Psychiatric News September 17, 2004
Volume 39 Number 18
© 2004 American Psychiatric Association
p. 5
New Law Ends Challenge To Resident Match Program
Ken Hausman
A federal judge rings down the curtain on a lawsuit charging the
resident match program with antitrust violations.
When President George W. Bush signed a law in April exempting the National
Resident Matching Program from federal antitrust statutes, it signaled the
imminent demise of a lawsuit that challenged the match program's legality.
On August 12 Judge Paul Friedman of the U.S. District Court for the
District of Columbia agreed with a motion by the Association of American
Medical Colleges, Accreditation Council on Graduate Medical Education, and
other defendants to dismiss the suit.
Congressional supporters of the match program had inserted language in the
Pension Funding Equity Act of 2004 that specifically exempts the resident
match program from antitrust laws. (The rest of that legislation concerns how
employers determine the interest rate of contributions to their workers'
pension plans. It was written in large part to provide relief to several
airline and steel companies.)
The law's match-related provisions state that "antitrust laws do not
prohibit sponsoring or participating in a graduate medical education residency
program, or agreeing to do so." It does not, however, "exempt from
the antitrust laws any agreement on the part of two or more graduate medical
education programs to fix the amount of the stipend or other benefits received
by students participating in such programs."
The lawsuit was filed in May 2002 by two residents and an M.D. research
fellow who charged that the match program's sponsors conspire to reduce
substantially the ability of graduating medical students to compete for slots
in residency programs, because the teaching hospitals that participate in the
match share salary and other employment-related data. The plaintiffs also
alleged that the opportunities to compete for residencies outside the match
are negligible, but if they enter the match they are unable to negotiate
salaries or working conditions (Psychiatric News, May 21; June 7,
2002).
The AAMC was charged because it operates the match program, and the ACGME
was sued because it accredits the residencies that participate in the match
and can control the number of slots available in a residency program. The suit
also named 27 teaching hospitals as defendants.
The plaintiffs had requested that the suit be granted class-action status
so that all physicians who had completed an ACGME-accredited residency or
fellowship since May 7, 1998, could be included in the suit. The court had not
ruled on the class-action request by the time Friedman granted the defendants'
motion to dismiss.
Friedman noted in his ruling that the law took effect as soon as Bush
signed it on April 10.
The plaintiffs had argued against dismissal, maintaining that charges
regarding a price-fixing conspiracy go beyond the new law's wording about
participation in the match program per se and should still be covered by
antitrust statutes. The judge pointed out, however, that their complaint did
not actually allege a price-fixing conspiracy concerning residents' wages, but
rather "a single overarching integrated antitrust conspiracy with the
match as its centerpiece."
APA President Michelle Riba, M.D., a longtime psychiatric educator, told
Psychiatric News that the dismissal of the lawsuit is "a
significant victory for physicians and medical organizations that realize the
critical role the match plays in medical education."
She added that it would have been "unfortunate" if the
plaintiffs had prevailed. "The match has been a major improvement over a
time when fourth-year medical students had to devote substantial time and
money negotiating in person with individual training directors" whose
program interested them.
The decision in Paul Jung, M.D., et al., v. Association
of American Medical Colleges is posted online at
<www.dcd.uscourts.gov/02-873a.pdf>.
[U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, Civil Action No.
02-0873] 
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