title: Residency Program Interviewee Opinion Survey: The Value of a Weekend Versus Weekday Interview with Respect to Typical Workday Exposure,Focus on the Applicant, Scheduling, Finances, and Tourism. Does it affect scheduling and attending an interview or ranking a program?
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Our research team investigated the value of a weekend interview for residency applicants. The importance of this offering to medical student interviewees has yet to be investigated and the implications are great, particularly with respect to applicant scheduling, costs, staffing, and potentially even program selection from the applicant's perspective. We aimed to determine if a weekend interview compared favorably to a typical weekday interview for residency applicants to our program.
  
  
  METHODS
  Following exemption from The George Washington University (GW) Institutional Review Board, an 18 question web-based survey was sent to 123 residency applicants who interviewed for GW's anesthesiology program. The results were collected anonymously, and data was analyzed using Pearson chi squared tests.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Of 123 surveys, 67 were completed for a response rate of 54%. The weekend interview was a "positive" offering with respect to focus on the applicant (71.6%, CI 60.1 - 82.4) and scheduling (83.8%, CI 75.1 - 92.6). Other considerations such as: decision to apply, rank, family time, costs, tourism, and exposure to routine work day were not significant factors in applicant decision-making.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Overall, the day of interview did not affect applicants' decisions to apply, interview, or rank the program. A weekend interview offering allowed for greater program focus on the applicant and easier scheduling of the interview from the medical student applicants' perspective.
authors.affiliation: Assistant Professor of Anesthesiology in the Department of Anesthesiology and Critical Care Medicine, The George Washington University, Washington, DC.
authors.forename: Jeffrey
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Berger
authors.affiliation: Medical Student, The George Washington University, Washington,DC.
authors.forename: Negin
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Daneshpayeh
authors.affiliation: Pain Medicine Fellow at Stanford University Medical Center, Department of Anesthesiology, Palo Alto, CA.
authors.forename: Nichelle
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Cook
authors.affiliation: Anesthesiology University Langone Medical Center, Department of Anesthesiology, New York, NY.
authors.forename: Adam
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Sachs