At least at my institution, radiology has seen a surge in applicants from just one year ago (6 to ~20). Perhaps this is not just an anomaly. As for this affecting the competitiveness of ortho... nothing wrong with some wishful thinking, right?

I don't think ortho will become any less competitive in the near future. The idea of an 80 hour work week is gonna seem nice to people that would otherwise steer clear of the 110 hour plus weeks typical of a junior ortho resident. (IMHO)

orthoguns,

Your theory makes the assumption that some or all of the new increase in people now going for radiology are being siphoned out of the ortho pool. What's to say that they're not coming out of the pools of other traditionally competitive fields ie urology, ENT, plastics, those who would be vying for top gensurg programs, ophtho, etc? My opinion is that ortho will always be competitive for reasons that we all know and why torture yourself and kid yourself by trying to reason otherwise. Spend your time and effort making sure you are a player and then nothing else matters.

Based on just what I've heard from other students during away rotations, it seems like every one is saying that there are like 10 or more people from their schools going into ortho this year. I wouldn't be suprised if the number of applications for ortho goes up this year.
Whether more applications means it's more competitive is another question. As previously mentioned, the new work hours make surgical specialties more appealing to people who might have traditionally done something like anesthesia or rads. Just look at the gen surg applications from last year, there were like only 33 unmatched spots before the scramble compared to like 33 percent the year before that. Then you have to think about ortho, where life after residency can be pretty good and you can still make some money compared to something like gen surg where you still might be working your ass off as an attending just to make a buck. People will be even more drawn to that. However, I think the climate of medicine might be changing to where more people are wanting a life outside of medicine. Just look at last year's class at Harvard, like 15 people went into Derm and a ton of others did rads. I just try not to think about stuff like this. If you like ortho and want to do it. Go for it. Take care of your own sh*t and don't worry about what other people are doing.

Why don't you all do what I did and frame the other chumps in my class for that were gonna go into ortho for cheating and get them expelled? At least I did something to take matters into my own hands, and now the rest of you slackarses will benefit. Actually, that's not really the way it happened, but I am the sole ortho applicant from my program, for reasons unknown. It's still not a bad suggestion tho... And no, I see no signs of it slowing down either. Beware the bad science of making unfounded assumptions that you wish to be true.

Yankees suck

There's no doubt that whatever happens in rads, is not going to, by any stretch of the imagination, alter the future of ortho. That's why the words "slightly" and "not significantly" are used. More than anything else, it's nice to dream to pass the time and hear some chatter on the board....Besides, it takes my mind off all the work i have in front of me with Cali...

OrthoGuns-
What are you doing up at 4:13 AM?

I don't think this was meant to be a thread that knocked the competitiveness of ortho or was looking for some possible advantage. I have to agree that I think many people are looking at other fields such as g-surg and radiology in addition to orthopaedics. It seems that there is some cyclical behavior to the demand in most fields. Many years ago, ortho was not nearly as competitive and g-surg was. It really was thought of in the medical circles as "the jock field." I think we can all agree that it is much more diverse than that now.
General surgery is much more appealing to applicants this year and will be in the near future simply for the 80 hr work week rule. Whether hospitals abide by it or not, the simple legislation of it will have more people applying. Radiology, not only because of the cush lifestyle, is also booming because it simply is a growing field. More procedures are done non-invasively and nearly all fields of medicine are evolving diagnostic tests around radiology. Does this take anything away from ortho? I don't know if it does or not. However, I am certainly still considering all 3 (g-surg, ortho, rads), while taking some time off to do research this year.
Good luck all with apps/interviews.

p.s.-don't read some of the threads about matched credentials from last year.(some are confidence boosts, some are really depressing)

HandJob-

insomnia is a bitch.

Thought I'd bring this thread back to the top now that people are getting invites/rejections. Any new opinions?