Analyzing the Research Publications of Successful Ophthalmology Residency Matches in 2024: Trends, Impact, and Outcomes

Purpose: To analyze the quantity and quality of research publications of medical students who matched into the top 25 ophthalmology programs in the 2024 cycle and compare these results to previous match cycles. Methods: This was a retrospective cross-sectional study. Participants included matriculating ophthalmology residents attending the top 25 programs as determined by Doximity. The Doximity Residency Navigator website was used to determine which programs were ranked in the top 25 in the country, and several websites were used to determine which students matched at the top 25 residencies. Once these students were identified, their research publications were collected via PubMed and analyzed. This data was compared with that of previous ophthalmology match cycles. The main outcome measures were total number of publications retrieved for each student. For each publication, the following publication-specific data were retrieved: including journal name, authorship rank, date of publication, whether publication related to ophthalmology, study type, h5-index score, and citation count were obtained for each publication. Results: A total of 147 matriculating ophthalmology residents were included. The mean number of publications was 6.79 ± 7.65 (median, 5) and the most frequent number of publications was 3 (n = 24). The mean number of first-author publications was 2.35 ± 2.91; of second-author publications, 1.42 ± 1.72); and of third-author publications, 0.92 ± 1.30. A two-tailed independent samples t test showed no significant difference in total publications between students (n = 66) entering programs ranked in the top 10 (mean, 8.20 ± 9.97) versus students (n = 81) entering programs ranked 11-25 (mean, 5.74 ± 4.96) (t[145] = 1.94, p = 0.054, Cohen’s d estimate = 0.323). There was a significant increase in publications compared to 2021 (mean 2.70 ± 3.10 [p < 0.01]) and 2022 (mean, 3.04 ± 0.350 [p = 0.0180]). Conclusion: Within matched applicants of the top 25 ophthalmology programs, there has been a significant increase in the number of research publications compared with that of the last 3 years.