496 MCAT (126, 121, 124, 125), cGPA 3.75, sGPA 3.82, accepted, class of 2022

[Beat_the_odds]

Hello everyone
so I'm here to tell you a little about my story, aren't you tired of hearing all the time how MCAT is the most predictable when it comes to success in medical school, well keep reading lol
here I am, a 2nd-year medical student, who got accepted into a US medical school with an MCAT of 496 yikes!
I graduated undergrad in 2018 with a B.S in biochemistry and a biology minor, 3000 hours of volunteering, research, shadowing, ECAs, now on my second year of med school, class of 2022, I made quantile 2 during my first year and hopefully because I have been doing better during my second year I will reach quantile 1, first-year was very rough emotionally since I had to move cities and felt very stressed/ sad all the time.
I'm non-traditional, 26 at the time I applied, URM, took the MCAT just once, with a kid and a husband, late applicant ( I submitted my primary in November 2017). I mean everything was just a mess with that application, but I gave it a try, I didn't have anything else to lose except the $ 2k of application fees ha!
I dont know why i got accepted, maybe bc im a female, maybe bc of URM status, maybe they liked my undergrad record idk but they did. and I have been doing just fine so far, the only thing that the MCAT predicted for me was how many schools were going to reject me which was a lot of them, basically, I only got 1 acceptance, but one acceptance is all you need. was it my dream school in my dream city? well no, but it's going to make me a doctor . Am I embarrassed about my mcat score? yes! none of my classmates know what I got and they will never know either, I like the way they see me now as the girl who has a kid and always gets As lol!
I don't recommend to do what I did but if you want to give it a try, why not! I remember asking through here if I should wait and retake the MCAT or apply now and everyone was like "you'll never get accepted with that MCAT and if you do, you will have trouble in medical school blah blah..." thank god I decided that I was going to apply and not have to live with the what-ifs. anyway, I hope this gives a little hope to people that are in my same shoes! back to studying now

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[Kirby Smart]

Congratulations!! That's awesome that you were able to accomplish your goals despite that! Out of curiosity, are you in an MD or DO program? Not that it matters, I'm just curious if any MD school was willing to look past that MCAT.

Also I'd like to point out, and I hope this doesn't come across too negative, but people likely just advised you to make changes before applying because statistically speaking you didn't have much chance. So, you are certainly the exception for someone in a situation with that MCAT score, however I happy to hear that it worked out for you!!

What area of medicine are you interested in? Also, have you found it hard finding a good work-life balance in med school being that you started school with a family already? Thanks for sharing your story!!

 

[Beat_the_odds]

Congratulations!! That's awesome that you were able to accomplish your goals despite that! Out of curiosity, are you in an MD or DO program? Not that it matters, I'm just curious if any MD school was willing to look past that MCAT.

Also I'd like to point out, and I hope this doesn't come across too negative, but people likely just advised you to make changes before applying because statistically speaking you didn't have much chance. So, you are certainly the exception for someone in a situation with that MCAT score, however I happy to hear that it worked out for you!!

What area of medicine are you interested in? Also, have you found it hard finding a good work-life balance in med school is that you started school with a family already? Thanks for sharing your story!!

It's a DO school, I didn't apply to any USMD because I knew that it wasn't going to work, so I only applied to 10 DO schools and 3 MD school in Puerto Rico, the PR MDs all gave me interviews but I didn't go to any of them.
the balance at the beginning was very hard, the first semester of medical school was super stressful for me, but now that I'm halfway my second year it's so much better and my husband helps me a lot. so for females/males that have families, it's possible to do it but you need support and understanding from your spouse that sometimes you won't even be able to talk about their day at work

 

[Beat_the_odds]

Congratulations!! That's awesome that you were able to accomplish your goals despite that! Out of curiosity, are you in an MD or DO program? Not that it matters, I'm just curious if any MD school was willing to look past that MCAT.

Also I'd like to point out, and I hope this doesn't come across too negative, but people likely just advised you to make changes before applying because statistically speaking you didn't have much chance. So, you are certainly the exception for someone in a situation with that MCAT score, however I happy to hear that it worked out for you!!

What area of medicine are you interested in? Also, have you found it hard finding a good work-life balance in med school being that you started school with a family already? Thanks for sharing your story!!

oh and I forgot to reply to the other questions, so I don't know what I want yet but ill try to do my best on the boards so I have options, my school matches many people every year in surgery, anesthesiology, radiology, cardiology, and even derm and obviously IM and primary care so let see.

 

[Kirby Smart]

Awesome! Thanks again for sharing, and best of luck moving forward!!

 

[RTC19]

Congratulations on your acceptance! Thanks for sharing your story!

 

[candbgirl]

Cards isn’t a residency.

 

[Beat_the_odds]

Cards isn’t a residency.

I just looked at my school residency placement data and they in fact don't have a cardiology section, I just remember seeing class of 2019 during match-day someone had cardiology on their board so I figured maybe there was a direct track, you know how interventional radiology is a fellowship but it has a track that you can match directly to it that its called IR integrated vs IR independent, I figured it was something like that, but sorry for my ignorance I'm just not interested in cardiology at all so I haven't done much research or spoken to anyone about the matching process for it.

 

[rx001]

Congratulations. This proves that even with Low MCAT/GPA you can still get into MD/DO with Great ECs.

 

[Beat_the_odds]

Congratulations. This proves that even with Low MCAT/GPA you can still get into MD/DO with Great ECs.

yes, I think that as long as if one is low and the other one is high you should have a chance, in my case I had low MCAT but a high GPA, but if I would have had both low I doubt that would have worked. in my class I have people with low GPA and high MCAT, for example, I know someone with a 3.2 GPA and 512 MCAT, I would have killed to have that MCAT lol

 

[DrStephenStrange]

Congratulations. This proves that even with Low MCAT/GPA you can still get into MD/DO with Great ECs.

With that low of an MCAT your only chance is pretty much at new DO schools. US MD is pretty much out of the question unless you wanna go to a school in PR.

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[Beat_the_odds]

With that low of an MCAT your only chance is pretty much at new DO schools. US MD is pretty much out of the question unless you wanna go to a school in PR.

Sent from my SM-G973U using SDN mobile

well by the time I graduate my school will be open for about 10 years, I'm not the inaugural class thank god, I have about 7 classes in front of me, so it's not the oldest school but it's not the newest either. and I didn't apply to any USMDs, and no I didn't want to leave the united states. I'm very happy with my institution, it wasn't my number one because it's far from "home" but it has pretty solid comlex scores and I think good matching for not being 60 years old lol

 

[Kirby Smart]

well by the time I graduate my school will be open for about 10 years, I'm not the inaugural class thank god, I have about 7 classes in front of me, so it's not the oldest school but it's not the newest either. and I didn't apply to any USMDs, and no I didn't want to leave the united states. I'm very happy with my institution, it wasn't my number one because it's far from "home" but it has pretty solid comlex scores and I think good matching for not being 60 years old lol

So when you started at the school it was 6 years old, i.e. a brand new school lol

 

[Beat_the_odds]

So when you started at the school it was 6 years old, i.e. a brand new school lol

something like that not exactly the right number because I didn't give you the exact amount of years but pretty close ! very lucky that I got accepted in a BRAND NEW school and I will have ABOUT 7 classes in front of me, meaning that there will be ABOUT 2000 student around US opening doors for me, and didn't have to wait another two years to start medical school, since I would have to study more than one month for the MCAT, which was the amount of time I originally studied for and retake it, then apply again as an early applicant instead of how I originally did, If I would have had to reapply again, I would have done things right, for I'm very grateful I didn't have to, do I recommend what I did to everyone? no because this process is already stressful and it adds more stress to it. for god's sake my recommendations are Kill undergrad, get a difficult major and a high GPA to make yourself more competitive then study for about 6 months full time for MCAT and get at least a 520 and go to Harvard....