Match Day results put spotlight on interventional cardiology’s workforce woes
More than 150 interventional cardiology programs participated in the specialty’s 2025 Match Day, and 97% of applicants were able to secure a new position. This represents just the second time interventional cardiology has participated in Match Day since it joined the National Resident Match Program in 2024—and that 97% success rate is an improvement over the previous year’s 94%.
Those numbers, however, do not tell the full story. At Match Day’s conclusion, there were still 71 unfilled fellowship positions across 49 different participating programs due to a lack of applicants. The Society for Cardiovascular Angiography and Interventions (SCAI) issued a statement about the unfilled positions, pointing to the changes required to help the specialty bounce back and thrive in the future.
“We recognize that unfilled positions present significant challenges for fellowship programs, and we take these concerns very seriously,” J. Dawn Abbott, MD, Match Task Force co-chair and SCAI president-elect, said in a statement. “The Interventional Cardiology Match functioned as intended, and nearly all applications secured a position. The issue we are seeing is not a failure of the match process, but rather evidence of a shrinking trainee pipeline. This underscores the critical need to address the factors that influence whether fellows pursue interventional cardiology: radiation exposure, orthopedic strain from wearing lead, demanding call responsibilities, burnout, and career longevity. SCAI remains deeply committed to advocating on behalf of the interventional cardiology workforce and advancing solutions that will ensure a bright and sustainable future for our profession.”
“It is eye-opening to note that there are considerably more fellowship positions than there are candidates,” added Douglas Drachman, MD, Match Task Force co-chair. “We will be exploring this trend and its implications in depth in the days and weeks to come, working with our training program director community to identify best practices to recruit, support and train the future of interventional cardiology.”
SCAI hopes to help end the cardiologist shortage
There is already a significant cardiologist shortage in the United States, and SCAI has made it a top priority to make interventional cardiology more appealing to medical students. For example, a recent survey of its members highlighted a handful of issues—orthopedic injuries and radiation exposure, for example—that the group is now working to address.[1]
“There is no doubt that interventional cardiology is a difficult career choice, but at the same time exceedingly rewarding through the impact we make on individual patients and society as a whole, and we need to help promote these latter aspects within the medicine pipeline,” SCAI President Srihari S. Naidu, MD, said in the same statement.
Michael has more than 19 years of experience as a professional writer and editor. He has written at length about cardiology, radiology, artificial intelligence and other key healthcare topics.