Pros and Cons of your DO School

AwesomO said:

Some of my friends told me that there school has someone surfing SDN to look for negative comments. Could be all hot air but sounds scary.

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I bet you could take 'em.

A user has asked me to post this for them.

Ohio University
Curriculum:

There are two options: traditional lecture based (CPC) and problem based(PCC).
CPC (Clinical Presentation Curriculum):
This is the default curriculum that the majority of students are in. There are lectures most days for a half day that are not required. There is a block structure with an exam at the end of each block. (A block would be Blood & Immunity or Musculoskeletal, for example.) The students receive a thorough, if sometimes overwhelming, list of topics that must be known and prepared for prior to the exam. Histology and Anatomy are covered over the first two years as they relate to the current blocks. Anatomy practicals are part of this curriculum as well. Students must earn a 70% or better on their exams to pass the block and those who fail must take a remediation exam later in the year. Students who fail the remediation exam will most likely have to repeat the year.

This curriculum will have 4-5 clinical experiences (CCEs) per quarter at doctor's offices, hospitals, clinics and such places as the WIC office or AA meetings. These experiences may be within walking distance of the school or up to an hour away and are typically for a half-day (4-6 hours). If more CCEs are desired they can be arranged. CCEs are optional during the Spring quarter of 2nd year and will earn the student a special remark in their Dean's letter.

This is an excellent, traditional curriculum which offers few surprises. This would be the best option for anyone who wants a more independent learning option as many lectures are not required and the learning objectives are laid out at the beginning of each block. CPC students do not get nearly as much patient contact as PCC during their first two years and have a much more demanding curriculum. These are things to consider before entering CPC.

PCC (Patient-Centered Curriculum):
This is a problem-based, small group curriculum in which approximately 20 students participate. Students must apply to this curriculum by writing a short essay and answering a few questions. Acceptance is not particularly competitive so do not fret about it too much.

Small groups are assigned at the beginning of each quarter and these groups meet for two hours every M-W-F every week. During the group sessions students derive learning issues for the next session and discuss the prior learning issues. There are facilitators to answer clinical questions if needed but they mainly serve to observe and generate a grade for each student.

There is no block format to this curriculum and the material to be mastered is determined by each group. Each group submits suggestions for testing material each quarter and the PCC administration determines which suggestions will be on the exams. Tests take place at the end of each quarter and will cover extremely diverse topics. During first year exams are essay and short answer. During second year exams are all multiple choice. Students must earn a 70% average for their exams over the year and must earn at least a 65% on each exam to avoid a disciplinary meeting. Remediation is not mandatory unless a 70% average is not earned for the three exams.

Students in this curriculum will have 10-11 clinical experiences (CCEs) per quarter in the same locations as the CPC students. Students in this curriculum will frequently be forced to miss noontime, informative lectures due to these CCEs. CCEs are mandatory during the Spring quarter and there is no special recognition in the students' Dean's letters.

Anatomy is covered in the first few weeks of the first year and there are no practicals. Histology is given as a separate course during the first year and it is not necessary to pass the course to pass the year.

This is an excellent curriculum for the student who wishes to work with other students and does not mind mandatory classes. This curriculum does not hit major topics in an organized fashion and would perhaps not be a good choice for someone who wishes to learn in a block manner or chapter by chapter. PCC students continue to be the red-headed stepchildren of this school and this is something to take into account if interested in this curriculum.

CPC and PCC:
The two curricula join one per week for a two hour hands-on OMM course. OMM is covered in two end-of-quarter exams, a written exam (multiple choice) and a practical exam. Students must earn at least a 70% on every exam to pass the Clinical Skills portion of the year.

Location:
OU is in southeastern Ohio within a couple hours of Columbus. Most clinical experiences will be in a rural or small-town setting during the first two years. The last two years can take place in several places throughout Ohio and may be in large cities like Columbus or small towns like Portsmouth.

Cost:
Real cheap for in-staters, real expensive for out-of-staters.

Faculty:
There is the normal mix of extremely good, extremely poor and everywhere in between faculty members that you would find at any major university.

Reputation:
It's hard to compete with schools like Case being in the same state but OUCOM students definitely hold-their-own at their clinical sites and have a good reputation within Ohio. Like everywhere else, not everyone has heard of a DO so not everyone knows OU has a medical school.

Clinical Rotations:
The third and fourth year rotations are varied from rural to big city. Students who wish to have a small-town/rural clerkship site will likely have no trouble. However, demand for large town sites is large so not all students who will get their preferred location. Sites are determined by a lottery during the second year. Typically the vast majority of students get one of their top 5 sites out of the 12 possible sites. (May be 13 now.) All sites are good and the opportunity to do an away rotation within Ohio is not too hard to arrange.

Housing:
Cheap and excellent. You can live in whatever sort of housing situation you can imagine here.

Study areas:
The few study areas that are available are great but there are not nearly enough study areas for the number of students. Plan to use the main university campus library, Alden, although it is frequently full or study at home.

Social Scene:
This is a wonderful town to drink and party. There are also the social events of a university - sports, plays, musicians, etc.

Local Hospitals:
Small and not particularly exciting. The Marietta hospital, about an hour away, is bigger and has more interesting cases. Students will do some CCEs at Marietta during the first two years.

Board Prep:
Some faculty give board review lectures that are varying in quality and material. No other board review is provided by the school. The Dean prides himself on OU not teaching or focusing on the boards.

Kaplan, of course, will happily sell you a course with books, Q bank and a few weekend lectures that take place at the medical school. The rate is the typical rate for all schools.

The only score data posted is from 2005, despite requests for more current information....don't know what to make of that. The pass rate is reported to be in the mid-upper 90s for Step 1 and 100% for Step 2 CE.

Specialty:
A list of recent graduates and their chosen specialties has not been publicized but there have been students in the Alumni magazine from a wide variety of specialties.

Grades:

Curriculum:
CPC-- A- (Could use a note-taking service but all lectures are available as mp3s.)
PCC-- B-/C+ (You'd think they just started the program last year.)
Location: B
Cost: A
Financial Aid: C (There are a few small scholarships, but count on the gov't to loan you money.)
Faculty: B+
Reputation: A-
Technology: A (They make great use of technology.)
Study Space/Library: C (The library and computer lab should be a priority for an overhaul.)
Library technology/Resources: A- (Wide-range of resources like AccessMedicine, textbooks, plentiful testing CDs, also all the resources of the main campus library and OhioLINK.)
Rotations: A- (This one really depends on if you get your first choice spot or not.)
Social: A
Hospitals: A- (same as rotations)
Post Grad: A (Doesn't this depend on you?)

Overall Grade: A-

Thanks for posting that Mshheaddoc!

great thread guys/gals

Can a current student please do this thread for Nova? Gracias!!!!

Shaniqua14 said:

Can a current student please do this thread for Nova? Gracias!!!!

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ditto, Nova would be great, thanks.

Id like to know about LECOM E and AZCOM please. Touro NV too.

ThisIsYourLife said:

Id like to know about LECOM E and AZCOM please. Touro NV too.

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I don't think knowing that information is necessary. It's clear AZCOM wins hands down.

If you will be there.. then if has to be!! Good luck to us both!!

Does anyone have any information about the 5 year MPH/DO program at PCOM?? I'm starting there in August and I'm considering the program, but would like someone's perspective who is actually doing it.

Thanks!

or anyone doing the DO/MBA 5 year at NYCOM? speak up

Can someone do Western, please.

Can somebody plz add their opinion for DMU, b/c from previous post it was represented as a horrible school! I mean more specific about curriculm (PBL or CPC?), reputation, clinical rotations, faculty, or anything???
Thanks everyone!

Hope this helps someone out...feel free to PM me with additional questions regarding MSUCOM...*Keep in mind that I am an OMS-III(ish) since I took a year off to do an MPH through UNC so my thoughts on clerkship are based more on comments from friends and former classmates*.

Curriculum: Systems-based lecture; Basic sciences (mostly 1st semester/2nd semester classes) were IMO weak - lack of clinical application (particularly physiology and biochem/molec bio) left studying for the respective USMLE sections to the student - surprisingly, these are the classes co-adminstered to MSU-CHM (allopathic school); anatomy is taught in ~8 weeks during the summer (all pro-sected bodies); neuroscience is well taught and interesting; pathology was surprisingly interesting; clinical skills is taught during the first year (unlike most med schools) and a 2 week family med preceptorship follows during 2nd year; systems classes begin in summer at end of 1st year and are by far the strength of the curriculum - strong classes on neuromuscular skeletal, reproductive, cardio, and respiratory (weaker in urology, heme, and growth/development); regarding OMM, only one 2 hour class each week

Location: currently only East Lansing, Michigan; satellite campuses at Macomb Community College, and the Detroit Medical Center (downtown Detroit) with opening TBD

Cost: $28k IS (keep in mind that OOS tuition is nearly $42k but most students receive a nice OOS student scholarship)

Faculty: Outside of basic sciences, ~90% are clinical associate professors (DOs); a few MDs scattered throughout (have to love Dr. Siew and Dr. Kaufman); in contrast to my husband (an allopathic grad), I think we had some of the best clinical teaching in the state for pathophys

Reputation: Excellent reputation for primary care education; I might have to take on JP for best DO school in the country (no bias )

Clinical Rotations: A lottery is held the second day of second year for clerkship rotations in one of 23 base hospitals across the state; wide variety of hospital options from small, community-based hospitals to larger university-based hospitals (especially with new affiliation with the Detroit Medical Center); for those interested in showcasing for residency slots, MSUCOM offers plenty of "out-time" for either selectives (at any hospital in the larger statewide-campus system) or electives (any hospital); the base hospital time includes PCAC (primary care, ambulatory care rotations - essentially a 6 month block of family, medicine, peds, gynecology, ambulatory med and appropriate didactics) and hospital-based rotations including anesthesiology, rads, medicine, surgery, and ob/gyn; we get 14 weeks of selectives and 20 weeks of electives which really gives you plenty of time to get out and show yourself

Housing: East Lansing is a college town with a variety of housing options (houses, condos, apartments); since the clerkship lottery does not guarantee a student a certain location, most students choose not to buy homes for fear of having to move to another part of the state

Study areas: Primarily located in the Kobiljak center - a few small group study rooms, 3 rows of cubicles and some larger tables; To accommodate the expanding class size, the admin has really tried to provide additional study space for students; I can't really comment on how well this has worked out since it has recently occurred, but I believe things are a bit better; many students chose to study at the Law Library located a short drive from the school (however, non-law students are banned during final exams)

Social Scene: MSU has been called a party school (by many including Playboy magazine); East Lansing has a nice downtown area with plenty of bars and restaurants within walking distance from school; each class has a social chair to organize events for the class (including bar crawls post-exams)

Local Hospitals: To reiterate, we have 23 base hospitals and nearly 30-some in the statewide campus system; certainly, the breadth of hospitals MSUCOM is affiliated with provides students with a strong clinical background

Board Prep: Each class vice-president is responsible for organizing a formal board-prep program where selected faculty (usually those well-liked by the students) are asked to give a 1-4 hour review on a specific topic; I personally found the micro, reproductive, GI, and heme review sessions incredibly helpful (they are also scribed by the Scribe Service and available for purchase); many in the class of 2009 felt that they amount of time we were given to prep for boards was inadequate (well, we were told that our classes would be "easier" than they ended up being) and I think many students wish they had taken an additional week to study (only about 10% of the class took the USMLE FYI); BTW, I have no idea what the class average is for boards because we are not given access to that data...

Specialty: MSUCOM has several affiliated specialty programs (neurosurg, derm, anesth, optho, ortho (HUGE), uro, plastics) and more and more students are entering these programs (IMO, if you want to do ortho, MSUCOM is the place to go - the NMS course is really an intro to ortho including all the hammering/drilling/bone breaking stuff incorporated into a hands-on session...not my cup of tea, but I will venture that nearly 10-15% of the class of 2009 will go ortho)

Grades: 7-0 = DO (one of the orthopods kept reminding us of this during NMS!); MSUCOM has a pass/fail system with most (NOT all) classes requiring a 70% to pass...bear in mind that your allopathic counterparts have to get 75% in many of the same classes (leaving the COMmies some extra time for social events particularly during the fall semester 1st year)

Curriculum: B+
Location: B (I am a little older and married and a large university town just wasn't my thing...)
Cost: A
Financial Aid: A
Faculty: A-
Reputation: A
Technology: B
Study Space/Library: C
Library technology/Resources: C-
Rotations: A
Social: B
Hospitals: A
Post Grad: A


Overall Grade: A-

Here is a link to the base hospital system...and for the clerkship breakdown of PCAC, base hospital, selectives and electives - enjoy!

I have to disagree with the last poster on DMU…perhaps that’s because my perception is from 4th yr and I’m a bit more optimistic because I can see the light at the end of the tunnel… I’ve had my share of complaints, but I dunno about C-.

Curriculum: First year (mine was 2004 so keep in mind there’s been some faculty turnover since) is fairly decent.Physiology is well done; biochem & micro are a load in info but doable. Anatomy I found quite good, actually—not sure how the new prof is but he’s from U of MD med school so can’t be that bad. It was my strongest course and undoubtedly had some impact on my decision to go into pathology vs surgery.

Second year has recurrent issues, depending on which guest lecturers can/cannot help to teach a course, but in retrospect doesn’t matter as long as you study like you’re supposed to for boards. I felt I learned more in the 3 months I prepared for boards (with Qbank, FA, HY, BRS, KAPLAN and Goljan) than in the previous 6, but not because of the quality of the courses—the content is so fast and furious you don’t have time to LEARN all of it. One thing that also hurts is that DMU doesn’t have a central teaching / research hospital from which it can draw professors (like most DO schools). Listening to guest lecturers (often just community docs) means the material is more clinically oriented.

Overall, I think the first two years give you the information necessary to pass USMLE, but how much of that you retain depends on what board exam you plan on taking because the emphasis is on passing the COMLEX, which is an entirely different test (USMLE = much more biochem, basic physio, biostats, neuroanat…you need to UNDERSTAND the material; COMLEX = much more clinical, random out-in-left-field questions…you need to KNOW the material).

The surgery course—though irrelevant at the time you take it and may be hard to balance with coursework—is great prep for rotations. I felt MUCH more prepared for surgery rotations, and didn’t feel like an idiot because I knew the ‘in’s and ‘out’s of the OR. The 25-hr investment is worth it, trust me.

Other clinical-prep courses (OB, ENT, ophtho) I felt weren’t as helpful, but were only a few hours long.

OMM: OMM is pretty big here, though I was a Boesler student, so I have no idea how the dept is now. I didn’t go to DMU because of the OMM, and will be going into a field that has absolutely no use for OMM, but can’t say it didn’t give me a better understanding of applied musculoskeletal medicine. I could care less for cranial, which was a hard unit for me because the prof that teaches it is rather intense. But, like they say, it’s still tested on boards…all 3 steps…that’s a whole ‘nother debate.

Location: I was rather bitter about moving to Des Moines and had a rough first year, but I’m sad to think I’ll be moving in a few months and think Des Moines is a great place. Plenty to do, and though it’s not exactly a vacation destination, it’s a place you can live quite comfortably. People underestimate the Midwest, which is fine with me because it keeps the wackos out.

Cost: Kinda sucks. $34k is a helluvalot to spend / yr on tuition, especially if you have to take out another $20k for living.

Faculty: Some are stronger than others; the turnover is regular…a few come and go every few yrs. I’m partial to the anatomy dept; the phys dept is great; I enjoyed micro & viro & biochem (though am biased cuz it’s my undergrad degree). They could use some better path teaching…the 1st yr course is too much info too quickly, but taught by a practicing pathologist (as are the 2nd yr systems-based path lectures), though the anatomy dept is all PhDs. Again, there’s no big research / teaching hospital that provides such faculty, just community pathologists.
Overall, the first two years (didactics) were pretty good, but that was supplemented with massive amounts of board prep. Part of that is because the faculty are preparing you for the COMLEX, which is much less basic-science oriented than the USMLE (IMHO).

Reputation: Beats me…compared to other DO schools, I’d rather go to DMU than many other schools I’ve read about, but it’s a matter of opinion…any arbitrary rankings don’t matter much. Compared to allopathic schools in the area (IA, NE, MN, WI), guess it depends on your perception of the DO degree vs the MD degree.

Clinical Rotations: Big plus or minus depending on how you look at it. Plus: there’s no big teaching hospital, so most of your rotations, you’re not competing against interns, residents, etc, for experience. Minus: there’s no big teaching hospital, so most of your rotations will not be supplemented with didactics, and the variety of specialty experience available is quite frustrating. Des Moines has little or no (closer to no) radiology, derm, anesthesia, OB, ophtho, etc…you’re best served doing an away rotation for many fields, unless you’re lucky enough to have an in at one of the practices in town.
[EXAMPLE: I did a gas rotation with a group in town that normally doesn’t take students, and my experience afforded me much more OR time / intubations / teaching than the standard gas rotation most students in town do.]
This CAN be a plus, too, and may afford you the opportunity to do away rotations at potential residency sites, granted you know what you want to go into when there’s opportunity for away rotations.

Another plus and minus: the program allows for much more elective time, though I understand they’ve been modifying the clinical requirements recently. The only experience I had in IM my 3rd yr was 4 wks with a subpar group at the local hospital—teaching was scant to absent. This isn’t a big deal if you do elective IM rotations with some better groups in town, but there’s no required several-month block of IM in a large teaching hospital.

Many students travel across the country for 3rd and 4th year, andthough I understand they’re changing this for 3rd yr students , 4th yr is still open.

Housing: Quite cheap, depending on your taste. I live close to school and it’s $525 / mos…heat and water included. ½ block away are $200k condos. Take your pick.

Study areas: Phenomenal. The new student activity center is a major upgrade from what was there previously. Then again, you’re only there the first 2 yrs, and occasionally for board prep if you’re still in Des Moines. Large library with plenty of cubicles, lots of study rooms…pretty nice. The facilities in general are great: the gym is top notch (full court with 6 hoops, ¼-mile track above, free weights, few dozen treadmills and PreCor machines.

School Policies: Like others have said… “ No formal dress code. No mandatory class attendance, for now. Seems like every year, someone in the administration makes a push to try and change this which is unfortunate.” Media includes MP3 lectures, Powerpoints, and Notepool.

Social Scene: It’s pretty crazy around here about every four years, so if you hit a caucus year, brace yourself. The class size is ~200, so plenty of people from which to choose your crowd, but there’s several school functions / yr, some black tie, more that are quite informal.

Local Hospitals: Mercy and Methodist are the two main hospitals, but Mercy is the one most students rotate at for core hospital. They have an allo FP residency and an AOA gen surg residency, but it’s a private hospital with lots of private physician groups, so experiences on rotations can vary a lot. Methodist has an allo peds, IM and gen surg residency, but the gen surg is rather anti-DO…most of the peds and some IM residents are DMU grads, however, and students often rotate there. Some specialty services (nephro, heme/onc) require students to be committed to applying to their IM program in order to rotate…why, I’m not sure…it’s a stupid rule. There’s also a VA and a county hospital, the latter of which is very popular with students…requests for rotations often outnumber requests for Mercy. There are also many surrounding communities, 15-45 minute-drives away, which offer lots of various experiences including core hospital blocks. Basically, if you want to stay here for your entire 3rd and 4th year, it’s doable, but you may want to branch out to larger facilities for gas, rads, heme/onc, OB and a few others.

Board Prep: KAPLAN teaches a COMLEX 1 prep course: lectures, Qbank and plenty of big fat books. Some like it, some don’t…most at least attend the lectures. It’s included in our tuition, so you don’t have to worry about fin aid for it.

Specialty: I guess primary care like most DO schools, but plenty of people do other things. My best friends are doing gas, ortho, ENT, rads, gen surg, peds, and 3 are doing FP. I’m doing path (which I branched out for and did away rotations at some big universities as well as local community hospitals).

Grades:(C = avg , B = above avg) I hate + and -

Curriculum: B
Location: B
Cost: C (but it’s a private school…what do you expect)
Financial Aid: A (?...I don’t get how this matters…what bank is not willing to loan you $$)
Faculty: B
Reputation: ?
Technology: A
Study Space/Library: A
Library technology/Resources: A
Rotations: C to A (depending on how willing you are to travel and how motivated you are)
Social: A
Hospitals: C to A
Post Grad opportunity: D


Overall Grade: B
PM me with disputes or questions.
This is just my experience…someone else might give it a D and others an A.

A few things to keep in mind: 1.)if you’re thinking allopathic ortho or gen surg, Des Moines is not going to help you. If you’re thinking DO ortho, be willing to travel (eg. to Michigan) for rotations…showing your face prior to residency apps is huge with DO ortho. Many 3rd yrs re-locate to Michigan or Ohio for the sole purpose of getting an early start with the abundance of programs in those states. Away rotations in general can be big (though aren’t essential as a general rule): I know for a fact I wouldn’t have gotten interview offers from 2 places had I not rotated there / had a contact there.

2.) most people change their mind from pre-med to residency selection…I was leaning ER or gen surg with absolutely no intent of doing path. Where you go to school doesn’t really matter as long as your grades a good, your boards are good, and you’re not a complete tool.

If you’re going to pass boards, it’s not because of the strength of your schools’ didactics, it’s because you’re a type-A person who generally does well, and you want to pass so you take initiative to study hard. If you’re a borderline student, this might be different, and the first two years may be more crucial.

Something to always ask in interviews is first time board pass rate for step 1 AND step 2. That should give you a generic picture of the didactics at the school.

schrute said:

I have to disagree with the last poster on DMU…perhaps that’s because my perception is from 4th yr and I’m a bit more optimistic because I can see the light at the end of the tunnel… I’ve had my share of complaints, but I dunno about C-.

Curriculum: First year (mine was 2004 so keep in mind there’s been some faculty turnover since) is fairly decent.Physiology is well done; biochem & micro are a load in info but doable. Anatomy I found quite good, actually—not sure how the new prof is but he’s from U of MD med school so can’t be that bad. It was my strongest course and undoubtedly had some impact on my decision to go into pathology vs surgery.

Second year has recurrent issues, depending on which guest lecturers can/cannot help to teach a course, but in retrospect doesn’t matter as long as you study like you’re supposed to for boards. I felt I learned more in the 3 months I prepared for boards (with Qbank, FA, HY, BRS, KAPLAN and Goljan) than in the previous 6, but not because of the quality of the courses—the content is so fast and furious you don’t have time to LEARN all of it. One thing that also hurts is that DMU doesn’t have a central teaching / research hospital from which it can draw professors (like most DO schools). Listening to guest lecturers (often just community docs) means the material is more clinically oriented.

Overall, I think the first two years give you the information necessary to pass USMLE, but how much of that you retain depends on what board exam you plan on taking because the emphasis is on passing the COMLEX, which is an entirely different test (USMLE = much more biochem, basic physio, biostats, neuroanat…you need to UNDERSTAND the material; COMLEX = much more clinical, random out-in-left-field questions…you need to KNOW the material).

The surgery course—though irrelevant at the time you take it and may be hard to balance with coursework—is great prep for rotations. I felt MUCH more prepared for surgery rotations, and didn’t feel like an idiot because I knew the ‘in’s and ‘out’s of the OR. The 25-hr investment is worth it, trust me.

Other clinical-prep courses (OB, ENT, ophtho) I felt weren’t as helpful, but were only a few hours long.

OMM: OMM is pretty big here, though I was a Boesler student, so I have no idea how the dept is now. I didn’t go to DMU because of the OMM, and will be going into a field that has absolutely no use for OMM, but can’t say it didn’t give me a better understanding of applied musculoskeletal medicine. I could care less for cranial, which was a hard unit for me because the prof that teaches it is rather intense. But, like they say, it’s still tested on boards…all 3 steps…that’s a whole ‘nother debate.

Location: I was rather bitter about moving to Des Moines and had a rough first year, but I’m sad to think I’ll be moving in a few months and think Des Moines is a great place. Plenty to do, and though it’s not exactly a vacation destination, it’s a place you can live quite comfortably. People underestimate the Midwest, which is fine with me because it keeps the wackos out.

Cost: Kinda sucks. $34k is a helluvalot to spend / yr on tuition, especially if you have to take out another $20k for living.

Faculty: Some are stronger than others; the turnover is regular…a few come and go every few yrs. I’m partial to the anatomy dept; the phys dept is great; I enjoyed micro & viro & biochem (though am biased cuz it’s my undergrad degree). They could use some better path teaching…the 1st yr course is too much info too quickly, but taught by a practicing pathologist (as are the 2nd yr systems-based path lectures), though the anatomy dept is all PhDs. Again, there’s no big research / teaching hospital that provides such faculty, just community pathologists.
Overall, the first two years (didactics) were pretty good, but that was supplemented with massive amounts of board prep. Part of that is because the faculty are preparing you for the COMLEX, which is much less basic-science oriented than the USMLE (IMHO).

Reputation: Beats me…compared to other DO schools, I’d rather go to DMU than many other schools I’ve read about, but it’s a matter of opinion…any arbitrary rankings don’t matter much. Compared to allopathic schools in the area (IA, NE, MN, WI), guess it depends on your perception of the DO degree vs the MD degree.

Clinical Rotations: Big plus or minus depending on how you look at it. Plus: there’s no big teaching hospital, so most of your rotations, you’re not competing against interns, residents, etc, for experience. Minus: there’s no big teaching hospital, so most of your rotations will not be supplemented with didactics, and the variety of specialty experience available is quite frustrating. Des Moines has little or no (closer to no) radiology, derm, anesthesia, OB, ophtho, etc…you’re best served doing an away rotation for many fields, unless you’re lucky enough to have an in at one of the practices in town.
[EXAMPLE: I did a gas rotation with a group in town that normally doesn’t take students, and my experience afforded me much more OR time / intubations / teaching than the standard gas rotation most students in town do.]
This CAN be a plus, too, and may afford you the opportunity to do away rotations at potential residency sites, granted you know what you want to go into when there’s opportunity for away rotations.

Another plus and minus: the program allows for much more elective time, though I understand they’ve been modifying the clinical requirements recently. The only experience I had in IM my 3rd yr was 4 wks with a subpar group at the local hospital—teaching was scant to absent. This isn’t a big deal if you do elective IM rotations with some better groups in town, but there’s no required several-month block of IM in a large teaching hospital.

Many students travel across the country for 3rd and 4th year, andthough I understand they’re changing this for 3rd yr students , 4th yr is still open.

Housing: Quite cheap, depending on your taste. I live close to school and it’s $525 / mos…heat and water included. ½ block away are $200k condos. Take your pick.

Study areas: Phenomenal. The new student activity center is a major upgrade from what was there previously. Then again, you’re only there the first 2 yrs, and occasionally for board prep if you’re still in Des Moines. Large library with plenty of cubicles, lots of study rooms…pretty nice. The facilities in general are great: the gym is top notch (full court with 6 hoops, ¼-mile track above, free weights, few dozen treadmills and PreCor machines.

School Policies: Like others have said… “ No formal dress code. No mandatory class attendance, for now. Seems like every year, someone in the administration makes a push to try and change this which is unfortunate.” Media includes MP3 lectures, Powerpoints, and Notepool.

Social Scene: It’s pretty crazy around here about every four years, so if you hit a caucus year, brace yourself. The class size is ~200, so plenty of people from which to choose your crowd, but there’s several school functions / yr, some black tie, more that are quite informal.

Local Hospitals: Mercy and Methodist are the two main hospitals, but Mercy is the one most students rotate at for core hospital. They have an allo FP residency and an AOA gen surg residency, but it’s a private hospital with lots of private physician groups, so experiences on rotations can vary a lot. Methodist has an allo peds, IM and gen surg residency, but the gen surg is rather anti-DO…most of the peds and some IM residents are DMU grads, however, and students often rotate there. Some specialty services (nephro, heme/onc) require students to be committed to applying to their IM program in order to rotate…why, I’m not sure…it’s a stupid rule. There’s also a VA and a county hospital, the latter of which is very popular with students…requests for rotations often outnumber requests for Mercy. There are also many surrounding communities, 15-45 minute-drives away, which offer lots of various experiences including core hospital blocks. Basically, if you want to stay here for your entire 3rd and 4th year, it’s doable, but you may want to branch out to larger facilities for gas, rads, heme/onc, OB and a few others.

Board Prep: KAPLAN teaches a COMLEX 1 prep course: lectures, Qbank and plenty of big fat books. Some like it, some don’t…most at least attend the lectures. It’s included in our tuition, so you don’t have to worry about fin aid for it.

Specialty: I guess primary care like most DO schools, but plenty of people do other things. My best friends are doing gas, ortho, ENT, rads, gen surg, peds, and 3 are doing FP. I’m doing path (which I branched out for and did away rotations at some big universities as well as local community hospitals).

Grades:(C = avg , B = above avg) I hate + and -

Curriculum: B
Location: B
Cost: C (but it’s a private school…what do you expect)
Financial Aid: A (?...I don’t get how this matters…what bank is not willing to loan you $$)
Faculty: B
Reputation: ?
Technology: A
Study Space/Library: A
Library technology/Resources: A
Rotations: C to A (depending on how willing you are to travel and how motivated you are)
Social: A
Hospitals: C to A
Post Grad opportunity: D


Overall Grade: B
PM me with disputes or questions.
This is just my experience…someone else might give it a D and others an A.

A few things to keep in mind: 1.)if you’re thinking allopathic ortho or gen surg, Des Moines is not going to help you. If you’re thinking DO ortho, be willing to travel (eg. to Michigan) for rotations…showing your face prior to residency apps is huge with DO ortho. Many 3rd yrs re-locate to Michigan or Ohio for the sole purpose of getting an early start with the abundance of programs in those states. Away rotations in general can be big (though aren’t essential as a general rule): I know for a fact I wouldn’t have gotten interview offers from 2 places had I not rotated there / had a contact there.

2.) most people change their mind from pre-med to residency selection…I was leaning ER or gen surg with absolutely no intent of doing path. Where you go to school doesn’t really matter as long as your grades a good, your boards are good, and you’re not a complete tool.

If you’re going to pass boards, it’s not because of the strength of your schools’ didactics, it’s because you’re a type-A person who generally does well, and you want to pass so you take initiative to study hard. If you’re a borderline student, this might be different, and the first two years may be more crucial.

Something to always ask in interviews is first time board pass rate for step 1 AND step 2. That should give you a generic picture of the didactics at the school.

Click to expand...

Thanks SCH!!

Tcom! Tcom! Tcom! Tcom!

UNTHSC-TCOM

Curriculum: Systems based curriculum: Biochem, Musculoskeletal, Neuro, Endocrine, Heme, in first semester and Cardio, Resp, Repro, Mechanism of Disease etc in 2nd semester. Anatomy is usually 2-3 days a week in the afternoons and covers the system you are covering in class. OMM is one afternoon a week usually 2-3 hrs. Second year is similiar schedule. You have a mix of lectures and Clinical intergration Labs as well as DSAs which is basically time to study on your own. You are in class alot more during 1st year and usually 2-3hrs a day in second year with 1 to 2 days free to study each week. One thing about TCOM is that it seems like the faculty want to prove to other TX schools that TCOM turns out students as good or better than them so you are pushed extemly hard during the 1st couple of years. A negative is that first year starts August 1 and ends at the end of June so you get 4 weeks off and thats it.

Location:Most people like Ft. Worth some think it is boring but Dallas is 20min away so if you like a bigger city you can always go there. The school is in the cultural district right outside of downtown and it is one of the nicest areas in the city.

Cost: It is easily the cheapest DO school in the country. Very cheap for instate residents and for out of staters it is still cheaper than other DO schools. TCOM has to take at least 90% Texas residents so its tough to get if an out of stater

Faculty:TCOM was robbed of some of its basic science faculty members by other DO schools and they are working on rebuilding in that area. Dr. Dubin the assoc. dean is an amazing teacher anatomy, cardio, endocrine, and path professors are great. Biochem is ok as are the rest of the departments but they can definetly be improved upon. It may take a couple of years to replace some of the faculty that left because they were amazing teachers. Clinical faculty are outstanding the school has a large physician group that include every specialty. The clinical faculty is expanding rapidly and is one of the strongest areas of the school now. There are quite a few MD faculty here so if you have a problem learning from MDs don't go here.

OMM: The OMM department at TCOM is large and very big on research. The national osteopathic research center is here. OMM is once a week every week for 2 yrs and if you are really interested in OMM you can really get involved here and totally immerse yourself in it. Otherwise you can do your 2yrs and get out as its not really pushed upon you (except by OMM faculty). Some people see this as a positive and some see it negatively.

Reputation:TCOM has a very good reputation in Texas. We consistently have higher board scores than many of the Tx MD schools and we are competitive in any TX residency. Nationwide we are a pretty well respected school however since most of our students are from TX many stay here for residency so we don't have a huge number of students all over the country like many other DO schools do. Students that have gone out of state have landed very good spots. The majority of TCOM students go into MD residencies (over 80%) as there aren't alot of DO residencies around the TX area so keep that in mind.

Clinical Rotations: I think our clinical rotations are good we have 2 campuses right now. One in Corpus Christi where students spend their entire third year and rotate through Christus Spohn, Driscoll Childrens, and Bay area Medical Center. Christus Spohn just opened an ER residency and Driscoll has a Peds residency and is a great Peds rotation. The rest of the students are in Fort Worth at John Peter Smith Hospital, Plaza Medical Center, Cooks Childrens, and Harris Methodist. JPS is a big county hospital around 500 beds and they have Ortho, Family Practice, Rads, OB/GYN, residency there. They are planning on opening an ER residency soon as well. Plaza is private and there is Internal Med, FP, Surgery, and Cards residency etc. Cooks is where we do Peds rotations at and we do various rotations at Harris as well. A handful of students go to Dallas Methodist for internal med and a few go to Texas Tech Odessa for OB and Peds. Next year TCOM is opening another clinical campus in Baytown so students can spend the whole 3rd year there for rotations. You get to pick where you want to spend third year. I think 10-12 can go to Corpus and around 10 will go to Baytown the rest are in Fort Worth.

Housing:There are many apartments and houses around the area. You can find a nice place relatively cheap. The further you are from campus the cheaper it gets in most cases, but you can find some cheap places within walking distance if you look a little.

Study areas:The library is nice but with the addition of new students it is quickly becoming to small. They are supposed to expand it but I don't know when it will happen.

Social Scene:There is no social scene at TCOM you are way to busy. You have test pretty much every 2 weeks and they push us very hard. Most stdents go out the night after tests we go downtown there are a number of bars. If you want something wilder you can always drive to Dallas

Local Hospitals:JPS, Harris Methodist, Baylor All Saints, Plaza, Cooks we rotate at all the major hospitals in the area and physicians and staff are very friendly to the students.

Board Prep:We have a full month of board review at the end of 2nd yr and a month off to study on our own. TCOM has had the highset COMLEX scores for the past 2 yrs and above 90 passage rate on USMLE. You will be well prepared to take boards here.

Specialty: There are lots of IMs and FPs like at most DO schools. Most students seem to want primary care but the students who want other specialties can easily obtain them. It does seem that the school places alot of emphasis on IM and FP however. You can check the TCOM website for their matchlist

One thing to keep in mind is that TCOM is about to undergo a major expansion where they are building a new classroom building and Rec center which is scheduled to open in Sept. of 09. There is also plans for several other new buildings.
Curriculum: B (1st yr is to long)
Location: A-B (depends on who you are and where you came from)
Cost: A+
Financial Aid: A
Faculty: B- (Loss of basic science faculty brings this down)
Reputation: A
Technology:B
Study Space/Library: C+
Library technology/Resources:C
Rotations: A
Social:C
Hospitals: A
Post Grad: A


Overall Grade: A


I typed this up fast so I'm sure there are lots of mispelled words and grammar errors sorry. If you have any questions let me know

JackDanielMD said:

Tcom! Tcom! Tcom! Tcom!

Click to expand...

Maybe this works: Western! Western! Western! Western!

Dallas may be 20 minutes from Fort Worth if it's not raining/snowing, there's no traffic and you drive like a maniac.

Wow, I can't believe that actually worked. Thanks TTMP

Western is awesome....I dont have time to do the full thing.....we are in the middle of IDIT (micro, immuno, path and pharm) as first years and the second years are in repro....this is the first time I have checked this since August. But I will say it is a great place and the area isn't that bad. I grew up in so Cal and Pomona gets a bad wrap but there are nice things about the area. Claremont is awesome! The professors are all really caring and kind in my experience and all the classes (first and second years) really help eachother out. So, in my opinion you would be crazy not to go to Western....I love it. But it is, as they say, very demanding and tough. You can message me if you have specific questions....good luck and definately Western.
In my opinion...the pros and cons are at every school. If you work hard and do your best, you will end up where you want to be. At COMP, they are very pro student and the classes are not super competitive. It sounds corny but it is my experience. hhaha. Good luck

Any Nova students willing to share information about the school using this template?

Anyone?

NYCOM is the most unorganized medical school in the U.S. I challenge anyone to refute this. Many of you that have applied there have an idea of how unorganized it is because they tend to lose many files and their mailing is very random. I am a second year student, and half of this year we didn't know what our schedule will be for the coming month, until a couple of weeks before. It is the second biggest medical school in the U.S., which means that it has one of the highest incomes, but at the same time it is the poorest medical school. It has the lowest accpetance numbers (avg. GPA, MCAT), it has the lowest board scores out of any D.O. school, and it has the lowest retention rate out of any medical school in the U.S. Anyone that knows NYCOM knows that it is only there to make money. Most people choose NYCOM either because they didn't get into anywhere else (as one of the deans openly admits), or they choose NYCOM only because it is close to home and they want to live at home.
The administration doesn't care about the students. One of the students is pregnant and is due around the time of board exams. She made a simple request for them to accomodate her by giving her a bigger chair for the exam since she can't fit in the seats in the auditorium in which we take our exams. They rejected her request!! Dealing with the administration is sometimes like dealing with the mafia.
Each incoming class has around 330 people in it. There are around 600 people studying at the NYCOM campus at the same time, including the first year class, the second year class, and those that are there for their third year (which don't make up for the number of people that have dropped out, therefore only around 600 total). It has a total of 3 small buildings for all of these people, which are shared with the PA students, nutrition students, etc. The library is very small and very often during exams studying space is hard to find. The air conditioning is often broken. In the summer, they set it to extremely low tempratures sometimes, and in the winter it is just as unpredictable. Some people might not think that this is a problem, but it is extremely annoying when you have to bring a jacket with you in the summer, or when you're freezing during an exam.
The education is very poor at NYCOM. The following are just some of the examples from the second year courses, but the first year courses are just as bad. For some courses, like cardiology and gastroenterology, the teaching is so horrible that they give us a "review" at the end of the course and they actually give us the questions to the exam including some of the answers, because they know that nobody will pass if they don't. On the other hand, for some courses, like dermatology and toxicology, they give us a review in which they tell us what we 'need to know' for the exam, and then they give us something completely different on the actual exam.
Pediatrics is on a category by itself. It was so poorly taught, and the exam questions were so bad that they ended up either throwing out or accepting multiple answers for a third of the exam, and 30 people still failed it! If you are thinking that they will change something about the course after something like this happens, you are wrong. Last year was just as bad. Last year, they ended up just passing everyone, because the average score was something like a 30%, and nothing changed about the course for this year.
OMM, which is what is unique about D.O. schools, and is partly the reason that I chose NYCOM over an M.D. school, is a complete joke and waste of time at NYCOM. The way that they have taught us OMM has made most people reject it. A few years ago, NYCOM had a very good OMM department and had some amazing teachers. For political reasons that have been kept away from us, almost all of those teachers left NYCOM in the last two years. There are only two OMM professors that stayed, one taking over the first year and one taking over the second year. The course director for the second year is incompetent and doesn't know how to talk. I doubt that there are more than a few people that actually respect him in the whole school. Since the beginning of the year, they have aquired two new full time OMM faculty, but four teachers for 600 students is still pretty pathetic in my opinion. NYCOM has a fellowship program in which the students accepted into the program get their tuition paid for in return for spending an additional year at NYCOM to be OMM fellows. In the past, about 3 people applied for every position into the program. This year, they didn't even have enough applying to the program, forcing them to extend the deadline so that they could go around begging people to become fellows.
Choose your school very carefully. Some people say that it doesn't matter what school you go to and that it is all in your hands to educate yourself. These people are just trying to make themelves feel better for going to a bad school. You do have to work hard no matter where you go, and you are responsible for doing the work, but anyone with common sense knows that you will get more and do better if you go to a good school as opposd to going to a bad school. There are two people that I know that dropped out of NYCOM after the first year and started over at a different medical school, and both say that their new school isn't even comparable to NYCOM. This brings me to the next point. 10-20% of people drop out of NYCOM, mostly after the first year. If it is not a bad school, then why do so many people run away?
Going to NYCOM is like going to war. The good thing is that it has brought us students together, as is what typically happens in times of crisis. Studying all of the material in medical school is hard enough by itself. What is going on at NYCOM not only doesn't make it easier, but in many instances proves to hinder our ability to learn. Those that are concerned about the reputation of their school will try to argue otherwise, but NYCOM is a school to stay away from for the next few years at least.
i found this quote on NYCOM, just wondering how much truth to it

Everyone should be aware that the last post (#176) regarding NYCOM is a repost from 2005. The information contained within it is at least 3 years old.

Now armed with the proper information, you can decide for yourself whether to figure the above information into your decisions.

Ilikescience said:

I do not go to DMU, I'm posting it on behalf of a current DMU student. This post was summited anonymously because the admin monitors the forums. I will do this again for other students who wish to remain anonymous as well. Thanks oh mysterious one!

DMU

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Wow, I never got how/why people assume the faculty of a school are "trolling the boards." If that was the case, many of us would no longer be in school my friend. Anyways, since I got the gonads to write under my own name, let me see about what I agree with your post and what I do not.

Curriculum: Every school has classes that are solid and others that need improvement. In DMU I would have to say that Biochemistry and Pharmacology are, by far, the best taught classes. As for the worst, I would list Histology and Hematology. Some of the classes are also taught by those with strong accents which can make it hard to understand. However, as someone who never attends classes, I can still listen to them on the MP3 at 2x speed with NO problems. Yes, most of second year is taught by guest lecturers and, yes, they sometimes put questions on the exam that have you asking, "what did I study last night?" However, these guest lecturers are, 99% of the time, clinicians in the field who also write board questions. All-in-all, I think it is beneficial to be taught and tested by the people I will have to impress in a few short months.

You made a blurb about the surgery lab being a bad thing and I really have no idea what you base this on. Okay, so it requires that you go to a few classes in the evenings. However, it isn't like it last 7 months; its a few classes, suck it up. Whats more, we are learning skills that many students don't learn until 3rd or 4th year (scrubbing in for surgery and tying suture knots, ect.). I think this is a major positive.

Clinical skills: this is where the surgical skills lab shines. You also cannot forget about SPALs and the Sim Labs. I believe that the Sim Labs are one of the most amazing editions to DMU. Here I get to mess up, which I do more often than not, without killing the patient. In addition, you have the surgical skills lab teaching you how to insert a chest tube, Foley cath, central line, ect. I think we are pretty damn well prepared clinically.

Location: Its Des Moines and I don't see much besides the inside of my apartment, my cat and TV; welcome to medical school. The bars are nice, but it isn't like living in New York. A major downside is the drivers; I rate Iowa drives lower than Philly or Jersey. Otherwise, there is enough to do here to keep almost anyone occupied.

Cost: I agree, about middle among other schools. The new Sim Lab, education center and the equipment (computer/PDA) we get are worth the tuition in my eyes. Not to mention the new anatomy lab and other improvements.

Faculty: One of the best parts of DMU is the availability of the faculty. I have never had a problem stopping by to ask a question. I have never felt like there wasn't someone I could turn to for help; this goes all the way to Deans. A negative is that some of the professors have strong accents which can be hard to understand at times. But, like I said, I have never had a problem listening to them at 2x speed.

Reputation: Its the oldest Osteopathic School. With age comes reputation, good or bad. I believe ours is good. When I lived in Pennsylvania, it was a doctor there who told me of the strong reputation in DMU; 1000 miles away and it still gets a good review.

Clinical rotations: They have changed everything this year so, I really cannot give you any information as of yet. They are trying to keep us closer to home and at rotations sites they have approved for third year. Fourth year is still open because it is almost all electives; so we can do what we want and go where we want to go.

School Policies: The same as said before: no dress code, no required attendance (except for OMM and a few classes here and there).

Study areas: I agree with the last post. I don't study in the school often but, when I have, most of the places are pretty solid. We have a nice fireplace which is cool to study in front of and the library is sweet as well.

I agree with the comment about the bookstore ladies, they rock and they know it. They will tell you what books everyone is buying and which books they recommend.

Local hospitals: I will know more about this in August.

Board Prep: we have the Kaplan medical course come in. We just started that now so I can't tell you how good it is.

Specialty: According to USNews (http://grad-schools.usnews.rankings.../webextras/brief/sb_med_primarycare_brief.php) between 2004-2006 40.8% of DMU graduates entered into primary care residencies. So, it isn't primary care "for the most part."


Grades (where a C is average):

Curriculum: B
Location: B
Cost: B
Financial Aid: A
Faculty: A
Reputation: A
Technology: A
Study Space/Library: A
Library technology/Resources: A
Rotations: -- (not enough information right now...)
Social: B

Overall Grade: A-/B+ (A- if the rotations are good and B+ if they are average)

Just some additional comments to add to Jamers' post:

Jamers said:

As for the worst, I would list Histology and Hematology.

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Can't comment on Heme, but I would disagree about Histo. The learning tools the main lecturer provides (i.e. virtual microscope and narrated tutorials) are really great, as are his lectures. There are some bad lectures (Dr. L), but the good ones (Dr. C) outweigh the bad by a lot.

Worst classes = Behavioral Medicine and Ethics

Jamers said:

Reputation: Its the oldest Osteopathic School.

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Second oldest

Jamers said:

I agree with the comment about the bookstore ladies, they rock and they know it. They will tell you what books everyone is buying and which books they recommend.

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I think the bookstore ladies are just salespeople; they'll try to sell you anything and everything, especially PD equipment, which they have no idea what they are talking about. Bottom line, they'd rather see you walk out of the bookstore with a cheap used book rather than no book.

Jamers said:

Overall Grade: A-/B+ (A- if the rotations are good and B+ if they are average)

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Agreed

Can someone evaluate Western COMP?

Thanks a lot

LECOM? LECOM? Anyone have info about LECOM-Erie?

Can someone please do Western?

No KCOM yet??

Yes please, can someone do Western? Thanks!

I'm a Western student! its right before our exams coming up this tuesday so i dont have a lot of time, but I remember using sdn back when I was applying and out of huge respect and all the help and information I've received, I'd thought I should post something about Western that may help someone else who is going through what i have.

Western was my number 1 choice when i was applying and it still is. the philosophy and the mission statement for creating humanistic and compassionate doctors are a reality that I am embued with everyday here at Western. i love the weather, although i must admit i'm a socal native, and I love the people at Western. Faculty and admin. are very friendly and they go out of their way to make themselves available for us. Although we are on a percentage system for our grades, there isn't much competition. its more like trying to survive our next exam is the feeling i get. not to say the material is hard or anything, but so much information that it just requires studying everyday. something i was never used to back in my undergrad days (i think this is true for any med. school though).

I didn't really understand it back when i was applying, other than the fact that rotations sites are set up really well at Western, but only after coming to this school, do i understand the huge influence Western carries to all its rotations sites and the legacy Western graduates carry to residency programs in the so.cal area. And we are still expanding everyday is the real cool thing! we just set up another rotation site and another medical center near school just within this past year. the school is everso expanding and i feel the tuition money at work here at Western. just check the matchlist for 2006 and 2007 graduates of Western, if you need to confirm the legacy Western carries in the residency programs.

there are drawbacks to Western as there are any schools. No cafeteria. for gyms, we get special discounts to bally's (1 yr membership is like 25 bucks), la fitness, and 24 hours. we don't have a nice lush green campus as I had back in undergrad, but issues like that will simply melt away once you start school and have to study everyday in rooms for hours at end. when we do need to unwind, we are always 30 mins away from LA (without traffic), 1 hr from skiing or the casino, whatever floats your boat.

the curriculum has changed drastically for the better since we got a new dean of medicine a couple of years ago. we are 4th in the nation for board score pass rate and above avg. compared to the national avg for board scores. you understand quickly that the grades that you get the first 2 years don't matter as much as your board scores, so even if we are based on percentage, we really just feel we need to pass. honestly, the percentage grades motivate me to always do better and try to attain an A, without getting stressed out, cuz in the end like I said, the board scores are what counts.

the OMM faculty are great here and the networking opportunities are endless, with OMM faculty and visiting physicians always holding workshops. many people are skeptical of OMM, esp. cranial, but understand that there will always be people who disagree with anything, and personally i feel its those that aren't very good at OMM, who complain the most about whether its effective or not. shadow a physician in your area who focuses only on OMM, and your skepticism will quickly disappear.

i know i'm biased, but at the rate we are expanding and the legacy we are building as the most competitive gpa/mcat DO school, on top of the rotations and residencies we are getting our hands on, I'm willing to say Western is headed towards the top sometime in the near future. hope that helps someone, and you guys may see me giving tours at Western for those applying. just mention sdn and I'm sure all the applicants eyes will all light up!

Thanks for the post, Western DO.

Con: its not MD

KECKington said:

Con: its not MD

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OMG! You're hilarious!!!

KECKington said:

Con: its not MD

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Easy does it there partna, most people on this forum would view that as a Pro. Including me.

Curriculum: There are currently 2 curriculums. 1 PBL which is limited to a maximum of 8 people the years that it is offered. The other is the traditional approach. However, since there are only 108 students in the class, the professors engage the students very often. They are not just lecturing about the material but are bringing it to a clinical setting. The curriculum is going to be changing to a more systems approach. So all of the classes will be working on the same systems at the same time. Exams for 1st year are on a block schedule. 1 week every 5 weeks or so are exams. There is generally 1 exam every other day. In 2nd year, you take module exams. Where 1 exam covers all of the material for that system at one shot. The exam is 200 questions over the course of 4 hours in order to build stamina to take the boards.

Location: Stratford, NJ. It is about 15 minutes from Philadelphia but there is a direct train that runs from the station 2 blocks from campus and I think costs less than $5 each way. There are also venues such as bowling, roller staking, movies, malls, and you are about 40 minutes from Atlantic City and the Jersey Shore. Skiing is not far away in the Pocono Mountains.

Cost: Pretty Decent. Most people get in-state tuition.

Faculty:Excellent. One of the largest faculty to student ratio at about 20:1. They put in the time needed to help the students. Be it meet with them for a few hours to help them understand a concept or pop in during a review and practically tell you what to study for the exam. They are there to help you succeed

Reputation: Top notch.

Clinical Rotations: You start seeing patients in your first year in your preceptorship where you are with a family physician for a minimum of 30 hours a year. During 3rd and 4th year you rotate through our hospitals of Kennedy Stratford, Kennedy Cherry Hill, Kennedy Washington Township, and Our Lady of Lourdes in Camden. If you prefer you can take the North Jersey tract and do all of your rotations but Geriatrics at Christ Hospital in Jersey City. During your OB.GYN rotations you will be allowed to deliver babies. During your peds rotation you will spend 1/3 of the time in the office, 1/3 of the time doing newborn checkups, and 1/3 of the time in the peds ER in Washington Township. The rotations are set up for you, there is a lottery to see which schedule you get.

Housing: There is no housing on campus. There are local apartment complexes that offer discounts to UMDNJ-SOM students.

Study areas: Pretty Good. The library, classrooms, and labs are available.

Social Scene: With only 108 people in the class there is always something going on and everyone is invited. Many people head to Philly on the weekends to dance and go clubbing. There was a Halloween party, Dodgeball tournament, there is an upcoming Ski trip and paintball trip.

Local Hospitals: Part of our school. Kennedy Health Systems and Our Lady of Lourdes. The Kennedy system is currently getting an upgrade to be able to offer more services.

Board Prep: As part of your tuition, you are signed up for Board Boot Camp which prepares you in 2nd year to take the Boards. UMDNJ-SOM has a 98-99% pass rate on the boards. Many students take both the COMLEX and USMLE.

Specialty: You can specialize in anything. If during your 4th year you would like to do a rotation during one of your electives that we do not offer, you can do it. Both you and the administration set it up. Our students have gone into every specialty out there.


Curriculum: A+

Location: A
Cost:B+
Financial Aid: A
Faculty: A+
Reputation:A+
Technology:A+
Study Space/Library: B
Library technology/Resources: B
Rotations: A+
Social: A
Hospitals: A
Post Grad: A


Overall Grade: A

Thanks for the info EMT2ER-DOC!

RoyalFB said:

No KCOM yet??

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+1

anything for LMU-DCOM?

Cirrculum:
As a fourth year I need to add a couple of additions and put a couple of my cents in. For the cirrculum they are always trying to change the lecture style format with adding more small groups in each medicine section. As for the module tests, this is correct and sometimes we would have another test added on in the afternoon.

Location: Philadelphia is really 25 minutes away on average. If communting to a rotation during rush hour it takes about 35-50 depending on what hospital you need to get to. The PATCO to phila is right now $4.90 round trip and leads you to center city. As for partying stuff, we have alot of everything but most of the time end up in phila or AC.

Cost- Agree with above. Pretty easy to get in-state tutuion. I was originally out of state

Faculty- First two years the faculty is great. It changes third and fourth year because some docs teaching styles are just bad.

Clinical Rotations: In addition to south jersey and north jersey you can also add jersey shore to do some of your rotations. I also spoke with the dean and said we might be adding another hospital in south jersey. There was a previous post by a PCOM doc who gave our rotation schedule and was worried about when we could do electives. That belief is bogus and you can easily set up your schedule to do our electives early if you need to compete. In addition we have alot of PCOM, NYCOM, VCOM, and KCOM students at our hospitals becuase of the great GME ops we have post grad.

Housing- as cheap or expensive as you make it. You could live in phila and commute, choose to live in cherry hill or voorhees and pay higher prices, live in pine hill or straford and save, or live with roommates and really save. Currenlty paying about $400 a month for everything

Study areas- you can also choose to study in coffee shops or book stores around the area.

Social scene- Just as good as described

Local Hospitals- A positive and negative. The positive is that this is our system and we are the only students unless people from outside schools choose to rotate here. The negative is that most of these hospitals are community based and all the really interesting cases go to cooper or phila.

Boards- We currently have boards boot camp and is a decent review but you need to really study on your own.

Specialty- Alot of choices in our system from ortho to psych. Only missing PMR, neuro, neurosurgery, rads, derm, optho, and heme/onc. I think maybe one or two more but I know PMR and neuro is in the works currently but won't be ready for another 5-6 years.

Can anyone post grades/comments for LECOM Erie?
Thanks!

RoyalFB said:

No KCOM yet??

Click to expand...

just two more months! I'll try and hash out a KCOM perspective by tonight for anyone who might be interested.

Are there any other UNECOM students out there willing to give their perspective on this thread? I read a couple of UNECOM Pro/Con reviews that seemed a bit conflciting and perhaps a bit aged.
Thanks!

Did you really just call an MSII and MSIII aged? Say it ain't so!

The posts aren't conflicting at all. Go back and read again... the information is less than a year old. I will tell you the current MSI's are just as whiny and bitter as we were as MSIs, and the MSIIs are pretty much dancing in the streets at the prospects of gettin' off their butts and into rotations. MSIIIs just came back to give their view on rotations and they all pretty much love their sites.

There are lots of changes happening here in Maine - UVM lost their Maine Med contract, but word is they're trying to put a satellite campus in Bangor. Tufts has a new contract with Maine Med. We have a new Dean. Curriculum continues to undergo change as the students have input... latest thought is to expand anatomy and have histology, pathology, and embryology parallel. We'll see where it goes.

bottom line: the "old" reviews are still valid. If you have specific questions, please ask in the UNECOM discussion thread.