telecom engineer wants to a doctor

phonedoctor · Jun 17, 2010

Hello Everyone:

I came across this website a few days ago. I have always wanted to be a doctor, but I guess life took me on a different route. I am much older, but still has the passion to follow my dream.

I am 36 years old. I have two masters degree.

MS in electrical Engineering and MS in computer Engineering.

I have been working in telecom network systems engineering for the past decade. Working on all kinds of signalling analysis and troubleshooting.

I always wondered that medical radiology would be my field of choice.

I am more interested in pursuing medical degree if and when everything materialises from the state of Texas prefferably Baylor.

I do understand I have to go through 90 hours of pre-requisite courses. My targeted goal is to get into med school by age 40.

So all the non-trads out there....do let me know what your views are...just bring it out...If you have any advise or word of caution...now is the time.

vc7777 · Jun 18, 2010

phonedoctor said:
Hello Everyone:

I came across this website a few days ago. I have always wanted to be a doctor, but I guess life took me on a different route. I am much older, but still has the passion to follow my dream.

I am 36 years old. I have two masters degree.

MS in electrical Engineering and MS in computer Engineering.

I have been working in telecom network systems engineering for the past decade. Working on all kinds of signalling analysis and troubleshooting.

I always wondered that medical radiology would be my field of choice.

I am more interested in pursuing medical degree if and when everything materialises from the state of Texas prefferably Baylor.

I do understand I have to go through 90 hours of pre-requisite courses. My targeted goal is to get into med school by age 40.

So all the non-trads out there....do let me know what your views are...just bring it out...If you have any advise or word of caution...now is the time.

[Sorry for the belated 'hello' - I figured someone else would have taken the reins on this one! 😳]

Welcome - there are many engineers on the Nontrad forum - including myself. Also, many students older than you, and a few with more degrees too (NOT me :laugh:

).

If you are looking for someone here to say anything negative - you will be hard pressed to find them.

You are in good company and will find many 'pieces' to the 'jigsaw puzzle' that is your own journey to medicine within each and every member of this community. Welcome.

Please root around and use the 'search' function (when you are logged in) to get some great ideas and inspiration to boot!

P.S. My BS was in electrical engineering I'm starting a MS/MD program in 18 days (possibly getting my MS in biomedical engineering) - I loved loved loved my systems and signal analysis work - I think my last hardcore EE signals class was a grad-level course in Wavelets and Sub-band coding. I spent the last 10+ years in biomedical hardware doing a lot of mixed-signal prototype and research grade hardware development (microcontroller and embedded systems design, RF front-ends, phase-lock-loops, etc.). How 'bout you? 😀

tremulousNeedle · Jun 18, 2010

BS in Computer Science myself; the analytical skills will stay with you forever, though the programming languages fade. I was fortunate enough to change paths early in my adult life, so I was only a few years older than the traditional med student.

Your best bet is to search around SDN and this specific forum for the different things that people did to prepare for school. Also, specifically research Texas schools, they use a different application system and are sort of in their own little world (though many of the general requirements and expectations are the same).

One point I would like to make is that since you already have an extensive academic career you may not need the 90 credits that you speak of. Obviously those credits may be necessary to boost your GPA, but if your undergrad GPA is decent you could probably get away with taking the minimum prerequisite credits (30-40 credits), plus some higher level sciences courses (~15 credits) to show that you can master the material (my numbers are rough, but they are way less than 90). You could end up saving a year or more in the whole process, plus it may give you more time to study for the MCAT.

Good luck.

phonedoctor · Jun 21, 2010

vc7777 said:
[Sorry for the belated 'hello' - I figured someone else would have taken the reins on this one! 😳]

Welcome - there are many engineers on the Nontrad forum - including myself. Also, many students older than you, and a few with more degrees too (NOT me ).

If you are looking for someone here to say anything negative - you will be hard pressed to find them.

You are in good company and will find many 'pieces' to the 'jigsaw puzzle' that is your own journey to medicine within each and every member of this community. Welcome.

Please root around and use the 'search' function (when you are logged in) to get some great ideas and inspiration to boot!

P.S. My BS was in electrical engineering I'm starting a MS/MD program in 18 days (possibly getting my MS in biomedical engineering) - I loved loved loved my systems and signal analysis work - I think my last hardcore EE signals class was a grad-level course in Wavelets and Sub-band coding. I spent the last 10+ years in biomedical hardware doing a lot of mixed-signal prototype and research grade hardware development (microcontroller and embedded systems design, RF front-ends, phase-lock-loops, etc.). How 'bout you? 😀

Thank you very much for your encouragement. My experience has been mostly on telecom networking side. Like analysing packet captures and verifying that they follow the protocol standards they are supposed to follow.

I have other headache to take care of before I start my journey towards medicine. The first one would be to get my greencard and visa issue. I have been in this country 10 years so far and will take atleast 3-4 more years to obtain a greencard. Immigration system sucks for some retrogressed countries like India and China. But again this is the place on Earth where anything is possible if you have the will to acheive it. Hopefully I will use these 3 years to get all my pre-requisites taken care of.

This website is awesome, the more I read, the more I feel that this is totally pausible.

I am going to be involved here and will keep ya all updated as we move forward.

Dimitry · Jun 24, 2010

hey man !

I'm currently working for Networking company (CISCO) 🙂 I'm thinking to switch to Medical field . I have green card i will apply for citizenship soon .What made u switch to medical ?

Where do u live ?

phonedoctor · Jun 24, 2010

Dimitry said:
hey man !

I'm currently working for Networking company (CISCO) 🙂 I'm thinking to switch to Medical field . I have green card i will apply for citizenship soon .What made u switch to medical ?

Where do u live ?

I am from Houston Texas. I guess when I was growing up in home country, I wanted to be a doctor, but medical was 10 times more expensive. So I decide to shun my dreams and chose easier route. Now that I am at a stage, where I do not worry too much about expenses and purely want to pursue medicine to become a master in this discipline. I figured, If I can get in by 40 and complete Radiology specialisation by 50, I can still practise for another 15 to 20 years. I am pretty sure I will be able to give back a lot.

phonedoctor · Aug 3, 2010

I just felt like announcing that I have enrolled at the local community college to start my pre-med course work. This will be a long journey towards my goal. I also got hold of Gold standard MCAT book to start reviewing on what concepts I need to hold on to as I go through this premed journey.

Right now I haven't registered for courses yet, still getting through all the papers work (old transcripts, visa and stuff).
I plan to take two evening/weekend courses this semester BIO-I and Chem-I.

DrTroll · Aug 3, 2010

Welcome to sdn. I myself has BS/MS on EE.

A piece of advice, a lot of ppl think adcom at med school don't like pre-reqs from community college. So if you can have your schedule work out, it might be best taken at a 4-year university.

SoftwareKevin · Aug 3, 2010

phonedoctor said:
I just felt like announcing that I have enrolled at the local community college to start my pre-med course work. This will be a long journey towards my goal. I also got hold of Gold standard MCAT book to start reviewing on what concepts I need to hold on to as I go through this premed journey.

Right now I haven't registered for courses yet, still getting through all the papers work (old transcripts, visa and stuff).
I plan to take two evening/weekend courses this semester BIO-I and Chem-I.

Good luck. Another EE here. Just finished my first year of pre-reqs and have one more year to go. I found the hardest part was just getting over the initial hurdle of starting. Once you get actually get in to your classes, it gets a lot easier 🙂

phonedoctor · Aug 5, 2010

DrTroll said:
Welcome to sdn. I myself has BS/MS on EE.

A piece of advice, a lot of ppl think adcom at med school don't like pre-reqs from community college. So if you can have your schedule work out, it might be best taken at a 4-year university.

Thanks for the advice. But 4 year university looks more expensive and also timewise will not be feasible with my work schedule. I will have to take my chances.

My strategy is to shoot for A's and then go for stronger MCAT scores.

But all this will go in vain, if I can't get a green card within 3 years. I am already in line for the past 5 years. However, I will still work on my goal, assuming that things will work out.

Thanks for the encouragement.

datsa · Aug 6, 2010

You should check out www.oldpremeds.org.
And don't worry about your age; I've got 10 years on you (I'm 46) and I won't even begin to apply until I'm 47 or 48 after taking the MCAT Spring 2011. Don't let your age stop you from anything; if someone says "no", and you still think it is worth the effort, keep plugging away. I've been told lots of "no's" in my life, and it has only made me a better, stronger person.

phonedoctor · Aug 6, 2010

datsa said:
You should check out www.oldpremeds.org.
And don't worry about your age; I've got 10 years on you (I'm 46) and I won't even begin to apply until I'm 47 or 48 after taking the MCAT Spring 2011. Don't let your age stop you from anything; if someone says "no", and you still think it is worth the effort, keep plugging away. I've been told lots of "no's" in my life, and it has only made me a better, stronger person.

Thanks lot for the link. I did check it out and saw that there are tons of information for people like me on that link.

Also thanks for the encouraging words. Everytime I read statements like these they re-invigorate my long time goal and make me work harder and stay strong.

txspeed · Aug 7, 2010

DrTroll said:
Welcome to sdn. I myself has BS/MS on EE.

A piece of advice, a lot of ppl think adcom at med school don't like pre-reqs from community college. So if you can have your schedule work out, it might be best taken at a 4-year university.

As long as he is looking to attend med school in Texas and is taking the courses at a community college in Texas, it shouldn't matter.

If his community college uses the Texas Common Course system, any common course class is the equivalent to one at a state university.

If he is going to apply out of state, it may be an issue. But, I can't imagine that the med school adcoms in other states are completely clueless about the Texas Common Course setup.

Oh, almost forgot: 34 years young myself. Good luck to you OP!

telecom engineer wants to a doctor

phonedoctor

Full Member

vc7777

Nontrad MD/MS

tremulousNeedle

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phonedoctor

Full Member

Dimitry

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phonedoctor

Full Member

phonedoctor

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DrTroll

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SoftwareKevin

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phonedoctor

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datsa

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phonedoctor

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txspeed

Particle wrangler

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