The #Path2Path Virtual Landscape During the COVID-19 Pandemic: Preparing for the 2020 Pathology Residency Recruitment Season

The #Path2Path Virtual Landscape During the COVID-19 Pandemic: Preparing for the 2020 Pathology Residency Recruitment Season

Blog Article

On May 11, here 2020, the Association of American Medical Colleges released recommendations discouraging in-person activities for away rotations and mandating virtual-only residency recruitment interviews.This paper focuses on how residency programs have attempted to adjust to this vastly different application cycle by using social media to reach their applicants.A total of 138 programs were identified through the Electronic Residency Application Services.The presence of Departmental/Residency program Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook as well as web pages offering virtual opportunities was recorded for each program on October 30, 2020.A total of 132 social media accounts were found; the majority of which were on Twitter, while fewer were on Instagram and Facebook.

All 138 pathology residency programs had websites.Sixteen (11.5%) of those advertised virtual open houses and 2 (1.4%) advertised virtual subinternships; social media were more often used for advertisement of these virtual experiences.A total of 58 open house opportunities sheepshead bay boats were advertised on Twitter, 21 on Instagram, and 20 on Facebook.

Innovative virtual subinternships ranging from 2 to 4 weeks were developed, but only represented 6% of the usual 126 away rotations available.Pathology programs across the country utilized websites and social media as a method of communication to interact with applicants as part of the #Path2Path in 2020 and to provide virtual opportunities in preparation for a drastically different recruitment cycle.