I think last year 4 DO's matched into allopathic residencies. According to Dr. Levine at Columbia, applicants there whether DO or MD are viewed the same and there is no preference given to MD's over DO's. If this is true at all places, email the programs and find out.
Also, unless you really want a certain location for certain reasons, there might be no DO ortho program so you apply MD; otherwise I feel that many qualified DO's, who could match MD, don't take the chance and go to a DO ortho residency as they will learn the exact same thing as an MD residency.
Here is what Dr. Levine said]Up to this point we have received 370 applications for our 6 residency positions at Columbia (if numbers hold out like the last 11 years we will eventually have ~500 applications). Only 3 of the 370 applications are from DO students but these 3 applications are reviewed just like the others as I have outlined in previous posts (USLME scores, medical school performance - especially 3rd year clinical grades, letters of recommendation, research experience, undergraduate performance).
At the end of the day, however, I think all students (osteopathic and allopathic) need to evaluate their strengths and weaknesses and determine with the help of their faculty supervisors/mentors how competitive they will be in one of the most difficult specialties to match. I meet with students all the time (admittedly mostly allopathic since that's where I work) and we candidly review their application and there are some students who I counsel to strongly consider another specialty given their situation and others who I counsel to at least strongly consider a back-up plan if they unfortunately do not match in orthopaedics.
I would give you the exact same advice - understand the strengths and weaknesses of your application and act accordingly. I am not sure it would be wise to forgo the osteopathic pathway so I would defer to your mentors on that question.[/quote]
