Bioinformatics MS vs SMP?

[striveth]

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I have always been very fascinated with statistics, its one of the few subjects that I am really enjoy and am naturally good at. I don't know much programming, but I have always had a good grasp on how to figure things out. Learned html fairly quickly in highschool as well as the artistic side of things (photoshop), flash ect.

I know c++ and R may be considered a new beast to ride, im quite confident I could learn quickly.

I am still an undergrad, majoring in chemistry/ environmental science. I might switch to just major in chem/bio, since I'm almost done with the prereqs for medschool.

Im in boston currently, I am debating wether or not I should try to pursue a masters in bioinformatics before applying to medschool. Would it take considerably longer than an SMP and is there a disadvantage? I am nontrad so would be doing so to boost my credentials (poor past GPA, but im kicking butt now!). I have 2 more years to go.

I'm thinking I might try to get involved first at the chemistry department at my school and somehow try to incorporate some statistical analysis project with my professor if things work out.

 

[DrMidlife]

Mastery of stats: generally useful in medicine

Mastery of programming: generally useless in medicine, except as a hobby or side gig

C++: something you won't see or have time to learn in a 2 year grad program, nor will any programming done in school qualify you to write production code in the real world. By contrast, R is not used to make production code, and it can be learned in grad school.

Interest in biostats: not interesting for med school admissions unless it's your answer to "what would you do if you couldn't be a doctor?"

SMP; usually one year, has no purpose other than getting low GPA premeds into med school

People who think an SMP looks good on a resume or can help you in a non-doctor/non-dentist career: largely delusional

MS in biostats: A good thing to do if you want to work in biostats. A useless thing to do if your GPA is too low to get into med school. A reasonable thing to do if you want to explore options other than medicine. A dumb thing to do if you want to get into med school sooner rather than later.

Cumulative GPA: what counts most in med school admissions. Your old bad grades are more permanent than a tattoo, except for DO schools, and even DO schools make you list every course you ever took. Your current work helps build your story, but you never get to write off the damage. So use that ability to figure things out to build yourself a good spreadsheet to show where your true cumulative GPA is, and plan accordingly.

Best of luck to you.

 

[deleted248403]

SMP; usually one year, has no purpose other than getting low GPA premeds into med school

People who think an SMP looks good on a resume or can help you in a non-doctor/non-dentist career: largely delusional

Agree with all apart from these two - and I think you were a bit OTT in most of these specific comments. Count me as delusional.

A masters is still a masters and offers a leg up over a bachelors candidate for a job given the difficulty for bachelor grads getting a job.

Will it land you a super awesome job just because of the SMP? Prob not. Will it help? Definitely

Cumulative GPA: what counts most in med school admissions. Your old bad grades are more permanent than a tattoo, except for DO schools, and even DO schools make you list every course you ever took. Your current work helps build your story, but you never get to write off the damage. So use that ability to figure things out to build yourself a good spreadsheet to show where your true cumulative GPA is, and plan accordingly.

Agreed.

Biostats is pretty useless for med school admissions process - if you have the cGPA, the sGPA, the MCAT and you wanna take a year or two to do something you are interested then go for it (MPH falls into the same category). Just don't expect it to have huge impact on your app other than a cool EC.
It is not a GPA repair/boasting situation

 

[striveth]

Mastery of stats: build yourself a good spreadsheet to show where your true cumulative GPA is, and plan accordingly.

Best of luck to you.

Yea I have done this, my cGPA (2.9 atm) is very low. I will undoubtedly need an SMP if I want to go MD, I have been getting almost strait A's for the past year and have 2 more years of strait A's left (optimistic). Even then my cGPA will be low at 3.2/3.3. Otherwise I will be fine for DO w/ the grade replacements I intend to do.

I guess I should probably aim for an SMP after my first cycle if no success. Thanks for the input.

Since R seems easier to learn, I might just try to keep that as a hobby. Who knows it may come in handy for research when I'm a doctor.

 

[deleted248403]

I guess I should probably aim for an SMP after my first cycle if no success. Thanks for the input.

U should just do an SMP - don't bother applying to med school

 

[striveth]

Yea, after reading a lot of posts on this forums about the SMP, It really seems that it truly fits my situation . Plus I would then have a shot at MD.