Some specialties are super competitive for everyone–dermatology, neurosurgery, vascular surgery, plastic & reconstructive surgery., ENT, ophthalmology, urology, orthopedics, interventional radiology.
There simply aren’t many positions in these specialties which also have a long training period. Match rates are in the 60-70 percent range–and that’s for qualified applicants who have the appropriate research w/ publications, very high USMLE scores, clinical experiences in the specialty, strong LORs from preceptors in the specialty AND program fit.
Because most osteopathic medical schools do not have a home hospital program nor an associated university, DO students have a much harder time getting the expected experiences needed to make a strong application to the the highly competitive specialties.
Prior to the match unification in 2020, osteopathic and allopathic medical grads applied for and matched into separate programs in all specialties. There were derm/ortho/uro/ophthalmology/ENT/etc programs that only accepted osteopathic grads.
Now all programs are open to all students.
Because most (but not all!) MD schools offer their students better access to specialty-specific research, clinical rotations in the super competitive specialties, better access to mentors in the super competitive specialties, etc, MD students are more likely to have all the expected qualities that program directors in these fields are looking for.
DO medical schools also expect students to arrange many of their own rotations, particularly in competitive specialties that are not among the basic clinical rotations required by state medical boards. (IM, peds, ob/gyn, surgery, psych, FM and, in some states, neurology.) Not having a home hospital with residency programs in the competitive specialty puts DO med students at a disadvantage in getting the clinical rotation exposure to those specialties. (No program director will take an application seriously if the student hasn’t completed a sub-I rotation in the specialty. Some specialties require 2+ LORs from clinical instructors in the specialty at different programs sites. So applicants in these field need 2 sub-Is, not just one. Two away rotations to arrange while trying to fit in all the other required M4 coursework AND residency interviews AND research–that’s a lot. .)
The reason why osteopathic med grads are more closely associated with primary care fields are complex and multi-factorial–and much more than I can go into here.
But, yes, overall DOs are more likely to match into less competitive, non-surgical specialties. (The non-surgical is the important part here…since DOs get less exposure to surgery than MD students do.)
If anyone wants to take a deep dive into the data–
Start Here: https://www.nrmp.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/Main-Match-Results-by-State-Specialty-and-App-Type-2024.pdf