According to the latest issue of the AMA News there has been an overall downtrend of primary care match applicants and filled spots. Family medicine has been hit especially hard. US seniors matching in family medicine declined from 2340 in 1997 to only 1117 in 2005. (Other spots went to international graduates) This makes up just 41% of the family medicine slots. Total filled FM positions declined from 2905 to 2275 over the same period. Family medicine filled just 82.4% of available slots. Over the past 5 years, the number of US seniors is down in primary care, but internal medicine, ob-gyn, and pediatrics saw small net gains when international graduates were included. More students are heading to subspecialties, and dermatology, emergency medicine, general surgery, orthopedic surgery, and plastic surgery were among the most competitive specialties. See the full data set at the NRMP site here. This may be a disturbing trend in US healthcare in general, especially with an aging population in need of well trained primary care docs. And it may signal to international graduates that this may be the best window of opportunity to gain admission to US residencies. Perhaps in 10 years there will be a majority of international graduates outnumbering US grads in primary care, and the opposite for specialty care.
-Fool