Did I make a mistake by choosing the BS/MD route?

[unsur3]

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[circulus vitios]

Uh, Albany is a great school.

http://www.amc.edu/Academic/Undergraduate/MatchResults.cfm

I paged through their match list and I saw a decent amount of ortho, ophtho, and urology matches.

 

[solitarius]

Don't worry. It'll be okay.

 

[Aerus]

I've been reading these boards for some time now and I've come to the realization that for competitive specialties, the tier of the medical school you attend does indeed make a difference, contrary to what I was told back in high school. I'm currently a BS/MD student in a joint program with Albany Medical College. The program does not let you apply out without giving up your seat to AMC, so I never thought of beefing up my resume much or studying for the MCATs because I didn't even consider that possibility. Plus, I never really considered the name of the medical school to be much of a factor. However, I am not interested in becoming a family practitioner or internist; I want to go into surgery. I really want to do orthopaedic surgery, but am now doubting my chances of landing a residency in this field since AMC is not very highly ranked. I've looked at match lists for the past few years at AMC and it seems only a few go into it. While I consider myself to be a fairly strong student, I don't think I will be in the top 5 or so at AMC. Based on what I've read, it appears if you go to a lower tiered school, you have to be a much stronger student to land a competitive residency than if you went to a higher tiered school. At this point, I have no desire to apply out since it would mean taking a gap year.

In short, as a good (but not class topping) student, did I ruin my chances of landing a competitive surgical residency by choosing the BS/MD at AMC?

Also, if I don't see anyone from AMC that went into derm or plastics in the past few years, does this generally mean no one was able to match into it?

Thanks, and sorry for the long post.

The name of the school does not make or break you. You can land in any residency from any school, given you have stellar credentials.

You DID sort of screw yourself over by not working as hard on extracurriculars though. One purpose of BS/MD programs are to diversify the incoming class of med students with people who had more free time to pursue a wide variety of extracurricular activities.

My friend at my school is in the BS/MD program and although she does not plan to apply to any medical schools, she would make a stellar applicant. Instead of traditional premed clubs, she does student body, campaigns to promote awareness for issues that she is passionate about, does research, and etc.

You'll still be fine though. Just stop being lazy and do something! If I were you, I would just attend U of Albany and work extremely hard in med school. Good luck!

 

[unsur3]

The name of the school does not make or break you. You can land in any residency from any school, given you have stellar credentials.

You DID sort of screw yourself over by not working as hard on extracurriculars though. One purpose of BS/MD programs are to diversify the incoming class of med students with people who had more free time to pursue a wide variety of extracurricular activities.

My friend at my school is in the BS/MD program and although she does not plan to apply to any medical schools, she would make a stellar applicant. Instead of traditional premed clubs, she does student body, campaigns to promote awareness for issues that she is passionate about, does research, and etc.

You'll still be fine though. Just stop being lazy and do something! If I were you, I would just attend U of Albany and work extremely hard in med school. Good luck!

Thanks for the reply, it was reassuring 🙂. I consider my EC's to be basic but not stellar. I didn't slack off, but I admit I didn't work as hard as I would have if I had done the traditional route. I have a summer's worth of paid research in which I presented my findings (intending to do more soon), around 150 hours of hospital volunteering, 40 hours of physician shadowing, lots of tutoring experience, and some leadership positions on student governing groups. I have a fairly high GPA too. My goal isn't to just "become a doctor" but go into a coveted field.

 

[RueTay]

Don't worry just yet.

If you decide to pursue ortho, bring in the BS/MD program will be one of the least of your worries. There is plenty of distress to come.

 

[235009]

1. you can match ortho from any USMD school
2. the number of ortho/ophtho/ENT/etc matches tells you absolutely nothing. the field a med student chooses to pursue is entirely dependent on interest. sure there are some who want a certain specialty but find themselves uncompetitive or apply to a specialty and don't make it but that is a small minority and they typically wouldn't have made it regardless of their school

 

[zeppelinpage4]

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[zeppelinpage4]

I know this might not help address your issues regarding school prestige, but for what it's worth AMC is a solid medical school IMHO. I'm very familiar with the hospital and know a number of physicians who graduated from there, or teach/work there. Although prestige is a good boost for residency apps, there are many many more factors (Step Score, Clerkship grades, etc), and if you really want to match a specialty, I think you can certainly do it. Match aside, Albany seems like a nice school to be at, just make sure you can be happy there and succeed. The rest will take it's course.

And match lists are hard to interpret, you don't know if the students couldn't match into competitive specialties, or if most of the class applied to less competitive specialties by choice.

I was very close to going to AMC and would be very happy there, but chose a state school for financial reasons.

 

[unsur3]

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[circulus vitios]

1. you can match ortho from any USMD school
2. the number of ortho/ophtho/ENT/etc matches tells you absolutely nothing. the field a med student chooses to pursue is entirely dependent on interest. sure there are some who want a certain specialty but find themselves uncompetitive or apply to a specialty and don't make it but that is a small minority and they typically wouldn't have made it regardless of their school

I hear this all the time but how true is it? If you're surrounded by high achievers, you're more likely to do well. If your school has a proven history of pumping out competitive matches, it's indicative of good teaching or a good curriculum. I mean I've seen 'prestigious' matches from 'lowly' DO schools, but it seems much more common at higher-ranking schools.

 

[osprey099]

Med school is med school. Stop complaining and be glad you have a seat reserved for you at an US allopathic med school without having to study for the mcat or paying all the app fees and travel fees that the rest of us need to do just to have a shot at a school.

 

[yehhhboiii]

amc is okay
you can match from anything from anywhere
the first cutoff is step 1 scores. if you're at harvard and you get a 220, you're going to be way worse off than someone from albany medical college with a 250 (average is around 227 recently with a standard deviation around 20 iirc). it's not that name of your school doesn't matter, it's that what you accomplish is much more important (step 1, third year grades, aoa [honors society], ecs [not as important]) and who you know (letters of recommendation). pedigree matters for academic programs if you want to be chair of surgery or something like that