Neurointerventional Surgery (Endovascular Neurology) — Specialty Profile

Exploratory, not prescriptive. This profile blends hard data (pay, match/accreditation, burnout, demographics — each sourced and dated) with generalizations and synthesized online opinion about culture and "who fits." It's here to help you get curious and go find out for yourself — not to tell you who to become. Numbers marked ⟳ verify change every year; check the linked source before you quote one. Last reviewed: 2026-07-26.

Also called: Neuro-IR, NIS, neuroendovascular surgery, interventional neurology, endovascular surgical neuroradiology (ESNR), and the new ACGME label Neuroendovascular Intervention (NEI). The catheter and angio-suite sibling of Vascular Neurology, the operator who physically removes the clot the stroke neurologist decides to remove. Organ system: the cerebrovascular system, treated from inside the vessel.

Multidisciplinary fellowship, entered after Neurology (usually via a Vascular Neurology year first), Neurosurgery, or Radiology.

The 30-second version

Neurointerventional surgery is the one place in neurology where you fix the problem with your hands, from inside the artery. When a large brain vessel occludes and a patient goes hemiplegic and aphasic, the neurointerventionalist threads a microcatheter from the groin or wrist up into the cerebral circulation under live X-ray, grabs the clot, and pulls it out. This is mechanical thrombectomy, one of the most dramatic reversible saves in all of medicine (number-needed-to-treat around 2.6 to prevent disability). Between those emergencies they coil and flow-divert aneurysms, embolize AVMs and fistulas, stent narrowed carotids, and devascularize tumors, a full cath-lab procedural craft. This is the operator counterpart to vascular neurology's decider role, and the sharpest personality contrast in the whole field: a 24/7, radiation-badge, high-adrenaline procedural life grafted onto a neurologist's training. The trade at the center of it: the highest pay and the most visceral saves in neurology, bought with the heaviest call and among the highest measured burnout in the field, and a training road that runs about two years past even stroke neurology. The paycheck is, in large part, hazard pay.

Quick dashboard (details and sources below)


Training after med school	~7–9 years on the neurology route (4 yr neurology + ~1 yr vascular neurology/neurocritical care + preliminary year + 1–2 yr NEI fellowship)
Total from college start	~15 years (4 undergrad + 4 med school + 4 neurology + ~1 vascular + ~2 neurointerventional) ⟳
Training chain	Med school (4) → Neurology (PGY-1 + 3 yr) → often 1 yr Vascular Neurology (or Neurocritical Care) → 1–2 yr Neurointerventional (NEI) fellowship — total training is long
Competitiveness (as a Neurointerventional Surgery fellowship)	High for the slots — small, procedure-driven applicant pool; ~62 programs in the SNIS match, of which ACGME accredits 10; mostly 1 fellow/yr; no public NRMP-style fill table (limited data) ⟳
Typical full-time pay (neurology-trained)	~$475k–$600k starting · ~$650k–$850k mature — the highest-paying neurology-linked track ⟳
Pay vs. general neurology	Roughly 2–3× general neurology (~$310k) and ~~2× vascular neurology (~~$316k) ⟳
Lifestyle	2/5 — the least controllable track in the neurology family; 24/7 thrombectomy call you cannot tele-shift
Burnout	56% of US neurointerventionalists met criteria on the Maslach inventory (2019 survey); a 2022 survey on a different inventory found 54% ⟳
% women	No reliable NIS-specific figure; markedly male-skewed — feeder fields bracket it (neurosurgery ~10%, radiology ~27%, neurology ~33%) ⟳
DO / IMG accessibility	Open on-ramp (neurology route), narrow field — two of three entry routes (neurosurgery, radiology) are among the least DO/IMG-open ⟳

What they actually do

Neurointerventionalists perform catheter-based (endovascular) treatment of blood-vessel disease of the brain, head, neck, and spine. They navigate microcatheters and wires from a femoral or radial artery up into the cerebral vessels under fluoroscopy/digital subtraction angiography and treat the problem from inside the vessel, without opening the skull. The signature emergency is mechanical thrombectomy for acute large-vessel-occlusion stroke, aspirating or stent-retrieving the clot out of a blocked brain artery, sometimes restoring a devastated patient to near-normal on the table. Electively, they treat brain aneurysms (coiling, flow-diverter and stent placement, intrasaccular devices), AVMs and dural arteriovenous fistulas (embolization), carotid and intracranial stenosis (angioplasty and stenting), and head/neck and spinal tumors and vascular lesions (embolization, including preoperative devascularization). It is a true procedural, high-adrenaline, cath-lab practice, the opposite pole from neurology's "cerebral diagnostician" stereotype.¹²

The defining structural fact: the exact same job is reachable from three different residencies, neurology, neurosurgery, and radiology, which all converge in the same angiography suite. This profile centers the neurology route, but the person next to you at the table may have come in through neurosurgery or radiology, which shapes both the culture and the pay ceiling (below).¹³

Representative procedures (a full cath-lab practice; ACGME requires ≥250 therapeutic procedures as primary operator): mechanical thrombectomy (aspiration and/or stent-retriever) · cerebral aneurysm coiling and flow-diverter/stent placement · AVM and dural-fistula embolization · carotid and intracranial angioplasty/stenting · pre-operative tumor embolization · diagnostic cerebral and spinal angiography (DSA) · vasospasm treatment after subarachnoid hemorrhage · venous sinus stenting · epistaxis embolization.¹

A day in the life (mixed practice week): Morning starts with overnight imaging and a case list: an elective flow-diverter for an unruptured aneurysm, a diagnostic cerebral angiogram, a scheduled AVM embolization. You scrub into the biplane angio suite (lead apron on), gain femoral or radial access, navigate catheters into the intracranial circulation under roadmap fluoroscopy, deploy coils or a stent, and confirm the result on the angiogram. Clinic and consult time is spent counseling aneurysm and stroke patients and reviewing outside imaging; post-procedure patients go to the neuro-ICU. Then the reason the field never sleeps: a "code stroke" or thrombectomy activation can fire at any hour, and the team races in, confirms a large-vessel occlusion on CT-angiogram, and you open the artery, occasionally watching a hemiplegic, aphasic patient recover mid-procedure. The rhythm is elective procedural work by day, 24/7 emergency thrombectomy call on top.²

The training path & time to completion

This is a post-residency fellowship reachable from three residencies, and its accreditation is in active transition, so read this section carefully.

The neurology route (what this profile centers): Medical school (4 yrs) → Neurology residency (PGY-1 intern year + 3 yr adult neurology = 4 yrs) → usually 1 yr Vascular Neurology fellowship (or 2 yr Neurocritical Care) as a required prerequisite → a preliminary/preparatory endovascular year at many programs → 1–2 yr Neuroendovascular Intervention (NEI) fellowship (the ACGME fellowship itself is 24 months, though applicants with substantial prior angio exposure may enter at the second year).¹²³

The vascular (or neurocritical-care) year is effectively required, not optional. The ACGME NEI requirements state that neurology/child-neurology applicants must have completed an ACGME-accredited or AOA-approved vascular neurology or neurocritical care fellowship, plus neuroradiology preparation, before entering. That makes Vascular Neurology the standard gateway year for the neurology road (see the cross-linked sibling profile).¹
Total from the start of college: ~15 years (4 undergrad + 4 med school + 4 neurology + ~1 vascular + ~2 NEI). That's roughly 1–2 years beyond even vascular neurology's ~13-year path, a genuine "kind realism" point: this is one of the longest training roads in medicine.³⁴
The three (or four) entry routes are the field's signature teaching point:¹⁴
1. Neurology / Child Neurology → residency + vascular neurology or neurocritical care fellowship + neuroradiology prep → enters the endovascular program. The long road.
2. Neurological Surgery → after a 7-year neurosurgery residency (neuroimaging prep built in). The longest overall (~16–17 years from college), but neurosurgeons can also open, clipping aneurysms and doing bypass, for a dual open-plus-endovascular practice.
3. Diagnostic Radiology or Interventional Radiology → via a neuroradiology fellowship, the classic ESNR pathway.
Fellowship length: 24 months, ACGME-accredited under the new Neuroendovascular Intervention requirements; colloquially described as 1–2 years depending on prior exposure and route.¹⁵

Accreditation and board status is, honestly, the trickiest fact in the profile, and it is mid-transition:

For years there was no single ACGME accreditation. Programs and physicians were credentialed through a patchwork: an older ACGME-accredited Endovascular Surgical Neuroradiology (ESNR) pathway on the radiology side (dating to the early 2000s); CAST (the Committee on Advanced Subspecialty Training of the Society of Neurological Surgeons) accrediting neuroendovascular fellowships and certifying practitioners on the neurosurgery side; and the multi-society "Training Standards in Neuroendovascular Surgery" published jointly in Stroke (2017–18). The American Board of Radiology separately recognizes a "Focused Practice in Endovascular Neurosurgery" (announced 2022).⁶⁷⁸
The new development is real: ACGME has moved to a unified, multidisciplinary "Neuroendovascular Intervention" (NEI) accreditation, and the reformatted program requirements carry a combined multi-specialty code (163/182/422, spanning radiology/neurosurgery/neurology), announced via ACGME communications in 2022 and rolling into effect across 2023–2025 (latest interim revision effective September 3, 2025). This absorbs the old separate tracks under one ACGME umbrella; some programs (e.g., Cleveland Clinic) now describe both fellowship years as ACGME-accredited.¹⁹¹⁰ How far the transition has actually gone matters as much as that it is happening. ACGME's own AY2024-25 data book counts ten accredited NEI programs — three under neurological surgery, two under neurology, five under diagnostic radiology — training fourteen fellows between them.¹¹ Against roughly 62 programs in the SNIS match, that is about one program in six, and the great majority of the field's fellows are still training outside ACGME accreditation. The unification is real and it is early, so a reader should know which of the two they are entering.
There is NO ABMS or AOA board exam for this subspecialty. The ACGME NEI requirements explicitly state "there is no ABMS or AOA board that offers certification in this subspecialty." Individual credentialing has historically run through CAST certification (society-level, accepting all three backgrounds), the ABR Focused Practice (radiology), and society mechanisms, all now converging behind the new ACGME program accreditation. This is a notable contrast with the sibling Vascular Neurology, which has a mature ABPN board (first exam 2005). Bottom line: program accreditation is now (newly) unified under ACGME; individual board certification remains route-dependent, not a single ABMS board. ⟳ Verify current status before quoting, because this is genuinely in flux.¹⁶⁸

How competitive is it?

As a fellowship, neurointerventional surgery is the opposite of its sibling. Where vascular neurology has more positions than applicants and actively recruits, NIS is a small, prestige- and procedure-driven field with scarce slots and motivated, self-selected applicants.

~62 fellowship programs participate in the SNIS Neuroendovascular Match (list last updated 4/15/2025); CAST separately maintains an overlapping list of approved programs.⁵⁷ ⟳
Most programs take 1 fellow/year (occasionally 2), so the national cohort is small, on the order of ~60–90 fellows a year across all three entry routes combined. For scale, ACGME's AY2024-25 census counts 14 fellows in the ten NEI programs it accredits, so most of that cohort trains in programs ACGME does not yet accredit.⁵¹¹ ⟳
There is no clean public NRMP-style fill/applicant table for NIS the way there is for vascular neurology (limited data). SNIS runs a unified multispecialty match via ERAS/NRMP administration (e.g., May 2026 match for July 2027 start), but its applicant/fill statistics aren't published in the same public format.⁵¹²

How competitive / who enters: because there's no big public match report, competitiveness is best described qualitatively: scarce slots, motivated applicants, and a procedural pedigree that usually reflects a commitment made well before fellowship. This is not a "shortage fellowship that recruits" in the vascular-neurology sense; it is a top-of-the-tree procedural track people aim at deliberately. The honest read: the field is competitive, but the on-ramp (neurology residency, then a vascular year) is comparatively reachable, and the selectivity concentrates at the fellowship rather than the residency door.⁴

Board: none. No ABMS or AOA board exam exists; credentialing runs through CAST certification, ABR Focused Practice (radiology), and the new ACGME program accreditation.¹

Compensation — the robust version

Here is the fact premeds most often get wrong: the huge "stroke money" they imagine belongs here, to the endovascular operator, rather than to the medical stroke neurologist. Neurointerventional surgery is the highest-paying neurology-linked track by a wide margin. Always read these numbers against general neurology (~~$310k) and vascular neurology (~~$316k), because that's the comparison a premed needs: the vascular fellowship buys about +2% over general; the catheter buys 2–3×.¹³¹⁴

Headline (neurology-trained neurointerventionalist): starts ~$475k–$600k, matures to ~$650k–$850k, and reaches up to ~$700k–$900k in high-volume community practice, roughly 2–3× general neurology and ~2× vascular neurology. Two independent sources agree closely, and neither is a compensation survey: ResidencyAdvisor's pathway analysis, an aggregator's own modeling, and RosmanSearch's 2025 neurology salary guide, a recruiter's.¹³¹⁴ ⟳

By training pathway (ResidencyAdvisor pathway analysis):¹³ ⟳

Pathway	Starting	Mature	Academic peak	Community peak
Neurology → neurointerventional	$475k–$600k	$650k–$850k	$550k–$650k	$700k–$900k
Neurosurgery → endovascular	$650k–$900k	$900k–$1.5M+	$800k–$1M	$900k–$1.5M+
Radiology → neurointerventional	at/near the top of the pay heap	—	—	—

ResidencyAdvisor's own framing is the one that sticks: "same angio suite, same catheters, very different career math." Neurosurgery-trained operators earn more because they also bill open cerebrovascular cases (higher RVU capture); neurology-trained operators are endovascular-only, which caps them below the neurosurgery ceiling but still far above any cognitive-neurology track.¹³

Corroboration (independent):

RosmanSearch Neurology Salary Guide 2025: interventional/endovascular neurology starting $400k–$600k+, explicitly named the highest-paying neurology subspecialty, premium attributed to "limited supply and the intensive nature of the work," with employers going "well above benchmarks to secure talent."¹⁴ ⟳
Self-reported salary aggregators (e.g., a "neuroendovascular interventional radiologist" figure ~$708k average; Salary.com "endovascular neurosurgeon") corroborate a high-$600k-to-$700k+ center of gravity for the broader procedural cerebrovascular workforce, though those blend in the higher-paid neurosurgery and radiology operators.¹⁵ ⟳
Crowdsourced "interventional neurologist" title-matched figures (Glassdoor, etc.) are unreliable, because they pool part-time and non-attending postings; disregard them for a full-time attending, same caution the sibling profile applies to its aggregators.¹⁵ ⟳

Why the premium exists (the field's specific revenue economy). Unlike parent neurology's revenue drivers (Botox/EMG, EEG, infusions) or vascular neurology's telestroke stipends, this is a device-and-catheter economy paid procedurally:²¹⁴

Mechanical thrombectomy. The flagship high-value, time-critical procedure; the single biggest volume/revenue engine post-2015 trials and the reason for large 24/7 call stipends.
Aneurysm treatment. Coiling and flow-diverter placement (elective, high-margin devices).
AVM/fistula embolization, carotid and intracranial stenting, tumor embolization. A full elective-plus-emergent procedural mix.
Compensation is procedural/RVU-heavy with large call stipends and directorship pay, and signing bonuses are common given the supply shortage.

Setting and geography. On the same ResidencyAdvisor analysis, academic peaks lower (~~$550k–$650k on the neurology route) than community and private practice (~~$700k–$900k), and the ~$150k+ academic-vs-community gap dwarfs almost everything else, the same pattern as parent neurology but on a much higher floor.¹³ Geographically, underserved and non-coastal thrombectomy-capable markets pay premiums to staff round-the-clock stroke coverage (a comprehensive stroke center must have 24/7 thrombectomy), while saturated coastal academic hubs pay less nominally. No NIS-specific geographic table exists (limited data); inherit the parent-neurology signal.¹³ ⟳

Lifestyle

This is the most call-heavy, least controllable track in the entire neurology family, a genuine cath-lab surgeon's life grafted onto a neurologist's training. Where vascular neurology's lifestyle variable is stroke call, in neurointerventional surgery the heavy acute call is not a dial you can turn down. It is the job. Stroke doesn't respect time zones, and thrombectomy is the emergency you exist to perform.

Hours run long and bimodal, with scheduled elective and angio days (aneurysm coiling, flow diverters, embolizations, diagnostic angiograms, clinic, consults) stacked on unscheduled emergency thrombectomy activations that can fire at 3 a.m. Expect ~50–60+ hours/week in most practices, materially more than general or vascular neurology's 45–55, with the true load driven by call density rather than the base schedule.¹⁶

Call burden is the defining fact, and it is measured rather than anecdotal:

In the national call-burden surveys, ~50% of US neurointerventionalists take call every day or every other day, and most respondents recommended a ceiling of once every three days.¹⁶¹⁷
Post-DAWN (2018) and DEFUSE-3, thrombectomy eligibility extended to 24 hours from stroke onset, so activations now come more than once every two days and consume roughly 124 minutes of procedure time per day on average across a practice.¹⁶
Covering multiple hospitals doubles burnout odds versus single-site coverage, and many operators cover several stroke-center EDs because operators are scarce.¹⁷
The call model means being pulled in overnight for a physically and cognitively demanding procedure, then sometimes operating (or driving home) sleep-deprived. The survey explicitly correlated call burden and sleep deprivation with burnout, motor-vehicle crashes, and medical errors.¹⁷
Call ratios in neurology-trained practices run roughly 1:2 to 1:7 depending on group size: two operators at a small stroke center means every-other-night hooks; a large group of six or seven is far more humane. Group size is the single biggest lever on your actual life.¹³

Schedule control is low, especially early-career. Unlike the outpatient neurology subspecialties (headache, movement, MS) that are genuinely clinic-controllable, and unlike tele-stroke, which decouples vascular neurology's decisions from geography, thrombectomy cannot be done remotely. You must be physically in the angio suite within the door-to-groin clock, which is exactly what makes this the hardest neurology lifestyle to structure away from. The levers that do help: joining a large group (lighter rotation), working where call is stipended (protective; see Wellbeing), and, later in a career, shedding call for elective/diagnostic-angio/clinic-weighted roles.

Lifestyle rating: 2/5. The lowest in the neurology family (parent neurology and vascular neurology both sit at 3/5). The work is procedural, emergent, 24/7, physically present, and cannot be tele-shifted; call density is high and measured; early-career operators have little leverage over the rotation. It earns a 2 rather than a 1 because mature/large-group practices, stipended call, and late-career elective pivots genuinely exist and can make it livable. But nobody should enter this expecting a controllable schedule. The paycheck is, in large part, compensation for the call.

Wellbeing — the part to take seriously

Burnout has two specialty-specific numbers, measured on two different instruments. A 2019 national survey of US neurointerventionalists using the Maslach Burnout Inventory found that 164 of 293 respondents, 56%, met established criteria, and the authors' own conclusion reads that this is "similar to the national average among physicians across other specialties."¹⁸ A 2022 survey of the same two societies, using the Copenhagen Burnout Inventory, put the figure at 54% of 164 respondents.¹⁷ Neither number can be ranked against Medscape's ~44% for parent neurology, because a single self-report item and a validated inventory are not the same measurement, and this page's own parent-field footnote records field-synthesis reporting as high as ~55%, at which point any gap closes.¹⁹ A separate grounded-theory study of academic neurointerventionalists tied stroke call directly to burnout and diminished career satisfaction.²⁰ ⟳

Named burnout drivers, in the order the surveys rank them:¹⁶¹⁸¹⁷

Feeling underappreciated by the department or institution. The largest effect either survey found, at 3.71× the odds of burnout.
Multi-hospital coverage on call. 1.96× the odds.
Call density and sleep deprivation. The two surveys disagree here. The 2019 survey that produced the 56% found call frequency not significantly related to burnout prevalence; the 2022 survey found call burden of once every three days or more, and more than ten years in practice, both independent predictors on its own instrument.
Downstream harms. In the 2022 survey, 39% reported falling asleep at the wheel, 23% a motor-vehicle crash or near-crash, and 34% medical errors they attributed to call fatigue; high call burden and fewer than four hours of uninterrupted sleep each independently predicted them. Burnout also carries a documented ~17% rise in malpractice-suit exposure across medicine generally.

Protective factors, also from the data, are a concrete and actionable finding:¹⁶¹⁸

Paid 24-hour call is protective. About 45% receive call stipends, and additional compensation for call was independently protective (0.70× the odds). (For a premed: this is a real question to ask an employer someday.)
The 2019 survey found no significant relationship between burnout prevalence and training background (neurology vs. neurosurgery vs. radiology), practice setting, call frequency, or the presence of a senior partner. So the thing everyone in this field names as its driver is the thing its own two measurements have not settled.

The satisfaction paradox. Despite that burnout prevalence, respondents commonly rated career satisfaction and life happiness 7–9 out of 10, a genuine "I'm exhausted but I love the work" pattern, very similar to EM and to vascular neurology's acute crowd.¹⁶ No neurointerventional-specific "would choose again" figure exists, and no current all-physician one does either. Nobody has published that rate broken out by specialty since about 2019, and there is no current overall anchor; this page used to give one at ~78%, and it has been removed rather than replaced.¹⁹

Emotional load is a genuine double weight, sharper than almost anywhere in neurology:

The highs are the biggest in neurology. Pulling a clot and watching a hemiplegic, aphasic patient recover on the table is the closest thing in medicine to a resurrection, faster and more visceral than even the vascular neurologist's tPA save, because you did it with your hands.
The lows are correspondingly heavy. Procedural complications are real, sometimes catastrophic, and yours: vessel perforation, reperfusion hemorrhage, a migrated coil; you carry devastating outcomes in young patients; and the decisions are split-second and often irreversible. The proceduralist owns the complication in a way the decision-making vascular neurologist does not.

Career longevity is limited by call tolerance and radiation rather than by the intellect. Two costs beyond the neurology-wide cognitive/emotional load: overnight-call attrition (the same circadian burden that shortens EM careers, with the literature flagging operators cutting back earlier), and occupational radiation and orthopedic wear (years in a lead apron, with fluoroscopy dose, lens and cataract and cumulative-dose concerns, and neck and back strain) that cognitive neurology simply doesn't carry. The common late-career move mirrors vascular neurology: shed acute thrombectomy call, shift to elective/diagnostic-angio, clinic, or program-director and administrative roles while keeping the expertise, a real off-ramp but a harder-won one than in outpatient neurology.¹⁷²⁰

Who's in the field (demographics)

Fellowship-specific demographic breakdowns are sparse (limited data). No NRMP-style matched-fellow composition table exists for NIS (unlike the sibling vascular-neurology match), so feeder-field reference data and one workforce study are the best available.

Women: markedly underrepresented, one of the most male-skewed corners of medicine. No clean US percentage exists, but an international survey ("Women in neurointervention, a gender gap?", Power et al., 2022) documents a large gender gap and small female share of the workforce.²¹ The three feeder fields bracket it: neurosurgery ~9.6%, diagnostic radiology ~27%, neurology ~33% women (AAMC 2021/2022). A procedural, radiation-badge, heavy-call cerebrovascular field draws heavily from the neurosurgery end, so the realistic read is well below neurology's 33%, but ⟳ no reliable published US NIS-specific figure exists; this is stated as limited data, not asserted as a hard number.¹⁹²¹
DO: no NIS-specific figure (limited data). Neurology is moderately DO-open (~12% DO in the vascular-neurology match); neurological surgery filled 3.2% of its 280 positions with DO graduates in the 2026 Main Match and radiology is low, so DO access to NIS runs mainly through the neurology (and to a lesser extent radiology) route.¹⁹ ⟳
IMG: no NIS-specific figure (limited data). Parent neurology is IMG-friendly (the vascular-neurology match ran ~38% IMG); the neurosurgery feeder took 6.1% international graduates in the same match, and the radiology feeder is also far less IMG-accessible. Net: NIS is less IMG-accessible than vascular neurology, because two of its three entry routes are among the least IMG-open specialties, but the neurology on-ramp is comparatively open.¹⁹ ⟳
URiM: no NIS-specific data (limited data). Inherit the parent-field pattern, in which cerebrovascular and procedural neuro subspecialties track below-average URiM representation (AAMC workforce data, consistent with neurology and neurosurgery). No number quoted.¹⁹ ⟳

Honest summary: the most male and least IMG- and DO-accessible of the neurology-linked fellowships, driven by its two surgical and radiological entry routes, but with a real, comparatively open neurology on-ramp. Fellowship-specific percentages largely don't exist; this leans on feeder-field reference data and says so.

Culture, personality & the online stereotypes

Who gravitates here: the proceduralists of neurology, people who wanted to do the intervention rather than just decide on it. If vascular neurology draws the "EM-brains of neurology," neurointerventional surgery draws the ones who looked at that and said "I want to be the one holding the catheter." Online they're framed as the surgeons of the neuro world: hand-skill-oriented, adrenaline-comfortable, competitive, willing to trade years of training and a brutal call schedule for the highest pay and the most dramatic saves in the field. Many are described as type-A, technically confident, and craft-motivated in a way that contrasts sharply with the "cerebral thinker" neurology stereotype. There's also a strong mission thread, since thrombectomy is one of the most effective interventions in all of medicine, and building thrombectomy access into underserved regions is genuinely world-changing work. As always, plenty of people in the field don't fit any of this. There are quiet, cerebral, and humane operators with balanced lives.

The stereotypes. Community perception rather than fact. Each carries a kernel and an unfair edge, and plenty of people do not fit the mold:

"The adrenaline-junkie proceduralists, the neurosurgeons who took the neurology door in." The read online is that this is where the action-oriented, hand-skills people in neurology end up, the ones who found even stroke neurology too cerebral and wanted to operate. Kernel of truth (it is the procedural apex of neurology); the unfair edge flattens a lot of thoughtful operators into cowboys.
"Married to the pager, but paid for it." The perception that your life belongs to the thrombectomy phone. This one has the most data behind it (56% burnout in 2019, 54% in 2022, and roughly half of operators on call every day or every other day), with two honest caveats: the 2019 survey found call frequency itself not significantly related to burnout, and both surveys show stipended call and large groups genuinely soften the job.
"In it for the money." A recurring jab that people chase the ~2–3× paycheck. Kernel: it is the highest-paying neurology track, and nobody pretends the money isn't a draw. Unfair edge: it ignores that the pay is hazard pay for a punishing call life, and that most operators are there for the saves and the craft.
"Turf-war specialty." The community's-eye view that neurology-, neurosurgery-, and radiology-trained operators jockey over who "owns" the angio suite, with neurosurgeons holding more institutional capital. There's a real historical kernel (three tribes, one procedure), but the new unified ACGME pathway is deliberately smoothing it, and in stroke-centric hospitals neurology-trained operators who run the stroke program do just fine.

What people say online (synthesized and paraphrased, not quotes): Across trainee and physician forums the themes are remarkably consistent. (1) It's the "if you want to operate, this is your path in neurology" field, repeatedly cited as the procedural apex and the highest-paying neurology-linked job by a wide margin. (2) The call is the universal caveat, with near-unanimous agreement that thrombectomy call is brutal, that "stroke doesn't sleep," and that group size and call stipend make or break the job; people warn residents to ask hard questions about the rotation before signing. (3) The training length is debated, since the neurology route is long, and threads weigh neurology-vs-neurosurgery-vs-radiology to reach the same chair. (4) The pay is not in doubt, with consistent agreement it's ~2–3× general neurology, with the honest note that it's compensation for a punishing lifestyle, not a free lunch. (5) The job market is strong but concentrated, since thrombectomy-capable centers are expanding and operators are scarce, so jobs exist but cluster at comprehensive stroke centers. Overall tone: proud of the craft and the saves, blunt about the call, unsentimental about the money being hazard pay.²¹³

Voices from the field. Paraphrased from public writing, with links to the originals:

Fargen et al., AJNR (2022) is the survey that tied call burden and sleep deprivation to medical errors and driving crashes, and that measured 54% burnout on the Copenhagen inventory. Its 2019 predecessor in the Journal of NeuroInterventional Surgery is where the 56% figure, the underappreciation and multi-hospital odds ratios, and the protective effect of paid call all come from. Together they are the best data on this field's lifestyle, and they are two studies rather than one.¹⁷¹⁸
NeuroNews International's coverage of the 2019 work. An accessible summary: ~50% take call every day/every other day, multi-hospital coverage doubles burnout odds, and call compensation is protective.¹⁶
A grounded-theory study of academic neurointerventionalists (2021). A qualitative model of how stroke call erodes career satisfaction and drives burnout among academic operators; useful for the "why people cut back" longevity point.²⁰
The SNIS "How to Become a Neurointerventionalist" pathways resource. The authoritative map of the three entry routes and their lengths; the neurology route is explicitly the multi-step long road.⁴
The AAN's "Emerging Subspecialties in Neurology: Interventional Neurology" and AHA Stroke workforce writing frame the field's growth, operator shortage, and the pathway a neurology resident takes to reach the angio suite.²²²³

Why people choose it / why people leave

Why choose it: the most dramatic, hands-on saves in all of neurology, since you reverse a stroke with your hands · the highest-paying neurology-linked track by a wide margin (~2–3× general/vascular neurology) · a full procedural cath-lab craft for people who want to operate but entered through neurology · genuine, expanding demand as thrombectomy-capable stroke centers proliferate → strong job security and leverage · a huge public-health mission (bringing thrombectomy to underserved regions) · a clear apex to aim for from within neurology.

Why leave or avoid it: the call, meaning 24/7 thrombectomy, ~every-other-day in many practices, physically present (can't be tele-shifted) · a measured burnout prevalence of 56%, among the highest in the neurology family · sleep deprivation with documented links to errors and crashes · a very long training road (residency + vascular/neurocritical-care year + preliminary year + 1–2 yr fellowship) · procedural complications you own personally · occupational radiation and lead-apron orthopedic wear · turf/political friction with neurosurgery in some institutions · pay that is real but is hazard pay, since you are paid for the lifestyle you give up.

Best fit if: you genuinely want to operate, and hand skills and procedures energize you more than clinic reasoning · you decide and act fast under acute pressure · stroke thrombectomy's "resurrection on the table" is the thing you can't stop thinking about · you can tolerate (or structure, via large groups and stipended call) a punishing overnight burden · you want the top of the neurology pay scale and accept its cost · you're mission-driven about acute stroke access.

Not for you if: you want a controllable, daytime, call-light life (this is the least controllable neurology track, at 2/5) · disrupted sleep grinds you down · you want mostly cognitive, non-procedural work · you're unwilling to add years of fellowship after residency · you dislike owning irreversible procedural complications · you want tele-flexibility or geographic freedom independent of a stroke center · you're doing it mainly for money without accepting the call (the burnout data are a warning).

The FLI angle — Neurointerventional Surgery (Endovascular Neurology) for first-gen, low-income & immigrant students

Where it fits FLI realities well:

The parent door is genuinely open. The entry to this ladder is neurology residency, one of the more DO- and IMG-accessible specialties (nearly half of PGY-1 neuro spots go to DOs/IMGs; vascular neurology, a common prerequisite step, is markedly IMG-open at ~38% IMG / ~12% DO of matched fellows). A first-gen/DO/IMG student can realistically start down this path in a way they cannot for, say, neurosurgery or the closed surgical subspecialties. The neurointerventional fellowships themselves are competitive (few slots, procedural), but the on-ramp is reachable.¹⁹
The earning ceiling is the highest in the neurology world. For a student carrying the typical ~$200k+ of medical debt, a track that starts at ~$475k–$600k and matures to ~$650k–$850k is a fast, powerful deleveraging tool, genuinely life-changing money for a first-gen family, and the clearest "the ladder is worth climbing" story in neurology.¹³
Demand = leverage, and PSLF fits naturally. Thrombectomy-capable centers are expanding and operators are scarce, so jobs and negotiating power are real. Stroke care concentrates in hospitals and nonprofit and academic comprehensive stroke centers, exactly the 501(c)(3) employers that qualify for Public Service Loan Forgiveness, so 10 years of qualifying payments toward forgiveness is very achievable here. (Ground it honestly: most physicians carry ~$200k+ in student debt; PSLF is a real but paperwork-heavy lever, not a guarantee.)

Risks to name honestly:

The training road is long and the opportunity cost is real. On the neurology side you're looking at roughly ~7–9 years after med school (residency + a vascular or neurocritical-care year plus a preliminary endovascular year plus a 1–2 year fellowship), all at resident and fellow pay while non-medical peers earn. For a student who needs to start supporting family fast, that delay is a genuine cost, and the honest alternative is that general neurology pays you as an attending years sooner (even if for less). Only go this long road if you truly want to operate.
The pay is hazard pay, not a lifestyle upgrade. The ~2–3× paycheck is compensation for the worst call in the neurology family and a measured burnout prevalence of 56%, among the highest in it though not the highest, since the neurocritical-care survey on the same Maslach instrument reads ~61%. A student drawn purely by the number should sit with the call data first, because this is high pay because the life is hard, rather than the "high pay plus controllable life" combination.
Geographic flexibility is narrower than it looks. Unlike tele-stroke (which lets a vascular neurologist live almost anywhere), thrombectomy requires you physically in the angio suite at a comprehensive stroke center. If family, status, or dependents tie you to a specific place, jobs may be concentrated where the stroke centers are, so ask hard questions about group size and call structure before signing, because a thinly staffed center means brutal near-solo call.
The physical/occupational cost is real. Years of radiation exposure and lead-apron wear are a longevity tax cognitive neurology doesn't carry.

Bottom line: neurointerventional surgery is the highest-ceiling track a neurology-trained physician can reach, entered through one of medicine's more DO/IMG-accessible front doors, with PSLF-friendly employers and world-changing acute-stroke impact, a legitimately powerful FLI ladder for someone who wants to operate. But it is a long road bought with the heaviest call and among the highest measured burnout in the field, and the money is hazard pay, not a free lunch. Choose it because you can't stop thinking about pulling the clot, rather than because of the paycheck alone. Shadow a thrombectomy activation (including the overnight version), and ask any prospective employer exactly how many operators share the call, before you commit.

Fun facts

The same job, three different residencies. Neurology, neurosurgery, and radiology all lead to the same chair in the same angio suite, a convergence almost unique in medicine, now being unified under a single ACGME "Neuroendovascular Intervention" accreditation.
There is no ABMS or AOA board exam for the subspecialty, and the ACGME requirements say so explicitly. You can complete accredited fellowship training and there still isn't a single unified board certificate, a striking contrast with the sibling Vascular Neurology (ABPN board since 2005).
Thrombectomy is one of the most effective procedures in all of medicine. The number-needed-to-treat to reduce disability is roughly 2.6, extraordinarily low for any intervention.
The 2015 thrombectomy trials (MR CLEAN, ESCAPE, and others) created the modern field almost overnight; DAWN and DEFUSE-3 (2018) then stretched eligibility to 24 hours, which, counterintuitively, increased overnight call by widening the treatment window.
The decider and the operator are usually two different people: the vascular neurologist decides whether and who to thrombectomize; the neurointerventionalist threads the catheter and pulls the clot. The vascular year is the standard bridge from one role to the other.
It's the rare corner of neurology where the longevity limiter is radiation and lead-apron wear rather than cognitive load, a proceduralist's occupational profile inside a cognitive specialty.

Sources

ACGME Program Requirements for Graduate Medical Education in Neuroendovascular Intervention (doc 163-182-422; "2025 reformatted," latest interim revision effective Sept 3, 2025) — 24-month fellowship; entry pathways (Diagnostic Radiology, Interventional Radiology, Neurological Surgery, Neurology/Child Neurology, the last requiring prior vascular neurology or neurocritical care + neuroradiology prep); case minimums (≥250 therapeutic procedures as primary operator); explicitly "there is no ABMS or AOA board that offers certification in this subspecialty." https://www.acgme.org/globalassets/pfassets/programrequirements/2025-reformatted-requirements/163-182-422_neuroendovascularintervention_2025_reformatted.pdf (2025). ⟳ verify exact year ACGME accreditation opened. ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵ ↩⁶ ↩⁷ ↩⁸ ↩⁹ ↩¹⁰
Road to MD research synthesis (procedures, day-in-the-life, revenue drivers, culture), consistent with the neurology and vascular neurology profiles on this site; ACGME NEI case minimums per ¹. 2026. ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵
ResidencyAdvisor — "Neurointerventional Pathways: Neurology vs Neurosurgery Earning Patterns" (2025) — training lengths by route (neurology ~6–7 yr after med school reaching attending 2–3 yr sooner than neurosurgery; "same angio suite… very different career math") and pay figures below. https://residencyadvisor.com/resources/highest-paid-specialties/neurointerventional-pathways-neurology-vs-neurosurgery-earning-patterns (2025). ⟳ Corrected 2026-08-17: the "same angio suite" line is this source's own wording and the body now attributes it in the sentence rather than only here, since it is a quotation. See ¹³ for the decision. ↩ ↩² ↩³
SNIS (Society of NeuroInterventional Surgery), "How to Become a Neurointerventionalist" / pathways resource — three entry routes (neurology / neurosurgery / radiology), prerequisite fellowships, and fellowship lengths; the neurology route (residency + vascular neurology or neurocritical care + preliminary endovascular year + 1–2 yr NIS fellowship, ~8–9 yr after med school) is the multi-step long road. https://snisonline.org/pathways/ (accessed 2026). ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴
SNIS — Neurointerventional/Neuroendovascular Fellowship Match and participating programs: ~62 programs (list last updated 4/15/2025); unified multispecialty match via ERAS/NRMP administration (e.g., May 2026 match for July 2027 start); most programs take 1 fellow/year. https://snisonline.org/matchprograms/ ; https://snisonline.org/fellowshipmatch/ (2025–2026). ⟳ ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴
CAST (Committee on Advanced Subspecialty Training, Society of Neurological Surgeons) — Neuroendovascular Surgery accreditation and individual certification (200 diagnostic + 250 interventional procedures as primary operator; individual "Practice Track" closed 12/2020; requirements updated Sept 2025). https://sns-cast.org/cast-approved-fellowship-programs-in-cns-endovascular-surgery/ ; https://sns-cast.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/Neuroendovascular-Requirements-Sept.-2025.pdf (2025). ↩ ↩²
"Training Standards in Neuroendovascular Surgery: Program Accreditation and Practitioner Certification," Stroke (2017/2018) — the multi-society (CAST/SNIS/AANS-CNS) framework that was the field's pre-ACGME standard. https://www.ahajournals.org/doi/10.1161/strokeaha.117.016560 (2017). ↩ ↩²
American Board of Radiology — Recognized "Focused Practice in Endovascular Neurosurgery" (announced 2022), the radiology-side individual credential. https://www.theabr.org/beam/focus-on-dr-and-ir-dr-october-2022/ (2022). ↩ ↩²
ACGME — announcement of the unified/multidisciplinary "Neuroendovascular Intervention" accreditation (combined multi-specialty code 163/182/422 spanning radiology/neurosurgery/neurology), ACGME e-Communication June 20, 2022 and subsequent rollout (2023–2025). https://www.acgme.org/newsroom/blog/2022/acgme-e-communication-june-20-2022/ (2022). ⟳ verify effective dates/rollout. ↩
Cleveland Clinic — Neuroendovascular Intervention Fellowship (both years ACGME-accredited; established 2003; accepts neurosurgery / radiology-plus-neuroradiology / neurology-plus-vascular-or-neurocritical-care routes) — illustrative program-level confirmation of the unified pathway. https://my.clevelandclinic.org/departments/imaging/medical-professionals/fellowships/neuroendovascular-intervention-fellowship (accessed 2026). ↩
ACGME, Data Resource Book, Academic Year 2024-2025. Table A.11 lists Neuroendovascular intervention three times, once under each parent specialty: 3 programs under neurological surgery, 2 under neurology, 5 under radiology-diagnostic — ten accredited NEI programs. Table C.21 gives the fellow counts on those same rows: 2, 4 and 8, so fourteen fellows on duty. https://www.acgme.org/globalassets/pfassets/publicationsbooks/2024-2025_acgme_databook_document.pdf Added 2026-08-17. The page described the move to unified ACGME accreditation as real and as absorbing the old separate tracks, and gave the field's scale as ~62 programs and ~60–90 fellows a year, which is SNIS-match participation and is correctly sourced to ⁵. What was missing was the size of the transition itself: one program in six of the SNIS match is ACGME-accredited, and a reader taking "unified under ACGME" at face value would misjudge the credential they are entering. The ⟳ hedge the section already carried is genuine, and this footnote is what it should have pointed at. ⟳ Verify against the AY2025-26 book, which may show growth: the same rows grew from 2 to 8 fellows on the radiology side over five years. ↩ ↩²
SNIS Neurointerventional Fellowship Match — unified multispecialty match via ERAS/NRMP administration; applicant/fill statistics not published in the public NRMP specialty-match format (limited data). https://snisonline.org/fellowshipmatch/ (accessed 2026). ⟳ ↩
ResidencyAdvisor — "Neurointerventional Pathways: Neurology vs Neurosurgery Earning Patterns" (2025) — neurology→NIS starting $475k–$600k, mature $650k–$850k, academic peak $550k–$650k, community peak $700k–$900k; neurosurgery→endovascular $650k–$900k start, $900k–$1.5M+ mature; call ratios 1:2–1:7; ~2–3× general neurology; academic-vs-community gap. https://residencyadvisor.com/resources/highest-paid-specialties/neurointerventional-pathways-neurology-vs-neurosurgery-earning-patterns (2025). ⟳ Corrected 2026-08-17: these figures stay with the host named, so this analysis stays and ResidencyAdvisor is named at every figure it carries — the headline band, the pathway table, the quoted framing, and the setting paragraph — rather than only in the table's lead-in. The headline sentence also now says plainly what kind of source each of its two is, since neither is a compensation survey and the whole compensation section rests on them. The reasoning is this site's aggregator rule, extended one row: an aggregator's number displayed with its provenance serves a reader better than a deleted figure with nothing to replace it, and this field has no survey row of its own. ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵ ↩⁶ ↩⁷ ↩⁸ ↩⁹ ↩¹⁰
RosmanSearch — Neurology Salary Guide 2025: interventional/endovascular neurology starting $400,000–$600,000+, named the highest-paying neurology subspecialty ("limited supply… intensive nature of the work"; employers exceed benchmarks); vascular neurology ~$300k–$375k (telestroke/neurohospitalist-bundled). https://www.rosmansearch.com/resources/Neurology-Compensation.html (2025). ⟳ ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴
marithealth — "Neuroendovascular Interventional Radiologist Salary (2026) — ~$708K avg" (Marit's own self-reported panel, not the MGMA benchmark beside it, which is masked); Salary.com "Endovascular Neurosurgeon" — corroborate a high-$600k–$700k+ center of gravity for the (surgery/radiology-inclusive) procedural cerebrovascular workforce; crowdsourced "interventional neurologist" title-matched figures (Glassdoor, etc.) pool part-time/non-attending postings and are unreliable for a full-time attending. https://www.marithealth.com/o/-/neuroendovascular-interventional-radiologist/salary ; https://www.salary.com/research/salary/hiring/endovascular-neurosurgeon-salary (2026). ⟳ On Marit Health: it publishes a panel of self-reported physician salaries, and displays MGMA and AMGA benchmarks beside them that are masked unless you create an account. The figure quoted here comes from the self-reported panel, not from either benchmark. Read it as crowd data: unweighted, of unstated sample size, and directional. On Salary.com: its CompAnalyst benchmark is HR-reported employer survey data blended with job-posting data, not a physician panel. It is base-weighted and so runs low against total-compensation surveys, and it is used here for percentile structure rather than for levels. Corrected 2026-08-16: this footnote and the body both read ~$717K until the figure was checked against the live page, which publishes $708,313. The earlier number is kept here rather than silently replaced, so a later pass can tell a correction from drift. Marit restates this panel monthly, which is what the ⟳ is for. ↩ ↩²
NeuroNews International — "The burden of a stroke call: 56% of US neurointerventionalists meet criteria for burnout" (27 August 2019; a summary of Fargen's SNIS presentation of the survey published in JNIS that year, and not of the later AJNR study) — ~50% take call every day/every other day; post-DAWN/DEFUSE-3 thrombectomy >1 per 2 days / ~124 min procedure time per day; multi-hospital coverage 2× burnout odds; underappreciation predicts burnout; paid 24-hour call protective (~45% receive it); career satisfaction/happiness 7–9/10 common despite burnout. https://neuronewsinternational.com/burnout-stroke-burden/ (accessed 2026). ⟳ ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵ ↩⁶ ↩⁷
Fargen KM, et al., "Correlation of Call Burden and Sleep Deprivation with Physician Burnout, Driving Crashes, and Medical Errors among US Neurointerventionalists," AJNR (2022), PMID 36007952 — an online questionnaire of the members of the two neurointerventional societies, 50 questions across call burden, sleeping patterns and the Copenhagen Burnout Inventory; 164 surveys completed; 54% reported burnout; call burden of ≥1 every 3 days and being in practice >10 years were independent predictors; 39% reported falling asleep at the wheel, 23% a motor-vehicle crash or near-crash, 34% fatigue-related medical errors; on multivariate regression, high call burden predicted sleeping at the wheel and crashes, and <4 hours of uninterrupted sleep predicted crashes and errors. https://www.ajnr.org/content/early/2022/08/25/ajnr.a7606 (2022). ⟳ Corrected 2026-08-17: this footnote read "56% meet burnout criteria … call compensation protective; no burnout difference by training background/setting/years" and attributed all four findings to this paper. Three of them belong to the 2019 JNIS survey now at ¹⁸: a different year, journal, instrument (Maslach rather than Copenhagen), sample (320 responses rather than 164) and headline (56% rather than 54%). Only the crashes, sleep and medical-error findings are AJNR's. The 56% was this page's most-repeated number, so a reader who followed this citation found a study reporting 54%. The two studies also disagree about call: AJNR found call burden predictive, and JNIS found call frequency non-significant. Both readings are now on the page. ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵ ↩⁶ ↩⁷
Fargen KM, et al., "A survey of burnout and professional satisfaction among United States neurointerventionalists," Journal of NeuroInterventional Surgery (2019), PMID 30975735 — a 39-question online survey distributed to members of the major US neurointerventional societies, 22 of the questions being the Maslach Burnout Inventory–Human Services Survey for medical personnel; 320 responses; 164/293 respondents (56%) met established criteria for burnout. No significant relationship between burnout prevalence and training background, practice setting, call frequency, or the presence of a senior partner. On multiple logistic regression, feeling underappreciated by hospital leadership (OR 3.71, p<0.001) and covering more than one hospital on call (OR 1.96, p=0.01) were strongly associated with burnout, and additional compensation for call was independently protective (OR 0.70, p=0.005). The authors' own conclusion: the 56% "is similar to the national average among physicians across other specialties." https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/30975735/ (2019). ⟳ Added 2026-08-17: this study is where the 56%, the Maslach instrument, the two odds ratios and the protective call payment come from. The page had attributed all of them to the 2022 AJNR paper at ¹⁷, which is a different survey reporting 54% on a different inventory. ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵
Cross-specialty figures. Women in practice, diagnostic radiology 27% and neurology 33%: AAMC, "Women are changing the face of medicine in America" (2022 data), https://www.aamc.org/news/women-are-changing-face-medicine-america. Neurological surgery 9.6% is the older 2021 vintage, from AAMC's Active Physicians by Sex and Specialty, 2021, https://web.archive.org/web/20250112142220/https://www.aamc.org/data-reports/workforce/data/active-physicians-sex-specialty-2021; the two vintages are a year apart and should not be read as one dataset. Burnout, neurology 44% against an all-physician average of 49%, with field-synthesis reporting often placing neurology higher at ~48–55%: Medscape Physician Burnout & Depression Report 2024, n=9,226, fielded July–October 2023, paywalled and returning HTTP 402, so it reaches this page through three independent relays that agree on the edition, the instrument and every row — Healthgrades Pro (https://resources.healthgrades.com/pro/the-most-and-least-burned-out-physicians-by-specialty) and Advisory Board (https://www.advisory.com/daily-briefing/2024/01/31/physician-burnout). DO and IMG accessibility: NRMP, Results and Data: 2026 Main Residency Match, May 2026, Table 2, https://www.nrmp.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/05/Main_Match_Results_and_Data-2026.pdf, which reports 18.8% DO and 22.4% IMG of neurology's filled positions against 3.2% DO and 6.1% IMG for neurological surgery (9 and 17 of its 280 filled positions), so neurosurgery remains near the bottom of the table on both counts. Corrected 2026-08-17: the body of this page said neurosurgery was "~1% DO," which is the 2025 figure (1.9%) rounded down; it now carries 3.2% and 6.1% with the denominator named, and this footnote's flag that the two disagreed has been removed because they no longer do. The "least happy outside work ~54%" line for neurology comes from a Medscape 2024 lifestyle table reported second-hand by HCN, which does not link the table it is reporting and which nobody here has opened. Unverified — do not treat as confirmed. No URL is given for it, because pointing a reader at a secondary that cannot show its own source would look like verification and would not be any. Would-choose-again is deleted rather than corrected: the ~78% that used to sit here has no current publisher, by specialty or overall, and nothing replaces it. The sibling vascular-neurology match composition (~38% IMG, ~12% DO) is carried on the vascular neurology profile on this site, which is a cross-reference rather than a source; the underlying figures are in NRMP's Results and Data: Specialties Matching Service 2026 Appointment Year, February 2026, https://www.nrmp.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/02/SMS_Results_and_Data_Report2026.pdf. ⟳ ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵ ↩⁶ ↩⁷
"Impact of Stroke Call on Career Satisfaction and Burnout for Academic Neurointerventionalists: A Grounded Theory Model," PubMed 33933697 (2021) — qualitative model linking stroke call to burnout and reduced career satisfaction in academic operators. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33933697/ (2021). ↩ ↩² ↩³
Power S, Biondi A, Saatci I, et al., "Women in neurointervention, a gender gap? Results of a prospective online survey," Interventional Neuroradiology (2022) — documents a substantial gender gap and small female share of the neurointerventional workforce. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/34516279/ (2022). ↩ ↩²
"Emerging Subspecialties in Neurology: Interventional Neurology," Neurology (AAN) (2023) — overview of the interventional-neurology pathway and its growth from within neurology. https://www.neurology.org/doi/10.1212/WNL.0000000000207821 (2023). ↩
"Securing a Training Position as an Interventional Neurologist," AHA Stroke (2021) — the operator-shortage and workforce/pathway context for neurology-trained neurointerventionalists. https://www.ahajournals.org/doi/10.1161/STROKEAHA.121.036311 (2021). ↩

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