c3.3 GPA, s3.2 or so, Texas resident, studying for MCAT

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MackandBlues

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Looking for some guidance, plan to apply next year June 2013.



c3.3 GPA, science GPA around there, true "undergrad" GPA maybe 3.2, 180 semester hours, PharmD degree at a top 5 pharmacy school = 2 years prepharm then 4 years pharmacy school
Grades didn’t matter in pharmacy school – so I was happy with my B’s and didn’t try that hard

After graduation:
Pharmacy practice residency for 1 year- did 1 month rotations in areas of: internal medicine, infectious diseases- general consult service, cardiology, medical intensive care unit, neonatal intensive care unit, research, medical intensive care unit at another hospital, nephrology, infectious diseases with the BMT/cancer ID team.

-duties included: rounding with the teams daily, working up every patient on the service, provided drug recommendations on treatment, dosage, interval, side effects, monitoring, and treatment duration, dosed vancomycin/aminoglycosides, served as a resource for the physician team and more

Next was a specialty residency in Critical Care for 1 year – did 1 month rotations in the areas of: medical intensive care (2 months), surgical/trauma intensive care, solid organ transplant service, emergency medicine, infectious diseases, cardiac intensive care unit, nutrition (writing TPNs), CT surgery intensive care, research.
-duties were the same as the pharmacy practice residency

After my residencies were complete I worked as a clinical pharmacist in the medical intensive care unit where I was responsible for all 24 patients and rounded daily with the MICU team. Did that for 2 years. Now have a job where 1/3 of my time is in the ED as a clinical pharmacist working along side the attendings and residents - this ED part started 3 months ago so just starting to get to know the physicians

So to sum it up-
Clinical/patient/physician experience: thousands and thousands of hours
Leadership: supervising an average of 6 people compromises about 1/3 of my 40 hour week currently, so tons of hours
Research: presented my research project as a poster at Society of Critical Care Medicine Annual Congress in 2009 and another poster for a different research project in 2010 at SCCM, also several posters at national pharmacy meetings
Nonclinical volunteer: assistant Girl Scout troop leader in 2006 (about 60 hours), community choir, church choir, and going to start again with Girl Scouts soon
LOR: I work with some EM attendings that are faculty at the top 20 med school our hospital is associated with and so I'm hoping that I can get letters from them when the time comes
Interviews: I have had over 40 interviews when searching for residency positions and actual pharmacist positions so I think my interview skills are good if I can get any :)

So obviously I need to kill the MCAT to make up for my GPA. Anything else I should be doing?

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Looking for some guidance, plan to apply next year June 2013.



c3.3 GPA, science GPA around there, true "undergrad" GPA maybe 3.2, 180 semester hours, PharmD degree at a top 5 pharmacy school = 2 years prepharm then 4 years pharmacy school
Grades didn’t matter in pharmacy school – so I was happy with my B’s and didn’t try that hard

After graduation:
Pharmacy practice residency for 1 year- did 1 month rotations in areas of: internal medicine, infectious diseases- general consult service, cardiology, medical intensive care unit, neonatal intensive care unit, research, medical intensive care unit at another hospital, nephrology, infectious diseases with the BMT/cancer ID team.

-duties included: rounding with the teams daily, working up every patient on the service, provided drug recommendations on treatment, dosage, interval, side effects, monitoring, and treatment duration, dosed vancomycin/aminoglycosides, served as a resource for the physician team and more

Next was a specialty residency in Critical Care for 1 year – did 1 month rotations in the areas of: medical intensive care (2 months), surgical/trauma intensive care, solid organ transplant service, emergency medicine, infectious diseases, cardiac intensive care unit, nutrition (writing TPNs), CT surgery intensive care, research.
-duties were the same as the pharmacy practice residency

After my residencies were complete I worked as a clinical pharmacist in the medical intensive care unit where I was responsible for all 24 patients and rounded daily with the MICU team. Did that for 2 years. Now have a job where 1/3 of my time is in the ED as a clinical pharmacist working along side the attendings and residents - this ED part started 3 months ago so just starting to get to know the physicians

So to sum it up-
Clinical/patient/physician experience: thousands and thousands of hours
Leadership: supervising an average of 6 people compromises about 1/3 of my 40 hour week currently, so tons of hours
Research: presented my research project as a poster at Society of Critical Care Medicine Annual Congress in 2009 and another poster for a different research project in 2010 at SCCM, also several posters at national pharmacy meetings
Nonclinical volunteer: assistant Girl Scout troop leader in 2006 (about 60 hours), community choir, church choir, and going to start again with Girl Scouts soon
LOR: I work with some EM attendings that are faculty at the top 20 med school our hospital is associated with and so I'm hoping that I can get letters from them when the time comes
Interviews: I have had over 40 interviews when searching for residency positions and actual pharmacist positions so I think my interview skills are good if I can get any :)

So obviously I need to kill the MCAT to make up for my GPA. Anything else I should be doing?
I suggest you add some office-based primary care shadowing. Your nonmedical community service is weak, so consider maybe a second gig that helps those in need. Your GPAs will be a big hurdle to overcome. Have you considered completing the TCOM SMP-like program to give yourself a better shot at MD schools in-state?
 
Thanks for your feedback - will add some office based primary care shadowing and get involved in more community activities. I had not considered an SMP until you mentioned it.
 
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Thank you, I will look into the program. What about taking a couple upper level biology classes over the next year while working full time even though a's wont touch my gpa? Or should i just save my money and not bother?
 
Thank you, I will look into the program. What about taking a couple upper level biology classes over the next year while working full time even though a's wont touch my gpa? Or should i just save my money and not bother?
That might be helpful for nonTexas DO med schools, but for Texas MD&DO, I don't think it will do enough for you to be worth the effort, unless TCOM feels some recent As in upper-level Bio will make you more competitive for acceptance into their program. Why not do some on-line research on their criteria, see if there is any info in SDN's Postbaccalaureate Programs forum about them, and maybe call if you have further questions.
 
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