As a rising P2 in pharmacy school and top 10% of my class right now, I don't find much interest in the field. My concern is that I was accepted with a 2.6 gpa & 99% PCAT (clearly I wasn't as focused in college but I was able to do really well on my PCAT)
Is it possible to gain admission into medical school while pursuing P2? I would like to continue my pharmacy school education until I have an acceptance from a med school; I have to take the MCAT but given I score above 505, do I have a solid chance of getting in somewhere?
Hey man I definitely think anyone has a chance if he knows what he needs to do.
In your situation it is definitely tricky, b/c as you state, you are a P2 (In I assume a 4 year pharmacy program? or 3 year) and you had a 2.6 gpa. Is that 2.6 an overall or science gpa? Congrats on the 99% PCAT.
The thing is that the average accepted gpa is around 3.4-3.6 for overall and science, might be 3.7 for more competitive DO schools. Definitely need to beef up those stats. A 1-2 post bacc of taking upper level biology and biomedical courses would do that. I wouldn't really recommend upper level chem and physics courses as you don't really take those in medical school. The closest you'll ever come to a hard chem/physics course is biochemistry, basic biomedical engineering, and thats if the later is even offered.
As for your history.. I mean if you are in a pharmacy program... I strongly suggest you to finish that program first, because you probably took out loans and stuff. But you say you don't find much interest in your field... not trying to offend you, but you really discover more about the field once your practicing, if you didn't find interest in it.. why did you apply in the first place? Is that the only program that admitted you, because pharmacy schools tend to admit almost everyone since they really care about $ and not about job prospects post pharmacy school. Again not trying to offend you, but these are serious questions.
So basically you need to increase that gpa to at least a 3.3 imo to have a solid (not great) but solid chance... Ace that MCAT, doing the best and work on those extracurriculars like DO shadowing, volunteering, research if possible, community activities, and some extracurrics to beef up that app, but don't go overboard. 4-5 solid activities are good.
Another option is to do a special masters or post bacc in a school with a linkage to a DO program.
But again, as someone who did something similar to you, as in 'switching professions,' but different because I got into medical school right after I got my bachelors, its tricky because you want to switch now. I mean you either finish your Pharm D or you leave it... I mean if you leave the pharm D profession, are you 110% sure you will get into DO school???
If you want to stay in Pharm D school and want to do DO, your going to have to start preparing for DO admissions now, but that means taking time away from your current studies... Pharm D school is no joke, as you probably know more than me, its tough, and probably a tad bit less than medical school but its still tough, leaving you with less time to prepare for the DO application cycle.
Imo, finish the program... THEN, work as a pharmacist while preparing for the MCAT and some DO related stuff, that way, God forbid your DO goal doesn't work out, hey you have a decent and respectable job to go back to and you'll have a good background when applying for DO school. DO Adcoms love people who had previous careers i.e: nursing, pharmacy, PA, biology research, EMT, etc.
.. Leaving the pharm d program is a very risky thing and ADCOMs would be hesitant if you left it to pursue DO.
Good luck.
