Jung v. Association of American Medical Colleges

Every year, American medical students and graduates participate along with foreign-trained physicians in a national matching plan to obtain a position in an accredited resident training program. Applicants and programs that participate in the matching plan submit rank-ordered preferences for training. A mathematical algorithm is used to place an applicant in a preferred program that also prefers the applicant.^{[citation needed]}

The National Resident Matching Program, also referred to as "The Match," is the only comprehensive national matching plan in the United States.

The suit was launched by Paul Jung, MD on behalf of all current and former medical residents against defendants that oversaw and participated in the matching process as well as institutions that employed medical residents.^[2]

The three physicians who launched the suit alleged that the NRMP Matching program was an anti-competitive practice, claiming that:

• fourth-year medical students were required to apply to the Match, and had no opportunity to negotiate their terms of employment with teaching hospitals (if they did not apply, they could not enter a residency accredited by the ACGME, and hence could not become certified as physicians by an ABMS-recognized board, meaning that they cannot practice their specialty)
• the defendants limited the number of residency positions available in U.S. teaching hospitals
• the defendants placed "substantial obstacles to the ability of a resident to transfer employment from one employer to another during the period of a residency"
• the ACGME encouraged or required participation in the Match as a condition of accreditation for institutions offering residencies.
• the defendants shared information on conditions of employment, and reviewed them in order to keep salaries low.^[3]

The defendants challenged the admissibility of the lawsuit with several arguments, including a lack of jurisdiction ^[4] and that the plaintiffs had not been injured.^[5] The court dismissed the cases against two defendants for lack of jurisdiction, and three because the claims of conspiracy did not involve them. The federal district court did allow the case to proceed against 17 defendants, ruling:

... the Court finds that plaintiffs adequately have alleged a common agreement to displace competition in the recruitment, hiring, employment and compensation of resident physicians and to impose a scheme of restraints that has the purpose and effect of fixing, artificially depressing, standardizing and stabilizing resident physician compensation and other terms of employment among certain defendants.^[4]