Do I even have a chance or do I need to do a masters/post bacc?

[med2025usa]

Hi everyone!

Just had some questions regarding getting into medical school in the U.S. I graduated 2 years ago from a high-ranked public school in the U.S. with a degree in computer engineering.

I was a premed student at a community college at first but switched majors before transferring out. I did most of the med school pre-requisites at community college before transferring out to the university. I would still have to take 3 more if I were to switch careers and focus on med school.

My cumulative GPA is 3.86 (It's high because I was part-time for some time and took some courses for P/NP).
My BCPM GPA is 4.0 (It's 4.0 because I did all of them at a community college).

I have to mention that after transferring out I was part-time for 3 quarters.
Also because of COVID, for 3 quarters we were allowed to take our courses for P/NP. Unfortunately, I took 8 courses as P/NP. 6 of them were engineering courses and the other 2 were for university graduation requirements (anthropology & writing).

My questions are the following: (assuming I do well on the MCAT and complete the usual extracurriculars for med school)

1) Do I even have a chance at MD or DO programs considering the fact that I took 8 courses for P/NP, was part-time for 3 quarters, a community college student and took my pre-requisites at community college? OR do I need to do a masters or a post bacc in order to improve my chances and prove that I can handle the course load at med school? I'm asking this because it seems most non-traditional premed students and some traditional students with gap years get masters to even have a chance at getting in.

2) Do medical schools even look at your transcripts to check if you took courses for P/NP or if you were part-time? OR do they just care about the completion of pre-requisites and your GPA?

Thank you in advance for your time and help.

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[bigboy318]

1. I think a post bacc would help, just take the classes you need to like the 3 classes and the pre reqs and show that you can handle the rigor. Maybe take some higher level bio classes & chem classes to show you can handle everything. I don't think the community college stuff and everything else hurts you since you are a non trad, if you were trad, it would most definitely hurt you though. Try to do the postbacc at a 4 year college though.

2. I would assume they do but again since you are non trad and you didn't P/NP the pre req classes, I think you will be fine.

 

[chilly_md]

Have you been working since graduating?

If you completed the pre-reqs and received letter grades for all of them, you can just finish the last few remaining ones and throw in a couple upper division classes while attending school for those semesters as mentioned above.

 

[med2025usa]

Have you been working since graduating?

If you completed the pre-reqs and received letter grades for all of them, you can just finish the last few remaining ones and throw in a couple upper division classes while attending school for those semesters as mentioned above.

Yes, does that make a difference?

 

[chilly_md]

Yes, does that make a difference?

It shows you’re a full career changer then. Spend a few hours on the weekends volunteering at a hospital for a little while to see if it is something you want to pursue before committing.

 

[Mr.Smile12]

Also read

How to Choose a Postbaccalaureate or Special Masters Program (SMP) - SDN

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