surgical Education Research Committee for distribution to residency applicants to surgical specialties entering the 2021 Match. Survey distribution was two-pronged; using an ASE distribution list, an anonymous link to the study survey was distributed to surgical clerkship directors with instructions to forward to students matching to a surgical specialty. The link was also distributed directly to surgical applicants who were interviewed at a single, large academic institution through the program directors of the respective programs at which those applicants interviewed. The secure survey platform employed in this study prevents multiple submissions from the same IP address to avoid duplicate submissions. For the purpose of this survey, “surgical specialties” was defined to include Cardiothoracic Surgery, Neurologic Surgery, Obstetrics and Gynecology, Orthopedic Surgery, Otolaryngology, Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery, General Surgery, Urology, and Vascular Surgery. The survey window opened after rank order list (ROL) certification deadline and closed on Match Day 2021. The NRMP was consulted during the preparation of this survey. Based on their recommendations, this survey window was chosen to assuage applicants’ concerns that the survey might affect their Match, while also avoiding the results of the main Match from affecting their responses. Before distribution, the survey was piloted internally with a group of surgical education research experts comprising of surgical faculty, residents, and medical students.
Demographic data including applicant gender, sexual orientation, race/ethnicity, type and region of medical school attended, couple-match status, and preferred specialty, were collected. Guided by previously published literature, and expertise from our institution's Graduate Medical Education office and the NRMP, we identified 18 unique factors that operationalize the concept of “fit” (Table 1).
Using Likert-type scales, applicants were first asked to rate the importance of those factors to their definition of fit (1 = “Not very important for “fit” for me” and 5 = “Very important for “fit” for me”), and then how effectively they were able to assess those same factors during video interviews (1 = “Very difficult to assess” and 5 = “Very easy to assess”). Applicants were also asked to rate a variety of virtual recruitment activities for how helpful they were for evaluating fit (1 = “Not helpful at all” and 5 = “Extremely helpful”).
Table 1Factors important for applicant fit.
Factors important for applicant fit
Academic recognition of the program
Cost of living
Diversity of the patient population
Emphasis on research
Emphasis on working with medical students
Gender diversity of the faculty
Gender diversity of the residents
Geographic location
How much the program seems to care about its trainees
Lastly, a single item open-ended question asking, “Are there other important factors influencing “fit” that were not listed above?” was included. The brief qualitative write-in responses were reviewed by two authors independently (JZR, CG), who then came together to come to a consensus on coding themes and tabulate the responses. All survey questions were optional. The survey instrument employed for this study is available as supplementary materials.
Descriptive statistics were performed to summarize the profile of respondents. The institutional response rate was calculated by dividing the number of survey responses received by the total number of applicants interviewed by the participating residency programs. The response rate for the ASE clerkship director distribution list arm was not calculated, as the denominator is unknown. Likert scales data were analyzed as categorical variables and Chi-square tests were performed to compare the results by cohort (institutional versus ASE), gender (male versus female), and race (White versus non-White). To facilitate analysis, the five Likert categories in the factor importance and ease of assessment survey questions were combined into three categories: not important (scores 1-2), neutral (score 3), and important (scores 4-5); difficult to assess (scores 1-2), neutral (score 3), and easy to assess (scores 4-5). Survey nonresponses were excluded from the analysis. All analyses were performed using SAS version 9.4 (SAS Institute), and a P-value <0.05 was considered statistically significant.
Results
A total of 183 survey responses were received, 58 (31.7%) from the ASE distribution list and 125 (68.3%) directly from interviewees at our institution (institutional response rate 28.7%). The demographic profile of the survey respondents is summarized in Table 2. There were some differences between the institutional cohort and the ASE cohort, with the institutional cohort being more racially diverse (49.5% non-White versus 18.0%, P = 0.009), mostly MD applicants (95.2% versus 64.7%, P < 0.001), more likely to be located in the Midwest (42.9% versus 14.0%, P < 0.001), and had greater representation of other surgical specialties than general surgery (36.4% general surgery versus 56.4%, P = 0.002). There were no differences in gender, sexual orientation, or proportion of applicants entering the match as a couple.
Table 2Demographics of survey respondents.
Characteristics
Institution (n = 125)
ASE (n = 58)
P-value
Gender
0.391
Female
65 (52.5%)
30 (60.0%)
Male
58 (47.2%)
20 (40.0%)
PNTS or not reported
2
8
Sexual orientation
0.084
Bisexual
8 (6.5%)
1 (2.0%)
Heterosexual
113 (11.8%)
44 (88.0%)
Homosexual
3 (2.4%)
4.0 (8.0%)
Other sexual identity
0
1 (2.0%)
PNTS or not reported
1
8
Race/ethnic group
0.009
Asian
28 (23.5%)
3 (6.0%)
Black
14 (11.8%)
3 (6.0%)
Latinx
8 (6.7%)
1 (2.0%)
Middle Eastern or North African
8 (6.7%)
2 (4.0%)
Native American, Alaska Native, Native Hawaiian or Pacific Islander
1 (0.8%)
0
White
60 (50.4%)
41 (82.0%)
PNTS or not reported
6
8
Medical school
<0.001
DO
0
18 (35.3%)
IMG
6 (4.8%)
0
MD
119 (95.2%)
33 (64.7%)
PNTS or not reported
0
7
Location
<0.001
West
11 (9.2%)
27 (54.0%)
Midwest
51 (42.9%)
18 (35.3%)
Northeast
31 (26.1%)
5 (10.0%)
South
26 (21.9%)
11 (22.0%)
PNTS or not reported
6
8
Preferred specialty
0.002
Cardiothoracic surgery
3 (2.5%)
1 (2.6%)
Neurosurgery
7 (5.8%)
1 (2.6%)
Obstetrics and gynecology
0
5 (12.8%)
Orthopedic surgery
22 (18.2%)
4 (10.3%)
Otolaryngology
18 (14.9%)
1 (2.6%)
Plastic & reconstructive surgery
17 (14.1%)
2 (5.1%)
General surgery
44 (36.4%)
22 (56.4%)
Urology
9 (7.4%)
1 (2.6%)
Vascular surgery
1 (0.8%)
2 (5.1%)
PNTS or not reported
4
19
Couples match
17 (13.6%)
2 (4.0%)
0.002
PNTS, prefer not to say; DO, osteopathic medical school graduate; IMG, international medical graduate; MD, allopathic medical school graduate.
The three most important factors for surgical applicant fit were how much the program seems to care about its trainees (with almost 98% of applicants rating it as an important factor), how satisfied residents seem with their program (97.9%), and how well the residents get along with each other (96.7%) (Fig. 1). The least important factors for applicants’ definition of fit were quality of the facilities (with <40% of applicants rating it as an important factor), cost of living (36.0%), and opportunities for supplemental income (12.0%). Respondents were given the opportunity to write-in additional factors not included in the survey. In total, 35 applicants submitted responses. These were grouped by theme and are summarized in Supplemental Table 1. The three factors that were most frequently suggested by applicants were the approachability of faculty and the program director (28.6%), the opportunities for professional development (such as dedicated time for research or pursuing additional degrees, 17.1%), and the placement of program graduates (14.3%).
Fig. 1Proportion of applicants ranking factors as important for their definition of fit and easy to assess through video interviewing (sorted by decreasing factor importance).
Applicants were then asked to evaluate the same factors they rated for importance, by how well they were able to assess those factors via video interviews. The factors that were perceived by applicants to be the easiest to evaluate through video interviewing were the academic recognition of the program (with almost 93% of applicants rating it as a factor that was easy to assess), the cost of living (82.6%), and the emphasis on research (78.7%), while the most difficult were how well the residents get along with each other (with only 26.5% of applicants rating it as a factor that was easy to evaluate), the diversity of the patient population (19.7%), and the quality of the facilities (13.0%).
Subanalysis by cohort
The responses from the ASE cohort were compared to those from the institutional cohort. Academic recognition (77.6% versus 48.3%, P < 0.001) and research emphasis (64.8% versus 39.7%, P < 0.001) were more important to the institutional cohort compared to the ASE cohort, while geographic location (68.0% versus 84.5%, P = 0.029) and the structure of didactics (33.6% versus 55.2%, P = 0.001) were less important (Fig. 2A). In terms of ease of assessment, research emphasis (84.0% versus 66.0%, P = 0.021), resident gender diversity (82.4% versus 60.4%, P = 0.005), and resident racial/ethnic diversity (73.6% versus 50.9%, P = 0.010) were all easier to assess for the institutional cohort compared to the ASE cohort (Fig. 2B).
Fig. 2Proportion of applicants ranking factors as (A) important for their definition of fit and (B) easy to assess through video interviewing by cohort (∗P < 0.05). (ASE: Association for Surgical Education).
With regard to gender, male applicants (n = 78) were compared to female applicants (n = 95). The gender diversity of the faculty (84.2% rating it as important versus 42.3%, P < 0.001) and the gender diversity of the residents (82.1% rating it as important versus 52.6%, P < 0.001) were more important to female applicants than male, while the quality of the facilities was less important to female applicants compared to males (30.5% rating it as important versus 44.9%, P = 0.016) (Fig. 3A). In terms of ease of assessment, the only statistically significant difference was in the ability to assess the emphasis on working with medical students, which was slightly easier to assess for female applicants than male (28.4% rating it as easy to assess versus 26.9%, P = 0.032) (Fig. 3B).
Fig. 3Proportion of applicants ranking factors as (A) important for their definition of fit and (B) easy to assess through video interviewing by applicant gender (∗P < 0.05).
Comparing surgical applicant responses by race, the diversity of the patient population (73.0% rating it as important versus 54.5%, P = 0.026) and the racial/ethnic diversity of the faculty (71.6% versus 53.0%, P = 0.040) were more important to non-White applicants (n = 74) than to White applicants (n = 101) (Fig. 4A). Additionally, how well residents get along with each other was slightly more important to non-White applicants than White (99.0% versus 93.2%, P = 0.040), while program family-friendliness was less important (39.2% non-White versus 62.4% White, P = 0.008). In terms of factor ease of assessment via video interviewing, how satisfied residents were with their program (47.3% versus 25.7%, P = 0.005) and diversity of the patient population (28.4% versus 12.9%, P = 0.001) were easier to assess for non-White applicants than White (Fig. 4B).
Fig. 4Proportion of applicants ranking factors as (A) important for their definition of fit and (B) easy to assess through video interviewing by applicant race (∗P < 0.05).
Lastly, applicants were asked to rate a variety of virtual recruitment activities in terms of how helpful they were to applicant assessment of fit (Table 3). The most helpful recruitment activities were the interview day itself (with >80% of applicants rating it as helping very much or being extremely helpful), resident-only virtual panels (78.5%), and website information on current residents and alumni (61.4%). In contrast, the least helpful recruitment activities were virtual campus tours (with only 34% of applicants rating them as helping very much or being extremely helpful), a program's social media presence (32.1%), and faculty-only virtual panels (28.9%).
Table 3Recruitment activities and perceived helpfulness by applicants in assessing fit.
Virtual recruitment activity
Perceived helpfulness
Not at all helpful
Helped a little bit
Helped somewhat
Helped very much
Extremely helpful
Interview day
1.2%
1.7%
16.7%
36.8%
43.7%
Residents-only virtual panel
0.6%
4.9%
16.0%
36.8%
41.7%
Website – Current residents and alumni
0.6%
12.3%
25.7%
33.3%
28.1%
Website – Program structure/objectives
3.5%
13.3%
26.6%
35.3%
21.4%
Virtual Q&A session with program director
2.1%
12.6%
31.5%
32.2%
21.7%
Website – Resident curriculum
3.0%
14.2%
32.0%
37.9%
13.0%
Virtual open house
2.6%
20.4%
34.4%
23.6%
19.1%
Virtual campus tour
7.1%
21.3%
37.6%
23.4%
10.6%
Social media presence (Twitter, Instagram, Facebook)
Due to the COVID-19 pandemic and in accordance with recommendations from a work group of the Coalition for Physician Accountability comprising of representatives from the AAMC, the ACGME, and the NRMP, recruitment for the Match 2021 was conducted virtually for the first time.
Significant literature over the last year has speculated on the possible effects of a virtual recruitment cycle. Particular emphasis was placed on ascertaining whether video interviewing could be an adequate substitute for in-person interviews, which until now had been the standard and the most important aspect of the recruitment experience.
With assistance from the ASE, this study set out to understand how surgical applicants assessed the factors important to applicant fit during the virtual recruitment cycle.
Several factors have been reported to contribute to surgical applicants’ perception of fit, ranging from geographic location to resident satisfaction with their program choice.
In this study, how much a program cared about its trainees, resident satisfaction, and resident rapport were the most important factor for applicant assessment of fit, which is reflective of ongoing changes in surgical culture—and culture in medical education as a whole—towards increased emphasis on resident wellness, morale, and quality of life.
With regard to ease of assessment, applicants found it difficult to assess whether residents got along with each other, the diversity of patient population served, and the quality of the facilities. It is not surprising that resident rapport was difficult to assess, since virtual recruitment limits the total number of current residents that applicants can interact with, and the total number of interactions they can have with them. Without onsite visits to a program and their city, applicants are only able to assess the diversity of the patient population served and the quality of the facilities through web materials, which these findings suggest, are currently insufficient.
We compared the responses obtained from our institution to those obtained through the ASE distribution list. There were some differences both in terms of factor importance and in ease of assessment between these two populations. Compared to the ASE cohort, research emphasis and academic recognition were more important to the institutional cohort, likely reflecting selection bias of applicants self-selecting to apply to our institution, a large academic center with strong emphasis on clinical, outcomes, and basic science research.
Research emphasis, resident gender diversity, and resident racial diversity were easier to assess for institutional applicants compared to those who received the survey through the ASE distribution list. This, again, may reflect specific areas of interest to our program that potentially get displayed more prominently during our recruitment activities compared to other institutions.
However, in the absence of information regarding which institutions the ASE survey respondents interviewed at, or the details of their recruitment materials and activities, it is impossible to draw conclusions from these data; this represents a limitation of our study.
The survey responses were additionally subanalyzed by applicant gender and race. Overall, applicants had similar views about which factors were important for applicant fit across gender and race, and their ability to assess those factors through video interviews was similar as well. There were, however, a few differences worth highlighting. In general, diversity-related factors tended to be more important to female surgical applicants compared to males, and more important to non-White surgical applicants compared to White, which is consistent with previous reports from in-person recruitment era surveys.
In terms of ease of assessment, the degree of emphasis on working with medical students was slightly easier to assess for male applicants than females—although statistically significant, the difference in the proportion of applicants rating the factor as easy to assess was minimal (<2% difference). We hypothesized that video interviews would present additional challenges for URM applicants when assessing fit, since it has been previously reported that URM applicants place more emphasis on program diversity when assessing fit. Since the number and scope of interactions applicants can have are limited through video interviews, applicants’ ability to gauge program diversity could potentially also be limited. However, it was White applicants instead who reported that patient diversity and resident satisfaction as more difficult to assess compared to non-White applicants. The reasons for this difference are unclear, further qualitative research is necessary to expound on this matter.
Based on these data and drawing upon literature from medical education, psychology, business, and communication studies, we propose in Table 4 some best practices to capitalize on successful programming and overcome the perceptual disconnects related to virtual recruitment.
Building brand authenticity on social media: the impact of instagram ad model genuineness and trustworthiness on perceived brand authenticity and consumer responses.
The concept of program fit is akin to that of organizational culture, which is often described in the corporate world as being comprised of formal and informal components. Current virtual recruitment programming is most successful at communicating formal components (program leadership, curriculum, departmental structures), but fails at conveying informal components (beliefs, traditions, anecdotes, etc.), as evidenced by the fact trainees struggle to ascertain resident rapport with one another (Caruso 2016). The immersive experience provided by onsite visits allows applicants to observe nonverbal cues and communication styles, and provides opportunities to participate in informal, spontaneous conversation, and may be impossible to recreate through video interviews (Deitte 2021, Fodje 2020). However, hosting informal, nonstructured, small group virtual forums may best facilitate organic conversations between applicant and residents, thereby allowing informal components of organizational culture to be more easily conveyed (Sternberg 2020, Butler 2021). Our study found resident-only virtual panels to be more helpful to applicants than interactions with PDs and faculty, which should be taken into account for future programming (Chesney 2021, Lee 2021).
Diversity and inclusion
Our study findings suggest that minoritized trainees continue to place particular emphasis on diversity-related factors when assessing fit to the programs at which they interview. To continue recruiting diverse resident classes, programs should be intentional when communicating their commitment to diversity and inclusion. Be transparent and specific about the initiatives undertaken to ensure diversity in their residency classes and amongst faculty and departmental leadership, and clearly outline implicit bias and antiracism measures in place (Nwora 2021). Increase visibility of residents and faculty of color and/or self-identifying as LGBTQ. Partner with local chapters of organizations committed to increasing diversity in medicine both at the undergraduate (such as the American medical Women's Association, the Latino medical student Association, and the student national medical Association) and the graduate medical education level (such as the Association of women Surgeons, the Latino surgical Society, and the Society of Black academic Surgeons) to identify opportunities for engaging with URM and other minority applicants, and offer additional virtual opportunities specifically aimed at connecting URM applicants with minority residents and faculty.
Social media presence
Social media presence was perceived by applicants to be least helpful for assessing fit, presenting a major opportunity for improvement. Social media authenticity has been shown to improve attitudes toward, and increase engagement with, the brand of a business (or residency program). This may be achieved by involving trainees in content creation (Brown 2021, Yang 2021). Content should focus specifically on providing applicants with insight into the resident experience, which is what applicants are most interested in (Nelson 2021). Consider “resident take-overs” of social media accounts, or “ask Me Anything” (AMA) sessions, which offer an opportunity for real-time bidirectional communication (Haas 2021). Social media also provides an avenue to celebrate resident and faculty accomplishments (awards, scholarships, publications), and to mark specific events (i.e. “live-tweeting” a presentation).
Program website
Without onsite visits, program websites become an increasingly important source of information for applicants, yet applicants have found many program websites to be outdated or difficult to navigate (Tang 2021). Program websites should clearly display program leadership contact information and have updated, centralized, faculty and resident directories. Websites should also include the number of residency spots offered, application requirements, demographics of the patient population served, descriptions of additional training sites, housing information, ancillary benefits, and case volumes (Nelson 2021). Programs can also capitalize on their websites by providing asynchronous and longitudinal recruitment experiences such as prerecorded educational offerings, or resident videos highlighting unique program features and ongoing research (Haas 2020, Sternberg 2020, Butler 2021, Brown 2021).
Virtual tours
Not surprisingly, quality of the facilities was one of the harder factors to assess through video interviews and virtual campus tours were not found to be helpful by applicants. Consider innovative approaches to highlight institutional facilities such as a tour given by a current resident or faculty, or virtual reality. A recent study from Zertuche et al. Studying the implementation of virtual reality tours as an alternative to onsite visits during the past recruitment cycle found the majority of applicants found it as a noninferior or superior option compared to in-person tours (Zertruche 2020). However, almost half of the applicants surveyed reported difficulties with the virtual reality technology.
There are several limitations to our study. The survey distribution was two-pronged, which increased the reach of our survey, but resulted in a mixed study population and made the true response rate impossible to calculate. The study cohort was mostly comprised of respondents from our institution (approximately two-thirds), which had some significant differences from the ASE sample including greater racial/ethnic diversity and an overrepresentation of MD and Midwestern applicants. Per the AAMC, the 2021 general surgery applicant cohort was almost 50% IMG, 50% female, and 50% White race; while the mixed study population had a similar gender and racial/ethnic composition, it was mostly comprised of MD graduates.
It is unclear how the unbalanced composition of the study sample or it overrepresentation of MD applicants might have affected our results, future research is necessary to validate this study's findings. Additionally, as an ASE distribution list was used, there is likely over-representation of applicants training at (and potentially also interested in) academic programs in our sample. The local distribution of the survey to surgical applicants at our institution was delegated to PDs to protect applicant privacy, while the second distribution arm was facilitated by the ASE via their clerkship director distribution list. Therefore, there was some variability in the presentation of the survey link that was not controlled for, it is possible some applicants received the survey as a stand-alone email, while others received it alongside links to other institutional and/or national surveys, which may have affected the response rate. In addition, survey factors were selected based on extensive literature review and in consultation with several medical education experts, but inevitably there will be other factors important to applicant fit that were omitted (Supplemental Table 1). Lastly, it is plausible that the factors that were difficult to evaluate through video interviewing would have been equally difficult to evaluate onsite, but there are no control data with which to compare our findings.
Conclusions
While virtual recruitment has some advantages including increased efficiency, reduced costs, and potentially greater diversity, there are several disadvantages such as the potential for exacerbating inequities and inability to perform holistic application review. Furthermore, video interviewing could affect applicants' ability to assess fit to the programs at which they interview. Our survey results revealed significant differences in factor importance by applicant demographics, where diversity-related factors were more important to, but in general not more difficult to assess for, women and non-White applicants. To continue to recruit diverse residency classes successfully, this study's findings should be taken into consideration by residency program leadership since video interviews will likely remain a part of future recruitment cycles.
Drs Zarate Rodriguez, Gan, and Awad were responsible for developing the study survey, data collection, analysis, and drafting of the manuscript. Mr Williams, Ms Drake, and Drs Ciesielski and Sanford, reviewed and edited the survey, assisted with data analysis, and reviewed and approved the final manuscript.
Disclosure
None declared.
Funding
None.
Availability of Data
Data are available from the authors upon request.
References
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Virtual interviews for surgical training program applicants during COVID-19: lessons learned and recommendations.
Shifting the surgical residency match to a 100% virtual interview format during the COVID-19 pandemic, how has it affected placement into surgical training programs?.
Building brand authenticity on social media: the impact of instagram ad model genuineness and trustworthiness on perceived brand authenticity and consumer responses.
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