LUCOM earns perfect Match rate during 2024 Match Day celebration

Alongside all medical schools nationally, Liberty University College of Osteopathic Medicine (LUCOM) celebrated its fourth-year class of student-doctors on Friday, during an annual Match Day that saw them achieve a 100 percent match in 2024.

The day is a significant milestone for medical students as they receive their future assignment for residency placement. Friday marked the second time in the last three years that LUCOM achieved a 100 percent match rate.

The National Resident Matching Program (NRMP) is a private, nonprofit organization that uses a computer-based algorithm to match the preferences of fourth-year medical students with the preferences of residency program directors. The NRMP also conducts Fellowship Matches for more than 60 subspecialties through its Specialties Matching Service.

The Match process begins every summer as students apply and interview to numerous residency programs throughout the country offering specialty training in medical and surgical specialties. Medical students and program directors rank programs and applicants, respectively, in order of preference and submit the preference lists to the NRMP.

LUCOM had 146 student-doctors match into 14 different specialties. In the class, 67.8 percent matched into a primary care specialty, which includes Family Medicine, Pediatrics, Internal Medicine, Obstetrics, Gynecology, and Psychiatry. Other specialties students matched in were Emergency Medicine, Transitional, Anesthesiology, Neurology, General Surgery, Pathology, Orthopedic Surgery, Urology, and EM/Family Medicine.

These future physicians will be serving communities across 34 different states, with the top five states being Virginia (28 students), California (10), Pennsylvania (10), South Carolina (10), and Ohio (9).

“My familiarity with LUCOM’s faculty, staff, and students makes the news completely unsurprising, but I join my colleagues on the mountain in celebrating this extraordinary accomplishment,” Liberty President Dondi Costin said. “In the spirit of March Madness, nothing says ‘champion’ quite like a match rate of 100 percent. When we say we Train Champions for Christ at Liberty, this is exactly what we mean.”

After the clock struck noon, LUCOM Dean Joseph R. Johnson, DO, FACOOG (Dist), addressed the students on behalf of Liberty University and its leadership.

“We are so excited for our Liberty College of Osteopathic Medicine medical students in this 2024 match,” Johnson said. “What an exciting group of students who have consistently met the challenges on their road to being a physician that will treat the mind, body, and spirit of all those patients they serve. God bless a 100 percent LUCOM Match Day.”

LUCOM Senior Associate Dean for Clinical Affairs Randy Litman, DO, MBA, FACOFP, HPF, FAAO, FACOI, congratulated the Class of 2024 and shared how much of a blessing it is for students to secure a residency program through the Match.

“I looked upon members of the Class of 2024, and God has started to close the LUCOM door for them, and in His divine intervention He has preserved the destiny of many, as He opens the next one. Why? Because he knows these people are worth so much more. I praise you for your achievements,” Litman said.

Fourth-year student Logan Haley was thrilled to find out that he will be able to stay close to family after matching at Lynchburg Family Medicine in Lynchburg, Va.

“Lynchburg Family Medicine was my number one choice, and I’m so excited,” Haley said. “It’s always been the dream and now it’s a reality. It’s so nice to have family in the area and pour back into a community that poured into us so much is amazing.”

“I was nervous, but overall, it’s exciting to know where I matched and it’s exciting to see where everyone else matched as well,” he added.

Fellow fourth-year Bryan Berguson was ecstatic to be matched in the same location as his wife at Geisinger Internal Medicine in Pennsylvania.

“It’s the culmination of eight years and it’s exciting to see it come to fruition,” Berguson said. “I’m so thankful to God that my wife and I can be in the same place and match together. It’s a huge blessing. LUCOM has really invested in our education and there are so many professors who invested in us, and we couldn’t be where we are today without them.”

Kourtney Gwin, who was one of the 13 students who matched in mid-December through Military Match, was blessed to be a part of Liberty University.

“Liberty really supports us in the Christian aspect of our education,” Gwin said. “I know everyone is praying for me and the feedback that I got for people praying for me through that match process was incredible.”