• Alina Mohanty, David J Caldwell, Caroline C Hadley, Alec Gibson, Ali Ravanpay, and Akash J Patel.
• Department of Neurosurgery, Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, Texas, USA.
• World Neurosurg. 2021 Nov 1; 155: e412-e417.

IntroductionDue to the COVID-19 pandemic, the ACGME recommended all interviews for the 2021 residency application cycle be held virtually. Because this is major shift from neurosurgical interviews in past years, this study aims to evaluate both applicant and interviewer satisfaction of conducting interviews virtually.MethodsFor faculty, an 11-question online survey was sent to 116 United States neurosurgery training programs. A 14-question online survey was sent to 255 neurosurgery applicants. The resulting data were analyzed qualitatively and quantitatively.ResultsFrom applicants, 118 responses were received. From faculty, 171 individual responses were received. Thirty-five percent (34.7%) of applicants agreed that they were satisfied with the virtual interview process as a whole. Although 44.5% of faculty disagreed with the statement "I would like to replace in-person interviews with virtual interviews in the future", 57.3% of faculty agreed that they were likely to implement virtual interviews in the future.ConclusionsSome things might be better assessed through in-person interviews, but there are clear benefits to virtual interviews. Future iterations of the interview process, incorporating virtual interviews, might help determine how and in which situations virtual interviews can be utilized in future residency application cycles.Copyright © 2021 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

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