The Match is a unified national process, jointly created by the Society of NeuroInterventional Surgery (SNIS), the Cerebrovascular Section of the AANS/CNS, and the Society of Vascular and Interventional Neurology (SVIN), that replaced the prior decentralized, “rolling acceptance” system for neurointerventional (neuroendovascular) fellowships. Applications are submitted through ERAS (the Electronic Residency Application Service, run by the AAMC), and ranking/matching is conducted by the National Resident Matching Program (NRMP). The goal is to give applicants and programs greater mutual visibility, reduce pressure for early/exploding offers, and standardize the timeline for everyone.
ERAS/AAMC is the application platform applicants and programs use to submit and review documents; and NRMP is the independent matching service that collects rank order lists from both sides and runs the matching algorithm that produces results on Match Day. Eligibility to each program is established by the program’s accreditation body (e.g. CAST). Each program’s individual applicant selection criteria are set by the programs themselves. SNIS is the sponsor of the Match, i.e. the professional society that acts as a reference and liaison for ERAS and NRMP; SNIS does not administer the Match.
Yes. The most up to date list will be found in ERAS’s own program directory. Individual programs participating may vary year by year. Please note that the ERAS list for the upcoming Match cycle is only updated in mid-late September, each year, notably one month before the Match cycle officially opens.
Trainees affiliated with one of four parent specialties are eligible: Neurology, Neurosurgery, Diagnostic Radiology, and Interventional Radiology. Neurology pathway candidates would need to complete a vascular neurology or neurocritical care fellowship prior to neurointerventional fellowship. Radiology pathway candidates would need to complete a neuroradiology fellowship or integrated IR/DR residency prior to neurointerventional fellowship. (https://sns-cast.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/Neuroendovascular-Requirements-Apr-2026.pdf)
Applicants are encouraged to confirm their eligibility directly with individual programs.
The matching algorithm itself is specialty-blind — it is an applicant-proposing algorithm that works purely from each side’s submitted rank order list, with no mechanism that weights a program’s ranking by an applicant’s residency background. That said, the Match does not standardize or restrict each program’s own selection criteria, so any historical preference a given program has for particular training backgrounds is a program-level decision, not a Match-level rule. One of the goals of the match process is to broaden program and applicant visibility from all training backgrounds.
The Neurointerventional Match does not control each program’s individual selection criteria. In practice, applicants should look at each program’s own website, prior fellow rosters, and PDWS/ERAS listing, and ask program coordinators directly for details.
Programs’ ability to sponsor international trainees is not under the purview of the Match process — the Match is designed to facilitate how applicants and programs find and rank each other, not each institution’s visa sponsorship policies or capacity. International applicants should ask each program directly, since sponsorship (J-1 via ECFMG, H-1B, etc.) varies significantly by institution and is arranged outside the Match.