Ask DocEspana Anything

[DocEspana]

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Thanks for doing this, Doc. 🙂

My question: what should be given serious consideration (or what criteria are crucial) when deciding which school to attend after multiple acceptances? I know you kind of touched on your own reasons, but I'd love a "general guide" lol

What residencies are available at home institutions and how happy you would be coming to this school in this city every day, or at least 5 day a week, for 2+ years. Those are really the best metrics. Honestly.

there are a million other metrics, including looking at how the students match, but there are all significant flaws in that. Unless you have a program that is consistently having "sub par" matches year after year, you can only make broad assumptions of a school from a match since the match process is so unique and complicated. Even saying people got their "first choice" match is complete nonsense since my "first choice" right now is actually my 15th choice. But i didnt get an interview at 1-14. No one discusses getting their "First choice match of the places i interviewed" but that is really what they are talking about. Yet we still bandy around the idea that x many students got their first choice match. Or that we shouldnt judge the person who is doing FM in buttscratch kansas because "it was their first choice". Well among what other choices? How much choice did they have.

All of this is just to say that there are many many metrics out there. Some may appeal to you a ton. Who knows. But the ones I'd rest my bottom dollar on is "will this be a place i'll be motivated to study my ass off in" and "what resources are available in affiliated locations". I would also not give much creedence to the cost. You will get enough money to earn back whatever it costs you to get educated as long as you pass.... but.... I am a unique person in that aspect.

 

[DocEspana]

Does knowning all the muscles, ligaments, bones, insertions, actions, origins,innervations and anatomical stuff pre med school give you an advantage during the first semester?

If you really know those things.... really.... then yes.

But odds are you don't know them as well as you will need to and that advantage will be very short lived as the required knowledge will rapidly blow past what you were required to know in undergrad anatomy.

but who knows. Knowing insertions and origins is a big deal. so if you know those, then yea. You'll be set.

 

[coolingglasses]

Well the first trends, and i will repeat them are these. 1) Taken girls stay taken indefinitely. 2) Single women become a wildcard, but generally remain single. 3) All guys regardless of how they enter, either become single or totally taken within 60 days of school starting, a "dating" medical student is like a unicorn. At least for a while, things get easier in later semesters.

Remember how in college your RA/CA/upper classmen told you that "floorcest" is bad. That you really should avoid hooking up with or dating people on your floor at all costs. Yea. Still holds true. The single guys all get drunk and hook up with the single women in the class. Hook ups happen. Everyone finds out. We all gossip and ideally we all quickly forget and never talk of it again. Inter-class dating has never ended well but also occasionally happens. I always hear an anecdote of meeting in medical school and getting married, but I've never actually met a person who can actually name a couple this has happened to. (not that i doubt it, but these things are surprisingly uncommon).

Now as for dating outside of medical school. Its shockingly uncommon too, but it occurs. Its just hard. You tend to lose social skills due to the isolation of all the time spent studying with people studying the same archaiac medicine facts. Add to that how medicine is unbelievably time consuming and so is starting a relationship. Also when you go out, you tend to go out in giant packs of medical students where you are both self-contained within your pocket of friends (so the urge to find people is lower) and frakly that giant gaggle of students is intimidating to onlookers and they don't want to encroach on it, as I've been told many times by people i briefly dated haha.

Now dating is entirely possible. I've had two decently long term relationships in medical school with people I've met along the line. But both of those situations were unique because I was at a point in my education where I had a very easy month so I could actually punch out dates and not miss out on a ton of studying. Also they were both deep into my education so I was already extremely "time efficient" with my studying. The nice part of dating like this? I dont have to play games and appear busy. I really am busy and might not get back to you for a day or two just because I couldnt spare the time for a phone call and felt that sending a one sentence text would be rude, so i just waited til i had a few free minutes a day or two later. The downside of dating in medical school? Most people will think that is intriguing at first, but when they realize you will always be like that and its not 'a game' they will become very very concerned about how much time you will be able to spend with them.

Welp.

Looks like I'm really saying goodbye to undergrad

 

[411309]

If you really know those things.... really.... then yes.

But odds are you don't know them as well as you will need to and that advantage will be very short lived as the required knowledge will rapidly blow past what you were required to know in undergrad anatomy.

but who knows. Knowing insertions and origins is a big deal. so if you know those, then yea. You'll be set.

well i was an exercise science major so I was pretty into anatomy, and i bought netters flash cards this year to keep my knowledge up and i know upper body already np working on lower now and ill have them all down before med school.

whats your opinion on new schools? would you ever attend one?

 

[Darkskies]

You accept it after a while. You never stop wondering "what if". But those thoughts become less and less prevalent only showing up when you are at your most stressed.... like interview season for me. You have to look at the decisions you had to face. You had two legit options. You chose to take on less debt and move your life forwards a year faster rather than gamble on a shinier degree. Frankly I think you made the right choice, but my strong disdain for masters degrees is known.

The real question is do you think being a DO will stop you from doing what you want to do? What do you think your field that will make you happiest is. If its something mainstream, then its not an issue at all. Thats not a "DOs do primary care" thing, thats a "AOA has a crap top of these primary care fields under their umbrella" so the number of available slots (when acgme is added in) is so large that acquiring a good program is an almost certainty if you have half way decent scores.

If you want to do something competitive, its as I said before. Being a DO doesn't all all limit you. But you have to actually full on earn the qualifications then, because you wont have the "name brand school" going for you, and you won't have tons of research opportunities beating down your door. You'll need to earn the scores off of the bat, or seek out experience in the field to distinguish yourself. That's nothing unique or arduous... its just common sense. In this case I don't think DO limited you either, but it made the pressure harder if your heart is set on it.



lessened stigma? The stigma is less than you'd think. But yea, it will further lessen it just by showing that all of these programs that historically only took DOs, that accepted the huge brunt of the DO education... well nearly all of them will meet ACGME standards. Something everyone on this board always said, but we've never had to prove til now. Proving it will make those programs show they are good, and will make all the students they always trained also look just as good.

As for blending/unification... that is a LONG way off still. Decades.



I'm gonna address this very quickly on two points. One well recognized, one under-recognized. 1) there is a DO degree in other countried (Especially western europe and australia) but it is a manipulation-only degree. Their local DO degree is an offshoot of the american education and it never strove to embrace full health treatment or pharmacology. It is inherantly different, but because the degree is named the same these countries often have red tape to swap your degree to a MD-equivalent or to differentiate you from the local DOs.

2) Everyone seems to forget that the US DO degree is accepted in 40-50 counties, but the US MD degree is only accepted in 50-60 countries. Pretty much any country you could want to practice in, minus spain and france, has the same recognition for both degrees. the ~100 or so countries that dont recognize the DO degree are overwhelmingly countries that dont allow carte blanche practice rights to any american physicians regardless of degree. The MD degree is not universal.

First of all thanks for doing this and answering our barrage of questions.. Do you have a source for the fact that a US MD degree only gives you practice rights in 50-60 countries? I've had a very difficult time trying to find any official data and every search engine brings up answers from SDN where people state that the US MD degree basically is universal(without backing it up with a source). How come this information is so hard to find?

I don't even know why I'm bringing this up since there's no chance for me to do a master's now(unless I drop out of DO school and apply to a postbacc for next year which would just be a completely idiotic and insane thing to do) but could it be that the reason the master's students you've known are lacking in various aspects is because they're students doing their master's at a DO school(not trying to be offensive to anyone) and only hoping to be accepted to a DO school after having completed their program? Students at top postbaccalaureate master's programs tend to have either the same stats or more competitive stats than first year students entering DO schools..

I'm actually not sure what field I would like to pursue at this point. I don't think I would ever enjoy surgery so those fields would be out but I'm trying to keep an open mind with regards to the nonsurgical fields. I'm thinking about Anesthesia, EM, a subspecialty of Internal Medicine, Radiology, or even Psychiatry just to keep my options open. The bottom line though is that I want to be a great physician and work hard to get the best training possible and I'm wondering if that's going to be limited now that I 'gave up' and chose to go DO. I know the first step I should take is to somehow get over the bruise to my ego and remotivate myself to be enthusiastic about my degree and my future career as a physician. I don't know why I let it affect me so much...

I'm planning on doing research over the summer and I know the deadlines are in January. At my school they did a talk on research opportunities for med students over the summer but so far the only two programs I know are MSTAR(aging research at Johns Hopkins) and the programs at Memorial Sloan Kettering. Do you know where I can find out about more med student summer research opportunities? I remember hearing that there was supposed to be a website that would link you to a ton of great universities and their summer research programs for med students... Did you do any summer research? How do you go about getting research opportunities as a DO seeing as nearly every DO institution has woefully poor research opportunities/endowments?

Thanks!

 

[DocEspana]

well i was an exercise science major so I was pretty into anatomy, and i bought netters flash cards this year to keep my knowledge up and i know upper body already np working on lower now and ill have them all down before med school.

whats your opinion on new schools? would you ever attend one?

I did go to one. I am touroNYs 3rd class. Brand new schools have hiccups. Some tiny, some huge. But its not some damning thing to be a new school. But being in the first class is always problematic. Second year likely too. For touro our 4th class was really the point where they hit their stride, but the 3rd year class (mine) had it pretty good too. But there were hiccups.

 

[411309]

How much does the school contribute to the overall success of the student in your opinion? (matching, board scores, doing well in class, etc)

 

[DocEspana]

First of all thanks for doing this and answering our barrage of questions.. Do you have a source for the fact that a US MD degree only gives you practice rights in 50-60 countries? I've had a very difficult time trying to find any official data and every search engine brings up answers from SDN where people state that the US MD degree basically is universal(without backing it up with a source). How come this information is so hard to find?

No official stats. but I know from AMA stuff that MD practice rights internationally used to be a big deal they pushed for every year that has fallen to the wayside without being addressed to any real levels. I've seen the charts they have of practice zones. Its more or less the same as the DO charts. But everyone here has repeated the "MD is universal" mantra so much that it has become a false-fact. Plus who wants to relocate to africa to prove it wrong?

I don't even know why I'm bringing this up since there's no chance for me to do a master's now(unless I drop out of DO school and apply to a postbacc for next year which would just be a completely idiotic and insane thing to do) but could it be that the reason the master's students you've known are lacking in various aspects is because they're students doing their master's at a DO school(not trying to be offensive to anyone) and only hoping to be accepted to a DO school after having completed their program? Students at top postbaccalaureate master's programs tend to have either the same stats or more competitive stats than first year students entering DO schools.

I know plenty of MD masters students. They're just as stupid. and let me assure you of one thing.... idk about every program, but I know of the elite NYC schools have masters programs that are definitely NOT pulling in better scores than DO schools. I know my undergrad acquantance, who is not medicine material at all, has a 3.2 gpa and a 26 MCAT as a non-bio major and just got into columbia's program because he was an accountant for a few years and succeeded wildly at that. His own analysis of why. And its also not all master program students. but its too many for my comfort.

I'm actually not sure what field I would like to pursue at this point. I don't think I would ever enjoy surgery so those fields would be out but I'm trying to keep an open mind with regards to the nonsurgical fields. I'm thinking about Anesthesia, EM, a subspecialty of Internal Medicine, Radiology, or even Psychiatry just to keep my options open. The bottom line though is that I want to be a great physician and work hard to get the best training possible and I'm wondering if that's going to be limited now that I 'gave up' and chose to go DO. I know the first step I should take is to somehow get over the bruise to my ego and remotivate myself to be enthusiastic about my degree and my future career as a physician. I don't know why I let it affect me so much...

it shouldn't at all. Those fields have a ton of residency spots. Tons. Tons. Get your grades and it wont be an issue. As i told someone else via PM, it doesnt make a difference if you went to a DO school or a crappy MD school. If you dont have the name brand school, youre not going to get points for that, and that is about it. If you could have gone to columbia or university of chicago, then yea your fates would be different. If not? Then no... it wont functionally disadvantage you. Although you may be blocked from a few places you would be blocked from them if you went to eastern mountain state medical school or hollywood upstairs medical college as well.

I'm planning on doing research over the summer and I know the deadlines are in January. At my school they did a talk on research opportunities for med students over the summer but so far the only two programs I know are MSTAR(aging research at Johns Hopkins) and the programs at Memorial Sloan Kettering. Do you know where I can find out about more med student summer research opportunities? I remember hearing that there was supposed to be a website that would link you to a ton of great universities and their summer research programs for med students... Did you do any summer research? How do you go about getting research opportunities as a DO seeing as nearly every DO institution has woefully poor research opportunities/endowments?

Some have very rich research opportunities. MSU and UMDNJ have higher research endowments than many MD schools (UMDNJ has more research than *most* MD schools). But its hit or miss. My school has plenty of derm research everywhere for anyone who wants it. And you can swing ophtho research. But you wont find many opportunities to do ortho, anesthesia, or radiology research. Most MD schools have at least some of every type of research hanging around looking for students. With that said, research is more or less never *required*. But the harder the field is to get into, the more your scores need to be high to get around having none. Want to do IM? Get a slightly above average board score and you'll get tons of interviews without any research. Want to do EM? Having a strong board score will mean you dont need any research but average scores can be confident with some sort of research attempts in their CV (be it published or not). If you want urology you need to blow away the boards to do it without research, but plenty of people match with only slightly above average scores if they did compensate by having an amazing CV. Research is an enrichment thing. You dont need it if you have the board scores easily, but if youre a middle candidate you could benefit from it. And DO students have plenty of research (I have two research projects on my CV, one is multiple award winning research), but I *believe* from what I see that MD schools tend to have it more easily accessible and more homogenously available.

 

[DocEspana]

How much does the school contribute to the overall success of the student in your opinion? (matching, board scores, doing well in class, etc)

How does the school play into matching, boards, and doing well in class... in that order.

Slighty. You are always at an advantage if you have a home affiliated program in the field you want to be in. Outside of your home affiliations, close to no influence.

Not at all unless they provide free board review. Boards are 100% you and how dedicated you are to board review.

Only in the sense that you perform better if you enjoy where you are.

 

[DocEspana]

Hey doc,

So you took the USMLE and COMLEX right? Other than OMM, how similar were the tests? How did you prepare? Did you do individual prep for both tests or did studying for the COMLEX alone prepare you for the USMLE? Thanks!

They approach the questions differently. USMLE often gives you all the info and asks you a very difficult question that requires you to put it all together. Often these require multiple correct logical conclusions. E.G. these are the patient symptoms, what is the most likely other disease they may have. Well you were given all the symptoms of lymes disease and you need to realize that. Then you have to realize its the ixodes tick that spreads it. Then you have to realize the ixodes tick also transmits babesiosis. This was an actual USMLE I question. One of the more complex ones, you rarely have to go three steps to answer a question, but it does happen occasionally.

COMLEX often gives you all the info, and extra uneccessary info, and wants you to filter through whats important and unimportant to give them a more straight forward fact. Say they give you every symptom of lyme disease except for the rash. They also give you some non-descript symptoms that anyone can have and are there to distract you (headache, fever under 100.4) and they give you an extensive surgical history that has no relevance. Well your job is to ignore all of that and tell them that "what other finding you expect" is a bullseye rash and not some post-surgical finding, meningitis sign, or viral sign.

Generally that difference in question philosophy works out okay, but sometimes the COMLEX questions get very very strange in an attempt to confuse you and make unanswerable questions or ones with multiple right answers. Oops. The worst the USMLE gets is asking questions so difficult that almost no one knows what the right answer is, but there technically is always an answer that uses every detail together to create a best answer even if you (and all of america) have no clue how these different symptoms and clues fit together.

But generally if you study for one, you just add OMM and youve studied for both.

 

[virtuoso735]

Does what you did in undergrad matter for residency match?

 

[abolt18]

So if I'm accepted to KCUMB this week, I'll have to choose between them and NSU. As I have interpreted your previous posts, you'd choose NSU over KCUMB because of NSU's associated residencies (they have a good amount in FL), teaching hospitals, and other good rotation programs. I ask because it'll save me a LOT of money (like 80K by the end of it) to go to KCUMB and I really loved it there and felt more comfortable in my skin, while being at NSU I was just like "meh" the whole time. I've got a wife and kid so living in FL would be fun but expensive, and much more expensive to visit family in the West.

Basically I'm asking, where would you prioritize these factors and make your final decision? As I see it,
NSU=more opportunities for success in different fields but much more money overall.
KCUMB=I'd probably be happier at least for years 1-2 and save a LOT more $$$.

HOW TO CHOOSE?!?!

 

[DocEspana]

Does what you did in undergrad matter for residency match?

Not really unless you did something absolutely impressive in undergrad like be published by a major medical journal or were a pharmacy rep part time in undergrad.

So if I'm accepted to KCUMB this week, I'll have to choose between them and NSU. As I have interpreted your previous posts, you'd choose NSU over KCUMB because of NSU's associated residencies (they have a good amount in FL), teaching hospitals, and other good rotation programs. I ask because it'll save me a LOT of money (like 80K by the end of it) to go to KCUMB and I really loved it there and felt more comfortable in my skin, while being at NSU I was just like "meh" the whole time. I've got a wife and kid so living in FL would be fun but expensive, and much more expensive to visit family in the West.

Basically I'm asking, where would you prioritize these factors and make your final decision? As I see it,
NSU=more opportunities for success in different fields but much more money overall.
KCUMB=I'd probably be happier at least for years 1-2 and save a LOT more $$$.

HOW TO CHOOSE?!?!

See the bolded part. Done deal go there. You will never take advantage of the opportunities available to you if you don't feel at your most comfortable and happy. Sometimes I shake my head when i hear someone turned down MSU or Nova for pikeville because "it just felt better" but I can't be a hypocrite when I tell everyone that your comfort is one of the best metrics of how well you will perform and utilize the resources available to you. Haha, though im tempted to argue that in certain cases getting everything out of one school might still not be as much as some of the resources of a really resource rich school

Nw with that said, go to KCUMB every single time. Its a pretty damn good school too and you like it. Seems easy to me.

 

[Darkskies]

I know plenty of MD masters students. They're just as stupid. and let me assure you of one thing.... idk about every program, but I know of the elite NYC schools have masters programs that are definitely NOT pulling in better scores than DO schools. I know my undergrad acquantance, who is not medicine material at all, has a 3.2 gpa and a 26 MCAT as a non-bio major and just got into columbia's program because he was an accountant for a few years and succeeded wildly at that. His own analysis of why. And its also not all master program students. but its too many for my comfort.



it shouldn't at all. Those fields have a ton of residency spots. Tons. Tons. Get your grades and it wont be an issue. As i told someone else via PM, it doesnt make a difference if you went to a DO school or a crappy MD school. If you dont have the name brand school, youre not going to get points for that, and that is about it. If you could have gone to columbia or university of chicago, then yea your fates would be different. If not? Then no... it wont functionally disadvantage you. Although you may be blocked from a few places you would be blocked from them if you went to eastern mountain state medical school or hollywood upstairs medical college as well.



Some have very rich research opportunities. MSU and UMDNJ have higher research endowments than many MD schools (UMDNJ has more research than *most* MD schools). But its hit or miss. My school has plenty of derm research everywhere for anyone who wants it. And you can swing ophtho research. But you wont find many opportunities to do ortho, anesthesia, or radiology research. Most MD schools have at least some of every type of research hanging around looking for students. With that said, research is more or less never *required*. But the harder the field is to get into, the more your scores need to be high to get around having none. Want to do IM? Get a slightly above average board score and you'll get tons of interviews without any research. Want to do EM? Having a strong board score will mean you dont need any research but average scores can be confident with some sort of research attempts in their CV (be it published or not). If you want urology you need to blow away the boards to do it without research, but plenty of people match with only slightly above average scores if they did compensate by having an amazing CV. Research is an enrichment thing. You dont need it if you have the board scores easily, but if youre a middle candidate you could benefit from it. And DO students have plenty of research (I have two research projects on my CV, one is multiple award winning research), but I *believe* from what I see that MD schools tend to have it more easily accessible and more homogenously available.

I'm actually at UMDNJ. Where did you hear that UMDNJSOM has higher research endowments than many MD schools? A 4th year here told me that the family medicine faculty are generally open to accepting med students in their research projects but in general the school itself doesn't have a ton of opportunities. I think UMDNJSOM gets a little less than 3 million dollars of NIH funding which is still more than every DO school except for MSU and TCOM but even then that's not very much since even the most bottom ranked clinically focused MD schools get at least 20 million in research funding. I think I would have to go to a big research institution over the summer to get anything substantial done especially since the faculty haven't really been open about any research opportunities here.

How did you go about getting a research opportunity for the summer between first and second year? Did you try to aim for research in Urology? I know that if I do well I should be able to match somewhere decent in the specialties I mentioned(except for maybe radiology) but I want to pursue research since to get into the top programs in any specialty having research helps a lot. Plus I'm not sure yet what I would like to pursue so it would be unfortunate if I ended up liking something much more competitive and I lacked research and other ECs when the time comes. Besides research might even be fun..😎

Also I agree with your sentiment that the great majority of both MD and DO affiliated master's programs aren't very competitive to get into. However,these programs also do not have a good track record with getting their students into an MD school. Programs like Eastern Virginia Medical School's Med Master's, University of Cincinnati's Master's in physiology, Tulane's ACP, and Temple's ACMS(if they accept you you just have to maintain a 3.5 GPA and have a 30 MCAT and you're in the next year at Temple med no questions asked) have about a 70-95% chance that you'll get into an MD program after completion(usually the affiliated MD school). Sorry, I keep bringing this up since it's a moot point now that I'm at a DO school. Like you said at least I saved a year and avoided being strapped with another 50k of debt(or MUCH more since EVMS would charge me OOS tuition for all 4 years of med school).

Also I was under the impression that apart from Howard/Meharry or some regionally focused medical schools even the 'easy' MD schools have average stats(3.65, 30) that are much more competitive than the best DO schools. I also thought that PDs were less biased against ANY US MD graduate since you see a decent number of students matching Ortho, Neurosurgery, ENT, Urology, and Derm from schools like Eastern Virginia Medical School or Ohio State University..

 

[abolt18]

Not really unless you did something absolutely impressive in undergrad like be published by a major medical journal or were a pharmacy rep part time in undergrad.



See the bolded part. Done deal go there. You will never take advantage of the opportunities available to you if you don't feel at your most comfortable and happy. Sometimes I shake my head when i hear someone turned down MSU or Nova for pikeville because "it just felt better" but I can't be a hypocrite when I tell everyone that your comfort is one of the best metrics of how well you will perform and utilize the resources available to you. Haha, though im tempted to argue that in certain cases getting everything out of one school might still not be as much as some of the resources of a really resource rich school

Nw with that said, go to KCUMB every single time. Its a pretty damn good school too and you like it. Seems easy to me.

Thanks a lot. I appreciate the opinion. This is pretty much how I felt but I kept asking myself if the opportunities at NSU were enough (or should be enough) to make me choose it over KCUMB. Too bad this is all theoretical and I won't know if I'm accepted to KCUMB until this weekend or next. Again thanks for taking the time. It's always nice to hear people's opinions when they can present them in a mature and respectful manner, and even though you have your own bias, you acknowledge it and warn people that it is only your own opinion.

 

[DocEspana]

I'm actually at UMDNJ. Where did you hear that UMDNJSOM has higher research endowments than many MD schools? A 4th year here told me that the family medicine faculty are generally open to accepting med students in their research projects but in general the school itself doesn't have a ton of opportunities. I think UMDNJSOM gets a little less than 3 million dollars of NIH funding which is still more than every DO school except for MSU and TCOM but even then that's not very much since even the most bottom ranked clinically focused MD schools get at least 20 million in research funding. I think I would have to go to a big research institution over the summer to get anything substantial done especially since the faculty haven't really been open about any research opportunities here.

How did you go about getting a research opportunity for the summer between first and second year? Did you try to aim for research in Urology? I know that if I do well I should be able to match somewhere decent in the specialties I mentioned(except for maybe radiology) but I want to pursue research since to get into the top programs in any specialty having research helps a lot. Plus I'm not sure yet what I would like to pursue so it would be unfortunate if I ended up liking something much more competitive and I lacked research and other ECs when the time comes. Besides research might even be fun..😎

Also I agree with your sentiment that the great majority of both MD and DO affiliated master's programs aren't very competitive to get into. However,these programs also do not have a good track record with getting their students into an MD school. Programs like Eastern Virginia Medical School's Med Master's, University of Cincinnati's Master's in physiology, Tulane's ACP, and Temple's ACMS(if they accept you you just have to maintain a 3.5 GPA and have a 30 MCAT and you're in the next year at Temple med no questions asked) have about a 70-95% chance that you'll get into an MD program after completion(usually the affiliated MD school). Sorry, I keep bringing this up since it's a moot point now that I'm at a DO school. Like you said at least I saved a year and avoided being strapped with another 50k of debt(or MUCH more since EVMS would charge me OOS tuition for all 4 years of med school).

Also I was under the impression that apart from Howard/Meharry or some regionally focused medical schools even the 'easy' MD schools have average stats(3.65, 30) that are much more competitive than the best DO schools. I also thought that PDs were less biased against ANY US MD graduate since you see a decent number of students matching Ortho, Neurosurgery, ENT, Urology, and Derm from schools like Eastern Virginia Medical School or Ohio State University..

Their NIH research endowment is roughly at the 50th percentile of all medical schools. Perhaps the numbers I'm looking at are averaged over the three schools? I guess we shall know better once its rowan's DO school.

research fell in my lap. I did it through connections i made in the AMA. It just was a natural outcome of talking to enough students and physicians before a very desirable project fell in my lab and I was offered the funding to do it in the summer between 2nd and 3rd year.

You forget that you see decent number of students matching into those same fields from DO schools. Remember DO schools are 1/5 the student volume as MD schools. We don't make up 1/5 of the population in any of these fields, we generally make up 2-10%, usually around 5%, in these highly competitive ACGME programs (possibly with AOA added in we may hit 20% of the total population but i know we definitely dont in urology. Its entirely possible in ortho where we have a ton of spots). But pick a school (preferably not RVU or pikesville, I believe they generally dont match well) and look at their matches. You'll get your handful of ortho, derm (often listed as IM/FM since these programs are integrated in the DO world), and urology at each school. Maybe only 1 urology, but thats because urology spots < DO schools.

Are their students from, say, meharry going to a school no DO has gone to. yea. Probably two or so of those per class. Yea. But usually they are going to the same exact places we are in the ACGME world from top to bottom of their match. Don't forget there are programs that won't look at you because youre a DO. They're not common. But since these low end MD schools are MD schools they will technically be looked at and do have that highly unlikely chance that they blow it away at the interview. Its not something that happens so much that I figured it was worth a distinct mention that would detract from the 98% overlap that does exist between DO and low end MD that upholds my simplified way of understanding a realistic "do vs md" matching outcome.

 

[Postictal Raiden]

I have read posts in the residency forum section that to have a solid shot at any of the competitive specialties (Uro,ent, RadOnc, Derm, and the integrated plastic, vascular, and CT) one MUST have some research experience. You have mentioned that despite the reduced accessiblity in DO schools, research is still an option.

How does one get involved in research? and When does it usually take place?

What if the school doesn't offer research opportunities in certain fields? let's say someone is dead set on ENT, and the school he/she attends a school that doesn't have an ENT program, what can he/she do to get involved in an ENT-related research?

Are your research experiences related to Urology?

Also, as a future urologist, what is your take on male circumcision?

 

[ValentineLissar]

Is it common knowledge which institutions are DO-unfriendly or did you learn from speaking to residents/classmates?

 

[phikapdoctor]

Thanks for all the awesome responses, I will definitely favorite this thread.
What are some of the worst things about going to an osteopathic school, and the best things about osteopathic school?

 

[DocEspana]

I have read posts in the residency forum section that to have a solid shot at any of the competitive specialties (Uro,ent, RadOnc, Derm, and the integrated plastic, vascular, and CT) one MUST have some research experience. You have mentioned that despite the reduced accessiblity in DO schools, research is still an option.

and that is absolutely 100% wrong. The ACGME, AMA, and the AOA both release info that show you that many of these residents in these fields do have zero research, And many have inhumanly large research portfolios. I was reading the other day about some of the AOA matches (havent read the AMAs one in a while) and one of the comeptitive fields in 2010 or 2011 (its the new analysis just released recently) had an average research rate of 1.8 research per student, and 0.8 published per student, with a high of 22 published documents and a low of zero published zero non-published. And with a total resident count of like 40. Analyzing that almost garuntees that there are plenty with zero research. Those are the exact numbers, but they arent exaggerations either. and for that matter I know urology residents with zero research experience in AUA programs right now. Guys are brilliant, but never had an interest in research and figured they'd just do some when they are residents. And told the programs that.

You definitely do need something to compensate for not having research. Blowing the boards of the water can be it. Being a national leader of a prominent organization could be it.

[quote[How does one get involved in research? and When does it usually take place?[/quote]

Well three ways usually. 1) falls into your lap. Most people find research because they have a professor who is really passionate and asks for volunteers to do research with them. This is the kind of research that I feel MD schools have oodles of and DO schools just dont have except in isolated situations. This tends to get done during breaks in schooling. 2) You seek it out. There are websites (I dont know which ones though) where you can seek out research. These are pretty much always done during breaks in school. 3) falls into your lap version 2.0. You're talking with a resident about a case and you both realize how incredibly rare the pathology is. Or you're talking with a fellow student or attending and you ask a question no one has an answer to. You check pubmed and, honest to goodness, no one has an answer to it. So you suddenly have a golden nugget of research because you have an unsanswered question or a rare pathology. This is the kind of research that you start work on immediately. I had this happen twice. I had a medical education question that no one had an answer to, so myself and another student convinced the state medical society to fund our inquiry into it. Secondarily I was discussing a rare pathology and it turns out that the disease I witnessed had only ever been documented ~50 times in history. So I wrote it up.

What if the school doesn't offer research opportunities in certain fields? let's say someone is dead set on ENT, and the school he/she attends a school that doesn't have an ENT program, what can he/she do to get involved in an ENT-related research?

Then you have to seek out your research opportunities or hope some fall into your lap on your electives there.

Are your research experiences related to Urology?

One is, one isnt.

Also, as a future urologist, what is your take on male circumcision?

I have a crew neck shirt. Any future sons I have will probably have turtlenecks unless something dramatically new is found in the literature. The fact of the matter is that circumcision research is almost entirely biased one way or another. Both by researchers who develop studies so poorly designed you begin to seriously be concerned that they rigged the study to get a result, and by physicians (including urologists) who seem incapable of reading research and not seeing the same conclusions either way. I've had a doctor read a paper on how it prevents penile carcinoma and then a paper on how the rate of surgical deformities from it are rising in the last 10 years and come to the conclusion that both were pro-circumcision (not. making. that. up.)

Honestly. It prevents penile carcinoma. It does. Cuts the rate down to almost zero. But the rate among non-circumcised americans is almost zero as well. Circumcision only actually "prevents" penile carcinoma in areas of the world where it occurs. Penile carcinoma is one of those super zebras in a person from the western hemisphere no matter what their circ status is. Additionally circumcision lowers your odds of getting HIV from heterosexual sex. Except the odds of getting HIV from a penile-vaginal coitus are so extremely low (for the male at least) that the difference in contraction rate is not clinically relevant despite being a statistically significant value. You'll learn about statistical significance versus patient outcome based research in med school I hope and pray. And circumcision has no effect on the rate of contraction in anal penetrative sex.

I think all of the research on sexual experience is awash because there is no good way to measure sensation and both sides have people who argue it was better before or after circumcision. As for aesthetics, the rest of the world would think we are crazy for thinking circumcised penis looks more normal. We think they're crazy for thinking otherwise. Aesthetics change as the majority of penises changes over time.

I think its an unnecessary surgery, but i wont discourage people from getting it electively, and it clearly is necessary in certain medical situations.

 

[DocEspana]

Is it common knowledge which institutions are DO-unfriendly or did you learn from speaking to residents/classmates?

learned from classmates. You'd be surprised how many world famous places are very very DO friendly. The unfriendly ones are institution or program specific.

 

[DocEspana]

Thanks for all the awesome responses, I will definitely favorite this thread.
What are some of the worst things about going to an osteopathic school, and the best things about osteopathic school?

Worst thing. OMM
Best thing. OMM

Its all in what you make of it. You will hate going and studying for the class. You will enjoy going to labs and being able to actually use it on your family and friends day 1.

Generally speaking I dont feel there are too many bad things to being a DO except for the occasional acute bouts of inferiority/napoleonic complex you see in first years a lot.

 

[DocEspana]

Lets also make it clear. Doc Espana is not an expert on anything except for being Doc Espana and in knowing way too many people with better knowledge of issues than he has without them. I read a ton of stats and love medical education, and so I am highly familiar with many stats that people do not commonly know... but i am not an expert. I can be wrong. I can have outdated info. I can misremember things. I pre-apologize if I make any incorrect statements or mischaracterize things based on bias of how i'm collecting data.

If something I say is the million dollar question on who wants to be a millionaire, for the love of god, take a 50:50 or poll the audience.

 

[MusicJunkie]

How do you study effectively as a med school student?

 

[DocEspana]

How do you study effectively as a med school student?

It will come naturally as the pressure rises.... you'll just find your way to become a zen studying machine. And once you unlock it, its like riding a bike. You can meander and do lazy studying whenever you want. But at a whim you can turn it on and power study too.

clinical years are a bit easier, so I tend to power study to get my daily education reading in, and then enjoy more free time than I had in the pre-clinicals.

 

[DocEspana]

I can't help myself. I have to revel in my own nerdiness.

Q: DocE what was your halloween costume this year?

A: answer. Frank Netter's Atlas.

 

[TheTasMan]

What are the top 3 most common urological procedures?

What are the top 3 most profitable or top grossing urological procedures?

Does size matter?

Some dickhead on here keeps asking if 3.0 GPA and 20 MCAT is good enough for DO schools. Is that true?

Why are they still dicking around with circumcision? Is it good or bad?

 

[DocEspana]

What are the top 3 most common urological procedures?

Stones, stones and stones. (lithotripsy, removal, and general cystoscopy). But there are urologists who never do stones and then it gets really interesting since they are basically masters of every surgery involving the renal, male reproductive, or urinary system.

What are the top 3 most profitable or top grossing urological procedures?

No clue. But per procedure, probably three different reconstructive surgeries.

Does size matter?

Technique matters. Unless your 3 inches or less, then yea, size mattered for you.

Some dickhead on here keeps asking if 3.0 GPA and 20 MCAT is good enough for DO schools. Is that true?

Answer #1: Shut up voice in my head!

Answer #2: Probably in 1897.

Why are they still dicking around with circumcision? Is it good or bad?

It has questionable merits. Also it is a required surgery in certain conditions. But mostly because people want to look like their fathers and circumcision is a required part of jewish and muslim faiths and a random cultural thing in 1950s america. So now there are a lot of fathers with shorn foreskins.

 

[Mosonik]

Just to the questions concerning research, board scores and matching for AOA, they recently published the data from 2011 and it's in a free pdf if you release some basic info to them. Has great
graphs and all the facts are straight forward, I highly recommend it for curious or educated minds.
http://www.aacom.org/data/Pages/default.aspx (Osteopathic GME Match Report 2011)

This should take the guess work out of it. Anyway, please continue, I am thoroughly enjoying this thread. Thanks Doc Espana!!

 

[abolt18]

Just to the questions concerning research, board scores and matching for AOA, they recently published the data from 2011 and it's in a free pdf if you release some basic info to them. Has great
graphs and all the facts are straight forward, I highly recommend it for curious or educated minds.
http://www.aacom.org/data/Pages/default.aspx (Osteopathic GME Match Report 2011)

This should take the guess work out of it. Anyway, please continue, I am thoroughly enjoying this thread. Thanks Doc Espana!!

What a nice little gem. Thanks for that! I'm curious how this will be affected with the up and coming changes.

 

[SpecterGT260]

I know I've ignored this specific forum for others lately, so I figured I would give back to all of the pre-DOs (and regular DO students) on here. Feel free to ask me anything, both professional and silly. The only caveat I give is that I am currently a bit outside of the Hurricane path and about to go to sleep. So if I don't come back tomorrow, its because the power went overnight. But barring power outage, I will answer every single question posed no matter the topic (unless its completely inappropriate).

Some facts on me so you can have starting points.

- Fourth year student at TouroCOM-NY

- Pre-DO admission stats: 3.2, 34T MCAT, mid-level public school. Interviewed at most DO schools and a crap ton of MD schools.

- Current interests: Urologic Surgery, Emergency Medicine

- Past Interests: Plastics, General Surgery, Ophthalmology

- Currently a Delegate to the AMA House of Delegates as well as a crap ton of positions in the AMA student section, AMA full section, and the Medical Society of the State of NY (Both student and full). My friends and connections in this area have been especially useful as I personally know (And sometimes hang out with) the big movers and shakers in medical-legal matters.

- I also play werewolf on this website WAY WAY WAY too damn much.

- Used to be a stand up comedian, in an improvisational comedy troupe, and was a professional radio DJ for 2.5 years at an indie station.

So ask away. Hopefully I can be of use to some people, and entertainment to others. If this thread totally bombs, I won't be surprised nor will I feel bad. But I figure I should give you guys some more attention and this is the simplest way to go about it. My apologies if its a little narcissistic to assume you want to ask me questions, but I will guarantee to be interesting.

wtf is werewolf?
Is it that weird thing the pre-vet board does all the time? 😕

 

[DocEspana]

wtf is werewolf?
Is it that weird thing the pre-vet board does all the time? 😕

Lounge did it first.... thus the name change to the wolves den. The pre-vet has really picked it up as an addiction though.

Basically it is a game of deception that has actually increased in complexity with the advent of online play despite the fact that it was originally a game in reading people's facial expression and body language for lies. Basic premise is a big group of people are all villagers and a smaller subset of them are wolves. The villagers have no clue who anyone is and the wolves all know who each other are. Each round everyone votes to kill people and the wolves have free reign to pick off an additional person each night. It goes til all the wolves are killed or until the wolves > or = villagers since they can openly outvote them on a day round at that point. We add a million more complex secondary roles to it to make it crazier.

 

[SpecterGT260]

Lounge did it first.... thus the name change to the wolves den. The pre-vet has really picked it up as an addiction though.

Basically it is a game of deception that has actually increased in complexity with the advent of online play despite the fact that it was originally a game in reading people's facial expression and body language for lies. Basic premise is a big group of people are all villagers and a smaller subset of them are wolves. The villagers have no clue who anyone is and the wolves all know who each other are. Each round everyone votes to kill people and the wolves have free reign to pick off an additional person each night. It goes til all the wolves are killed or until the wolves > or = villagers since they can openly outvote them on a day round at that point. We add a million more complex secondary roles to it to make it crazier.

which is why they seem to be movie themed now.... well, now I know

 

[docmayer]

How much is rent? I just finished my Touro secondary and am mailing this puppy away tomorrow but the COL has me a little worried. However the more I think about it, the more I think it isn't really that bad. I mean, so what if rent is 600+/month MORE compared to a school in a rural area. That is 7200/year, which really isnt that much in the grand scheme of things... is there something I am missing?

 

[DocEspana]

I pulled off 800 per month for a midtown apartment. 2BR shared with one guy (So 1600 total for us). No one will ever get a rent as nice as I found, but you can pull 950 rents in nice areas if you look hard enough and have friends who will split a multi bedroom place with you.

Also did 1050 for a huge one bedroom in brooklyn when i lived there and am doing 700 for a big apartment in Jersey City right now.

 

[TheTasMan]

How do people haul groceries around in NYC? Say a sack of potatoes, a gallon of milk, a half-gallon of ice cream, a twelve-pack of beer, two wine bottles, five steaks, a couple of chickens, five bags of chips, two boxes of cereal, a dozen eggs, and a box of condoms.

Have you ever dropped a bowling ball from a tall building?

 

[deleted103644]

How do people haul groceries around in NYC? Say a sack of potatoes, a gallon of milk, a half-gallon of ice cream, a twelve-pack of beer, two wine bottles, five steaks, a couple of chickens, five bags of chips, two boxes of cereal, a dozen eggs, and a box of condoms.

Let me handle this one...

Fresh Direct.

Have you ever dropped a bowling ball from a tall building?

Nope, but I've dropped a Nalgene - didn't break.

 

[SpecterGT260]

Let me handle this one...

Fresh Direct.



Nope, but I've dropped a Nalgene - didn't break.

What would happen if you fired a Nokia at a nalgene?

 

[coolingglasses]

How do people haul groceries around in NYC? Say a sack of potatoes, a gallon of milk, a half-gallon of ice cream, a twelve-pack of beer, two wine bottles, five steaks, a couple of chickens, five bags of chips, two boxes of cereal, a dozen eggs, and a box of condoms.

Have you ever dropped a bowling ball from a tall building?

I used to do this on a bicycle... although the prospect of riding in NYC scares the **** out of me lol

 

[deleted103644]

What would happen if you fired a Nokia at a nalgene?

Nokia? What's that? Is it an iPhone app?

 

[SpecterGT260]

Nokia? What's that? Is it an iPhone app?

Kinda.... only except no

 

[deleted103644]

I used to do this on a bicycle... although the prospect of riding in NYC scares the **** out of me lol

It's actually pretty bike friendly and getting friendlier.

Bloomberg has been adding bike lanes everywhere.

 

[Dirtyshadow]

I am eyeballing a competitive surgical specialty (Ortho) and have DMU and CCOM to choose from. I am from Illinois, so I am looking at CCOM more seriously. I noticed that CCOM also has an Ortho residency nearby. Do you think this would be very beneficial? I have heard that to get into the current competitive AOA residencies, one must rotated there to even get an interview. If this is true, do you think this will keep the MD students out after the merge? Also, do you think these 2 schools have any real name recognition in ACGME programs (like ortho) or is it just like..."oh another DO, LuLZ"?

 

[Postictal Raiden]

Perhaps your knowledge on the subject is limited to what you have experienced from shadowing but I will ask any ways:

Despite the great variability, how would you describe a typical week of a urologist? (clinic:OR ratio, number of OR procedures/week, number of patients/day, frequency of elective surgeries, male:female patients ratio, volume of calls, etc..)

How healthy are urology patients compared to those of GS/ENT/NSG/Ortho?

Does turf war exist in the field?

 

[TXKnight]

Man I've been reading your posts since I joined SDN. I've always enjoyed them. I like stats and informed decisions too. And futbol. Best luck in whatever you do!

 

[ValentineLissar]

Did you ever find yourself at certain core rotation sites that had a lot of SCUT work?

If you did, how did you protect yourself from it or what did you do to make those rotations meaningful learning experiences?


Thanks a lot for continuing to answer all of our questions!

 

[DocEspana]

Perhaps your knowledge on the subject is limited to what you have experienced from shadowing but I will ask any ways:

Despite the great variability, how would you describe a typical week of a urologist? (clinic:OR ratio, number of OR procedures/week, number of patients/day, frequency of elective surgeries, male:female patients ratio, volume of calls, etc..)

It varies immensely, but generally speaking unless you are purposely trying to have a crazy week... urologist work a few days a week (4?) and have pretty regular hours with the occaisional day that goes super late. But thats because sometimes surgeries become super complicated.

As for breakdown of procedures. The AUA stated that only 10% of urologists have done a major surgery in the last 6 (or was it 12) months. But hose 10% do a ton. Most urologists do office work and procedures (OR or in office) without the major open or laproscopic surgeries. Just the office surgeries of all kinds and OR cystoscopy.

How healthy are urology patients compared to those of GS/ENT/NSG/Ortho?

Well men who have trouble peeing are usually older and older people are usually sicker. But I would say that them and ENT have the healthiest patients becuase most of the patients are either kids with some sort of urologic issue (rarely serious, though sometimes complicated) or people in their 40s to 60s. Overwhelmingly people in their 40s and 60s. Because after 70 treating prostate or bladder cancer is usually pointless, doesnt extend life expectancy so we dont do them as often as in younger people. And prior to that age people are healthy enough to walk out of most surgeries same day or next day

Does turf war exist in the field?

I've seen one in philly. but generally it seems like a field with more than enough patients for any doctors to join just about anywhere.

 

[DocEspana]

Did you ever find yourself at certain core rotation sites that had a lot of SCUT work?

If you did, how did you protect yourself from it or what did you do to make those rotations meaningful learning experiences?


Thanks a lot for continuing to answer all of our questions!

Honestly no. But I also think that grabbing things for my resident, even innane things like a coffee or some equipment is something polite i should do just as a respect of the heirarchy of it all. And the "scut" work that has even the slightest merit, i love doing. Send me out to do a million suture repairs. Have me change everyone's foley. I'll draw blood for labs on the entire floor. Writing notes makes me better at doing more quicker.

I dont believe scut work exists. Everything has a purpose to train you, and the few thins that serve no purpose are generally "helpful" things that you can and should do for your residents as favors for all the education they stop to give you.

 

[TriagePreMed]

Did you try putting the ñ before you made your screenname?

 

[TheTasMan]

As a future urologist, what would you say to a med school professor who is a dick?

Should the AOA be overthrown? Or would it be against some kind of Smith Act?