Post-bacc/GPA boosters or english-language international med school?

[DancingJesus]

Hi all,

First time posting here. I've scoured these boards and the internet for a few weeks after finally seriously considering a career in medicine (psychiatry, specifically). I originally wanted to do clinical psychology, but after recently becoming involved in psychiatry research and gaining the opportunity to shadow the PI (who is a psychiatrist) during his consultations, I've changed my course.

A little background info: I graduated almost 3 years ago with a BS in psychology in the US. In those three years, I've been doing research at my alma mater (cognitive development) for 3 years while also working as a behavioral therapist for children with autism during those 3 years as well. Just recently, I've switched gears a bit to do research at a different institution in psychiatry, where I've been for the past 3 months.

Now here's the problem: I wasn't concerned much with my cGPA of 3.09 since I had a major GPA of around 3.7 and had planned to strictly pursue psychology in graduate school. Now that I want to consider medical school, my indifference has come back to haunt me. My sGPA is currently unknown but surely lower, so I need to do something about it. I've narrowed down my two options to these:

1. Take post-bacc/refresher basic sciences at a university here in the US to boost my GPA and get in the few classes that I didn't take (ochem, physics). Afterwards, pursue med school/residency here. Or,
   
2. Go study internationally at a university that offers a 6-year medical school program with undergrad pre-reqs included. After completing the program, pursue a residency in the US.

I've specifically been looking at the University of Milan: http://www.unimi.it/ENG/courses/D56.htm which offers a medical program in English. My reasoning behind this is that it's significantly cheaper than medical school here in the States. Also, they only factor in scores for the IMAT test ( http://www.imschool.it/the-international-medical-admission-test-imat/ ) when considering your application, which would null my poor undergraduate performance. Furthermore, the idea of studying internationally is novel and would certainly make my Italian-speaking significant other very happy. From what I've gathered about these international programs:

• Programs that are translated into English like are relatively new and may not be recognized here in the States. Indeed, I haven't been able to find solid confirmation that Univ di Milano's English program is recognized separately from their Italian one.
• Pursuing a residency in the US as an IMG will be considerably harder (more so for competitive specialties, unsure about my preference with Psychiatry)

I'm hoping you all can shed some light on my situation.

First of all, should I even be considering medical school? I ask not because I'm second-guessing myself, but for reasons purely based on my cGPA/sGPA. I've read the many success stories from low-GPA applicants on this forum and am prepared to do what it takes to meet the challenge.

Secondly, is international medical school a good option, especially an English version such as the one I mentioned? I don't want to waste my time considering this if I won't be able to come back to the US due to it not being recognized here. I've looked all around the forums and internet and can't seem to find a specific answer to this question.



Any feedback would be welcome, especially corrections to the information I've gathered so far and any input that might be relevant. I'm still in the process of researching all of this, which is why I came forward to ask for help.

Thanks in advance.

---

Members don't see this ad.

 

[Goro]

Cue the successful Carib lotto winners to come in, sputtering "but, but...NRMP!!

OP, if you want to practice medicine in this country, you'll need to attend a US medical school, MD or DO.

Take the post-bac, ace it and MCAT, and you're fine!!

Take a look at the many threads on Caribbean and other off-shore schools. The issue is how the number of US medical school graduates has grown tremendously while US residency slot have barely budged. Thus off-shore graduates are facing much tougher odds of getting into US residency programs (example thread here)


One thing that AAMC, AACOM, NRMP and all the other acronyms have is data. http://www.nrmp.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/ADT2015_final.pdf (see Table 4)

In 2014, for US citizens who were graduates of International Medical College (IMG) here is a breakdown of the numbers

6,917 Total who submitted the ERAS application for NRMP.
691 Withdrew, which is mostly and automatically done if they did not pass STEP II exam
1,796 Did Not submit a ranking list, which is mostly done because they did not get any interviews at a residency program
2,354 Did Not match into any residency slot
2,660 Matched into a slot

A total of nearly 7,000 US citizens IMGs applied for residency slots, only 2,660 got them. The above indicates that upwards of 3,000 graduates of International Medical Schools who likely passed STEP II did not get a slot in the main match for residency. There is a supplement match (SOAP) for unfilled open slots which this year included 1,193 of the 1,306 slots. Yet there were 1,093 senior US-MD graduates who did not match and another 60 who did not rank. These students are automatically entered in this supplemental round, as I assume are the seniors at the international school . So you can see even in the SOAP match, there is intense competition.

I also like to note that this table includes DO graduates who matched in the “MD” slots. It does not include the DO graduates who matched in the DO/AOA slots. Combining NRMP, AOA, Military and Supplemental/Final Opportunity, DO match at 99.45% (see http://www.aacom.org/docs/default-source/medical-students/aacom_match2014_infographic_finalv2.pdf)