30MCAT 3.89GPA what if I only get into DO?

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Prism328

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From what I've heard so far, DOs are as good as MDs, they do the same things. It doesn't matter. Take the DO spot (not as need be because its NOT suppose to be a backup plan, so if one were to choose between an MD or a DO choose what they like better even though they are the same...urghh flip a coin? Do the MD/DO track?)

Seriously though, I got it, DOs are cool, it doesn't matter to me, I'd be as happy as a DO as I would an MD.
 
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Go to DO school of course. It would be foolish to reapply.
 
Go D.O. You will be in medical school. However, if you apply smartly, you should have no trouble getting accepted somewhere as long as your ECs and stuff are impressive. Just make sure you have some safety schools and if you want, a few reach schools.
 
DO.. Why would you turn down a medical school and waste a year? DO's do surgery.. -.0 please get a clue.
 
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Then go to D.O. Not that many people will care or even notice the two letters that come after your name, anyway. Plus, why you would apply to D.O. schools if you don't wanna go at all and wasting your application money?
 
You are misinformed. DOs do everything that MDs do.

If you are lucky enough to get into medical school, and you want to be a physician, you should attend. I don't know of a simpler way to put it.

And you should research the field of medicine a bit more, if this is your goal.
 
fair enough, I'll go the DO route if need be. I havn't looked too much into DO schools at all to be honest so I don't really know much about them. I always look at the labels on the doctor's lab coats at my ER and I've never seen one that says DO before.
 
Prism328 said:
DO's don't get to do as much fun stuff as MDs like cool surgeries.
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Really?!? For your own sake, do a little bit of reading on the difference (or lack thereof) between DO and MD.

I'm trying to bite my tongue (metaphorical), but comments like that are an invitation for people on this forum to lambast you.
 
Prism328 said:
fair enough, I'll go the DO route if need be. I havn't looked too much into DO schools at all to be honest so I don't really know much about them. I always look at the labels on the doctor's lab coats at my ER and I've never seen one that says DO before.
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We all get it that you're trolling... but for the benefit of the doubt:

Sometimes hospital issued clothing just has MD since they mass order them that way, or the security people mess up. I worked with a doc before who's name tag said DO and security ID said MD, yet he was a DO. People mess up.
 
Prism328 said:
fair enough, I'll go the DO route if need be. I havn't looked too much into DO schools at all to be honest so I don't really know much about them.
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No **** Sherlock.

Seriously, comments like this really p!ss me off. I know plenty of DOs who have worked very hard, who have multiple graduate degrees, who are leaders of their departments and adored by their patients. It takes a lot of hard work and natural talent to get to their position. Then a little ignorant snot like you says something like "alright, I'll go DO if need be." Like it's an option on a menu. Work hard, and if you're lucky enough to be accepted by a DO school hopefully by then you will have gained some knowledge about the profession and a dose of humility.

/end rant.
 
I always knew they could do surgeries but are there like DO neurosurgeons or cardiothoracic surgeons?
 
All residencies are open to DOs. In addition, DOs have their own residencies that are not open to MDs.

Please do more research on this. There are hundreds of posts about DO careers on SDN.
 
Alright alright, DOs are as good as MDs. I got the point. So theres like no problems getting residencies and jobs or anything right? Man, people are a lot more defensive of DOs than Carribian Schools. I apologize for my mindset of DOs, its just some of my classmates say they'd rather go to a Carribian school and get an MD than go get a DO, one of my advisors are against both. I will do so more research on DOs.
 
Prism328 said:
so I have a 30 MCAT (9V, 10P, 11B) and a 3.89 cGPA and 3.91 sGPA, got my ECs, volunteer, shadowing, TA, etc and i'm applying for MD, many mid-level schools with average mcats of 31. Nevertheless the numbers of matriculants are scary low and I am in constant fear of getting rejected to every MD school, so I decided to apply to some DO schools as well, like 2 or 3 (I know theres also a good chance I won't get into those either) but lets say I do get rejected to every MD school but get accepted into DO school. If you were in this situation would you rather reapply next year or go to a DO school? I just want to practice medicine but I get the feeling DO's don't get to do as much fun stuff as MDs like cool surgeries.
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There is no right choice. If you aren't happy with a DO, don't do it. You'll be miserable for the rest of your life. If you don't like DO, don't apply. If you don't care, do apply. It is as simple as that.
 
alibai3ah said:
There is no right choice. If you aren't happy with a DO, don't do it. You'll be miserable for the rest of your life. If you don't like DO, don't apply. If you don't care, do apply. It is as simple as that.
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if both MDs and DOs do pretty much the same thing as everyone else is saying then I don't care.
 
Prism328 said:
Alright alright, DOs are as good as MDs. I got the point. So theres like no problems getting residencies and jobs or anything right? Man, people are a lot more defensive of DOs than Carribian Schools. I apologize for my mindset of DOs, its just some of my classmates say they'd rather go to a Carribian school and get an MD than go get a DO, one of my advisors are against both. I will do so more research on DOs.
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Could that be because you come here and tout DO as a back-up, then insult the profession? Gee, I wonder what would happen if I went on a nursing board and said that I'll be a nurse if need-be, but I would really rather do something else.

Do yourself and everyone else a favor and don't bother applying to DO schools. You don't want to go, that's clear, and besides, even if you make it to the interview stage, they'll most likely realize you know crap about them.
 
Prism328 said:
so I have a 30 MCAT (9V, 10P, 11B) and a 3.89 cGPA and 3.91 sGPA, got my ECs, volunteer, shadowing, TA, etc and i'm applying for MD, many mid-level schools with average mcats of 31. Nevertheless the numbers of matriculants are scary low and I am in constant fear of getting rejected to every MD school, so I decided to apply to some DO schools as well, like 2 or 3 (I know theres also a good chance I won't get into those either) but lets say I do get rejected to every MD school but get accepted into DO school. If you were in this situation would you rather reapply next year or go to a DO school? I just want to practice medicine but I get the feeling DO's don't get to do as much fun stuff as MDs like cool surgeries.
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Put the following in order of priority (most--->least)

1. I want to be a physician
2. I want to have the Doctor of Medicine (MD) degree

If 1 is higher on your priority list, then apply DO. But before you apply, make sure you spend some time to learn more about the DO philosophy to make sure that is good fit for you. As long as you are a competent, compassionate physician most people could care less about the degree behind your name. But MDs do have slight advantage over DOs as far as residency and future career options are concerned. But in my opinion the advantage is not enough that one should wait a year and reapply.
 
Prism328 said:
so I have a 30 MCAT (9V, 10P, 11B) and a 3.89 cGPA and 3.91 sGPA, got my ECs, volunteer, shadowing, TA, etc and i'm applying for MD, many mid-level schools with average mcats of 31. Nevertheless the numbers of matriculants are scary low and I am in constant fear of getting rejected to every MD school, so I decided to apply to some DO schools as well, like 2 or 3 (I know theres also a good chance I won't get into those either) but lets say I do get rejected to every MD school but get accepted into DO school. If you were in this situation would you rather reapply next year or go to a DO school? I just want to practice medicine but I get the feeling DO's don't get to do as much fun stuff as MDs like cool surgeries.
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Reapply next year. Don't accept what you consider second best.
 
Why do people sweat D.O's so much? I work at Mayo Clinic, one of the top medical organizations in the world, dealing directly with patients and NEVER have I seen a D.O challenged by a patient or treat a patient in a different way than an M.D. Not to mention, there are a ton of D.O's floating around there. It's not like one or two D.O's slip by and everyone else is an M.D.
 
i personally would hold out for an MD school. Do you want people thinking you are an optometrist?
 
Just Joshin said:
Could that be because you come here and tout DO as a back-up, then insult the profession? Gee, I wonder what would happen if I went on a nursing board and said that I'll be a nurse if need-be, but I would really rather do something else.

Do yourself and everyone else a favor and don't bother applying to DO schools. You don't want to go, that's clear, and besides, even if you make it to the interview stage, they'll most likely realize you know crap about them.
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I didn't mean to insult DOs as a profession, I guess I suck at wording things, but if DOs are the same as MDs, whats the incentive to go DO if one were accepted to both MD and DO schools? Maybe some people prefer the holistic approach, I think thats cool. I'm just trying to says things as realistically as possible, I'm sorry if it sounds insulting, but can you blame me? correct me if i'm wrong, realistically, if most people had a choice, would they choose DO or MD? How do I ask that question without sounding insulting? Like I said, I didn't know that much about DOs, but if they do do the same things as MDs then it doesn't matter to me.

I probability shouldn't have added the last thing about cool surgeries, I know they do surgeries, but in articles i've read I see that they are usually GPs which are cool too, we need more GPs.
 
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Come on everybody we all know what DO really stands for..

DO= Don't Operate

I mean all DO's can do is take a temp and prescribe Tylenol
 
I don't have any data on this, but if I were you the one thing I would try to investigate is the percentage of DO's that get accepted to competitive specialties vs. the number of MD's that get accepted to competitive specialties. If I were to guess, if competitive specialties were looking at two similar students, one with an MD degree, and one with a DO degree, they would definitely take the MD. That being said, if the DO student does better on Step 1 and is clearly a better student than the MD, they would probably take the DO student. DO would probably work, but there is that possibility that you would be at a disadvantage to MD's when applying for competitive residencies. That should be your concern with DO. I'd look into it. And maybe I'm wrong about this.
 
golfman said:
I don't have any data on this, but if I were you the one thing I would try to investigate is the percentage of DO's that get accepted to competitive specialties vs. the number of MD's that get accepted to competitive specialties. If I were to guess, if competitive specialties were looking at two similar students, one with an MD degree, and one with a DO degree, they would definitely take the MD. That being said, if the DO student does better on Step 1 and is clearly a better student than the MD, they would probably take the DO student. DO would probably work, but there is that possibility that you would be at a disadvantage to MD's when applying for competitive residencies. That should be your concern with DO. I'd look into it. And maybe I'm wrong about this.
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thank you for the info, thats what I needed. Note to self: Word things better when posting on the forums. Man, its like the time when Obama talked about the pig and the lipstick and people interpreted it as referring to Palin.
 
Ummm...I've seen the match lists for DO schools and they aren't bad. Plus from other doctors and residency directors, I get the feeling it's skill and the compassion of the doctor that considerably more weighted than the name itself...

As a dude that's going through this as well, I think the higher priority now is to get in somewhere that's in the US and just become skillful there. Prestige of the name or school is kinda meaningless compared to the patients that will need our help. >_<
 
Prism328 said:
Alright alright, DOs are as good as MDs. I got the point. So theres like no problems getting residencies and jobs or anything right? Man, people are a lot more defensive of DOs than Carribian Schools. I apologize for my mindset of DOs, its just some of my classmates say they'd rather go to a Carribian school and get an MD than go get a DO, one of my advisors are against both. I will do so more research on DOs.
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Your friends are wrong, very wrong.
 
Prism328 said:
thank you for the info, thats what I needed. Note to self: Word things better when posting on the forums. Man, its like the time when Obama talked about the pig and the lipstick and people interpreted it as referring to Palin.
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I know. Some people get very sensitive. Many of them are DO's who get tired of explaining to people what DO's are.

Anyways, once you are a practicing physician it won't matter if you are a DO or an MD. But, like I said, I think it may be harder to get into a competitive residency from a DO school, unless you outshine the MD students who start out with an advantage over you. I'm sure DO students will say that I'm wrong, but they are biased. And I guess I am biased as well, being a Medical Student. So the only thing to do is try to find some stats that I mentioned, and maybe call up some residency directors (you can do this anonymously, you can find these program directors by just doing some googling) in specialties that you are interested in and ask them if being an MD or DO matters to them when they are selecting residents. Their opinions matter the most.
 
Scarletblack said:
Ummm...I've seen the match lists for DO schools and they aren't bad. Plus from other doctors and residency directors, I get the feeling it's skill and the compassion of the doctor that considerably more weighted than the name itself...

As a dude that's going through this as well, I think the higher priority now is to get in somewhere that's in the US and just become skillful there. Prestige of the name or school is kinda meaningless compared to the patients that will need our help. >_<
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I'm sure they are not bad. But are they as good as MD match lists? Probably not. But I don't have any data to back that up. Do you have data comparing the % of MD's that get into competitive specialties vs. the % of DO's that get into competitive specialties? For example, I would love to know what percentage of DO's that apply to Dermatology get in vs. what percentage of MD's that apply to Dermatology get in.

Logic would say MD's would have the better chance. I'm not saying DO's don't have a chance, they are just at a slight competitive disadvantage for residency spots, I think.
 
If you want some statistics, ~94% of US MD students will match to an MD residency. ~74% of DO students who apply for MD residencies will also match one. Only ~52% of foreign medical graduates (foreign MDs) will match a US MD residency.

Source: The Princeton Review
 
golfman said:
I'm sure they are not bad. But are they as good as MD match lists? Probably not. But I don't have any data to back that up. Do you have data comparing the % of MD's that get into competitive specialties vs. the % of DO's that get into competitive specialties? For example, I would love to know what percentage of DO's that apply to Dermatology get in vs. what percentage of MD's that apply to Dermatology get in.

Logic would say MD's would have the better chance. I'm not saying DO's don't have a chance, they are just at a slight competitive disadvantage for residency spots, I think.
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Aren't there only like twenty-something Dermatology residency positions in the country? I'm sure it's ridiculously hard for either MD's or DO's.

BTW, it would be hard to make that comparison due to the OGME residencies that are available to DO's.

I wouldn't doubt, though, that MD schools have better match lists when it comes to the most competitive ACGME residencies.
 
TexasHopeful said:
If you want some statistics, ~94% of US MD students will match to an MD residency. ~74% of DO students who apply for MD residencies will also match one. Only ~52% of foreign medical graduates (foreign MDs) will match a US MD residency.

Source: The Princeton Review
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Perhaps the lower % is not because of the DO name itself but because DO students have lower average stats (apologies ahead of time if this sounded insulting) so perhaps a DO student with the same USMLE, etc as a MD student.
 
I don't really get why people still need convincing

Among the world of medicine, DO will get respect. It obviously hasn't reached media yet since every character that is a doctor is, of course, some M.D. from Stanford or Harvard or Yale (the household names) such as House M.D. However, I'm sure that the ability to certainly exemplify the practicality of why you chose to go into medicine will be ascertained through schooling and then even with future patients. So, don't worry...

Anecdotal evidence will be everywhere. Including the Orthopaedic Center near campus is led by a DO and MD partnership...
 
Danlee07 said:
Among the world of medicine, DO will get respect. It obviously hasn't reached media yet since every character that is a doctor is, of course, some M.D. from Stanford or Harvard or Yale (the household names) such as House M.D. However, I'm sure that the ability to certainly exemplify the practicality of why you chose to go into medicine will be ascertained through schooling and then even with future patients. So, don't worry...
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Ha, I remember the two nip tuck docs are from Hopkins.
 
Prism328 said:
From what I've heard so far, DOs are as good as MDs, they do the same things. It doesn't matter. Take the DO spot (not as need be because its NOT suppose to be a backup plan, so if one were to choose between an MD or a DO choose what they like better even though they are the same...urghh flip a coin? Do the MD/DO track?)

Seriously though, I got it, DOs are cool, it doesn't matter to me, I'd be as happy as a DO as I would an MD.
Click to expand...

If this is the case, why even ask the question?
 
vin5cent0 said:
Why do people sweat D.O's so much? I work at Mayo Clinic, one of the top medical organizations in the world, dealing directly with patients and NEVER have I seen a D.O challenged by a patient or treat a patient in a different way than an M.D. Not to mention, there are a ton of D.O's floating around there. It's not like one or two D.O's slip by and everyone else is an M.D.
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Because a sadly large percentage of premeds that post on this forum haven't had enough real life experience and are too stuck in a bubble of elitism and anal-rententiveness to realize that most patients won't even realize, let alone give an eighth of a crap about whether you're an MD or DO. It's ridiculous.
 
The only people who care about DO vs MD are ignorant premeds, and a very, very small % of residency directors. DOs can and do everything in the US an MD can/do. I got several acceptances and ended up choosing an MD program, but the second choice was a DO. The type of program was FAR less important than picking the one I thought I would be happiest at.

From my experiences, premed societies at universities are HORRIBLY ill informed, about this and everything else. They seem to be filled with future "gunners". My friend was told not to bother applying to school because she didn't get her MCAT scores back until late July, which was "clearly too late". I talk her into applying in October, and she is off to medical school next month.

Yes, there are better paths, and it can be argued that MD is an easier/better path than DO. But that doesn't mean you have to ignore all other paths.
 
SoulinNeed said:
Aren't there only like twenty-something Dermatology residency positions in the country? I'm sure it's ridiculously hard for either MD's or DO's.

BTW, it would be hard to make that comparison due to the OGME residencies that are available to DO's.

I wouldn't doubt, though, that MD schools have better match lists when it comes to the most competitive ACGME residencies.
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Derm is difficult for both MDs and DOs, but just as an FYI, a DO from AZCOM just matched this year to Mayo Derm.
 
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