Do people generally succeed?

[Nomemal]

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If you ignore all the people who gave up on Med school throughout the 4 pre med years, do people who stick with the process and try hard enough generally get in for the most part or do a lot of people have to unhappily change their career after many cycles?

 

[candbgirl]

I think less than 50% of people who
actually apply are accepted. It might even be closer to 60 % who are unsuccessful. There have been several mentions of this disappointing statistic on SDN. All you can do is work hard and submit the best possible application possible and hope for good results.

 

[Means]

I believe 60% of people who apply don't get accepted any given year, so i would imagine a good portion of that 60% will eventually change careers.

 

[Goro]

If you ignore all the people who gave up on Med school throughout the 4 pre med years, do people who stick with the process and try hard enough generally get in for the most part or do a lot of people have to unhappily change their career after many cycles?

No. Some 60% of applicants get rejected.

It is a pre-med delusion that determination or dedication alone are substitutes for competence.

 

[The Knife & Gun Club]

If I recall from my app cycle overall acceptance rates for AMCAS was around 40% (so ~60% do not successfully gain admission).

However if you were to consider MD & DO among students who have actually met the minimal requirements I would guess +80% success.

I consider minimum requirements to be: Apply day 1, MCAT > 500, GPA > 3.0, no arrests, some minimal shadowing/LORs/volunteering, and applying to at least 15 DO and 15 MD schools (including all in-state institutions)

 

[efle]

do people who stick with the process and try hard enough generally get in for the most part

• At most universities, a large portion of premeds get weeded out not because they are lazy, but because they can't earn good grades in prereqs (like organic chemistry, physics, and biochem) even when they are working hard.

• Of those survivors that make it through the prereqs, a large portion have to change plans when they reach the MCAT and are unable to score competitively. Right now, the average admitted MCAT is in the top 20%, and the majority of test takers get scores much too low to be competitive with (half of test takers get a 500 or lower!). And that's only the people actually sitting for the exam, not accounting for all the people who score poorly on practice MCATs and decide not to bother taking the real thing.

• Of those people who survived all the prereqs and actually took the MCAT and proceeded with applying, most--about 60%--don't get admitted anywhere. In the successful 40%, half of them hold only a single offer of admission, often from being fortunate and having a state school with heavy instate bias where the applicant pool they competed against was a lot more limited.

Whether someone has to give up and change career goals can depend a lot on individual factors, like state of residence, URM/ORM, and whether they are okay with going DO (or even NP in a state that allows them unsupervised practice). But for a typical cookie cutter premed about to head into college, unfortunately there is a high chance that even if they try hard, they wont make it into MD school.

 

[Unlimited Apps]

• At most universities, a large portion of premeds get weeded out not because they are lazy, but because they can't earn good grades in prereqs (like organic chemistry, physics, and biochem) even when they are working hard.

• Of those survivors that make it through the prereqs, a large portion have to change plans when they reach the MCAT and are unable to score competitively. Right now, the average admitted MCAT is in the top 20%, and the majority of test takers get scores much too low to be competitive with (half of test takers get a 500 or lower!). And that's only the people actually sitting for the exam, not accounting for all the people who score poorly on practice MCATs and decide not to bother taking the real thing.

• Of those people who survived all the prereqs and actually took the MCAT and proceeded with applying, most--about 60%--don't get admitted anywhere. In the successful 40%, half of them hold only a single offer of admission, often from being fortunate and having a state school with heavy instate bias where the applicant pool they competed against was a lot more limited.

Whether someone has to give up and change career goals can depend a lot on individual factors, like state of residence, URM/ORM, and whether they are okay with going DO (or even NP in a state that allows them unsupervised practice). But for a typical cookie cutter premed about to head into college, unfortunately there is a high chance that even if they try hard, they wont make it into MD school.

Another reason why I make it crystal clear to all high schoolers and underclassmen that ask me questions about being a premed to ALWAYS have a back-up plan. Not only a back-up plan in mind but also in terms of one's actions and decisions in college whether it be double majoring or majoring in an interesting field that has more career options than just biology or adding minors and/or internships in other fields of interest.

No one wants to be a graduate with a BS in biology that has a resume that only lists cookie-cutter premed activities and end up being either overqualified or under-qualified for most jobs when medical school doesn't work out.

That being said, I do think that dedication and determination along with some baseline level of competence can get someone to the point where they can apply to medical school. What happens in that process however is another ball game and has a whole set of additional factors. I have seen way too many premeds at my school change tracks simply because they partied too much the first year or two and weren't willing to put in the extra effort to recover and improve their GPA (but were certainly academically capable). Or students who realized pretty late into their college career that they had the academic metrics but not the extracurriculars to get into medical school.

I would know because I was one of those students who was solely responsible for the huge hole I dug myself and then had to work extra hard the rest of college and take a gap year to slowly recover and finally put together a complete and (hopefully) competitive MD application.

 

[Biochemistry69]

It is a pre-med delusion that determination or dedication alone are substitutes for competence.

What do you mean? r u calling us smart?

 

[puahate]

Unfortunately no. It's the way it is. Honestly kinda sad but that is life. We can't get what we want.

 

[Goro]

What do you mean? r u calling us smart?

I don't understand your question.

 

[BC_89]

It is a pre-med delusion that determination or dedication alone are substitutes for competence.

Quote of the month

 

[Dagrimsta1]

No. Some 60% of applicants get rejected.

It is a pre-med delusion that determination or dedication alone are substitutes for competence.

I can confirm this statement. If you think that being determined will get you through med school, you’re gonna have a bad time. Common sense is extremely important as well as some actual intellect.

Although having a 100k+ fire under your ass will definitely help get anyone into gear.

 

[Lucca]

Personally, I don’t like throwing around the “60% of applicants every year won’t be accepted” statistic because, while true, it’s helpful to almost no one. In actual fact there’s a subset of students who have a 100% chance of getting in from day 1 and others who are not so fortunate. It’s very difficult to have a sense of how good of a student you are coming out of HS unless you went to a very competitive HS and have really high SAT/ACTs. But, after freshman or sophomore year you should be able to have a general sense of where you stand academically. If you are near the top, your likelihood of success is very good provided you also don’t have any red flags.

This is why my advice to young college students thinking premed was always very different depending on the student I was talking to. At the general college prospective days I would tell people the usual things: have a backup plan, think about other careers, prepare for a marathon, try to choose a major that gives you good prospects after UG but that won’t tank your GPA, etc. At the honors prospective day, I knew that were these kids to stick with it they would have a >97% chance of getting in (I’m not making that up, that was the actual statistic for our science honors premeds). So my advice to them was obviously very different and the conversation was more about figuring out what they wanted to do and being the best possible candidate they could be for it than the typical premed caveat emptor.

That said, it’s true that most people who set out on premed as freshman will not succeed. It’s also true (perhaps even more so) that just because you *can* do something doesn’t mean you *should* and my concern with highly capable students is that they are doing something just because they can and it seems like a safe idea rather than fully exploring their alternatives.

 

[deleted887473]

Sometimes I envy those "unsuccessful premeds" who figures out something else they'd rather do with their life.

 

[Nucleophile1]

If you ignore all the people who gave up on Med school throughout the 4 pre med years, do people who stick with the process and try hard enough generally get in for the most part or do a lot of people have to unhappily change their career after many cycles?

Most of the pre-meds that I know who did not get in changed their career prior to graduation from undergrad. The biggest thing I saw that hindered people from continuing along the pre-med track was poor grades. I knew someone who failed a class so many times that the department told this individual that they had to switch majors.

The MCAT is another big hurdle. The people I know who did poorly on the MCAT took it before they were ready to take it (i.e. their practice tests were low). However, they have since chosen other careers and are happy.

Another common mistake is that people are not strategic about the application process (i.e. applying to one school only, applying to state schools where they are OOS, applying late, etc. etc.).

Trying hard is not enough. You have to get the grades, MCAT, and then make good decisions when it comes to the application process. A good advisor can be very helpful; however, many colleges do not have good pre-med advisors. My pre-med advisor at my college was not helpful at all which is why I turned to SDN.

 

[puahate]

Most of the pre-meds that I know who did not get in changed their career prior to graduation from undergrad. The biggest thing I saw that hindered people from continuing along the pre-med track was poor grades. I knew someone who failed a class so many times that the department told this individual that they had to switch majors.

The MCAT is another big hurdle. The people I know who did poorly on the MCAT took it before they were ready to take it (i.e. their practice tests were low). However, they have since chosen other careers and are happy.

Another common mistake is that people are not strategic about the application process (i.e. applying to one school only, applying to state schools where they are OOS, applying late, etc. etc.).

Trying hard is not enough. You have to get the grades, MCAT, and then make good decisions when it comes to the application process. A good advisor can be very helpful; however, many colleges do not have good pre-med advisors. My pre-med advisor at my college was not helpful at all which is why I turned to SDN.

My experience mimics this. I knew a girl who was on a BS\MD track. MCAT was one point under required limit. She didn't retake just decided to do an accelerated nursing program. Really is sad because i thought she'd be a great physician.

 

[getdown]

Sometimes I envy those "unsuccessful premeds" who figures out something else they'd rather do with their life.

This is very true. Some premeds have these horse blinders on of "med school or bust". They keep trying and wasting years of their lives when they could be working and doing something else. I have a premed friend who applied same time I did and didn't get any interviews. Moved on to the business world and is now a VP/executive at said company. He just finished building his own mansion while I'm just paying off my student loans and won't buy a house till a couple more years.

It just shows that being a doctor isn't the only thing in the world. If you want to live and have a comfortable life there are other jobs out there you can do to achieve that. Business doesn't have the same job security as medicine but it does have a higher ceiling as well. Ultimately, you want to make sure this is the right career for you due to the huge amount of sacrifices you'll have to make. Personally, I think it was all worth it for me. I could never see myself doing excel sheets and board meetings all day. Give me the OR any day and I'm happy as a clam.

 

[Reader88]

The real gatekeeper in medical school admissions tends to be the mcat. Anyone can go to an easy school and get A's, anyone can shadow, anyone can volunteer, anyone can get research, scribing, or medical assistant experience etc. However not everyone can get a good score on the mcat. All the other deficiencies can be made up with a gap year or two and some post-bac classes but you'll still have to sit for the mcat and take a test that is standardized against all the other applicants in the applicant pool. Grades tend to be the first hurdle that weeds people out because it makes people question their motivation for medicine, but grades are also not standardized and don't easily differentiate people from different schools. I went to Johns Hopkins and a lot of people there who get low grades still make it to med school. I have friends with gpa's that people on sdn would say are barely competitive for DO but they've gotten into top 20's. My school probably has more outliers when it comes to gpa compared to the general population so you probably can't compare a Hopkins gpa to the average student. Anyway I'd say overall that if you can get a top mcat score (514+) then you can probably get all the other pieces together to make a competitive med school app even if it takes a few extra years and maybe even a failed app cycle. If you're barely breaking 500 after multiple attempts then you might not make it.

Based on my experience as an MCAT tutor, this is really true. There are many students with good and even great GPAs who just can’t overcome this hurdle. Working with them often makes me wonder how they got a good GPA with no critical thinking skills but that’s another question....

 

[puahate]

Based on my experience as an MCAT tutor, this is really true. There are many students with good and even great GPAs who just can’t overcome this hurdle. Working with them often makes me wonder how they got a good GPA with no critical thinking skills but that’s another question....

Because in school you are taught what is tested. AAMC doesnt do this. 3rd party testing companies try to mimic what the AAMC will test and teaches you but you cant be 100% sure. For most professors they teach what is on the exam so you can realistically study for the exam. You know what is on it. Sure the AAMC has the MCAT outline but you still have zero idea what new things will be brought up there.

 

[Mus musculus]

Here's a somewhat related question- how many applicants are generally non competitive? I understand 40% get in, 60% do not. But, how many applicants are really unrealistic with their chances of getting in?

 

[Nucleophile1]

Here's a somewhat related question- how many applicants are generally non competitive? I understand 40% get in, 60% do not. But, how many applicants are really unrealistic with their chances of getting in?

I would divide the 60% into two camps:

1. Non-competitive: Low MCAT/Multiple low MCATs, Low GPA, no ECs, no shadowing, etc. Some of those people will say "oh my cousin's friend's sister got in with a 500 MCAT and no volunteering so that means I will too"

• For the 2017-2018 cycle, the average MCAT of an application was 504 whereas the average MCAT of a matriculant was 510. The average GPA of an application was 3.56 whereas the average GPA of a matriculant was 3.71.
• https://www.aamc.org/download/321494/data/factstablea16.pdf

2. Poor decisions: Applying super late, applying to top programs that they have no chance at, applying to 1 or 2 schools, applying to schools that are not OOS friendly, etc.

There are individuals who interview poorly or make a bad impression on interview day, so even though they were initially competitive, they may not get accepted. You can also have a combination of the two where someone who is non-competitive to begin with applies to schools that they have no chance at.

Unlucky states can definitely play a role in whether or not someone will get accepted, but the majority of the time, the 60% probably falls into one or both of the categories I listed above.

I'm not saying that competitive people don't ever fall through the cracks and not get accepted because I'm sure that does happen. However, I think that the majority of the time, a specific issue can be identified as to why someone did not get accepted.

 

[Goro]

Here's a somewhat related question- how many applicants are generally non competitive? I understand 40% get in, 60% do not. But, how many applicants are really unrealistic with their chances of getting in?

I'd say at least 50%.

Oddly, the same thing thing holds true in faculty searches!

 

[Shammyguy3]

I'd say at least 50%.

Oddly, the same thing thing holds true in faculty searches!

Thats interesting. So half the applicant pool is non competitive (for reasons like poor stats, no experiences, etc.). Of the half that is competitive then, it seems that nearly 80% get accepted? With 40% overall acceptance for all applicants, thats what it would come out to.

Then, if thats true, that also means ~10% of the competitive applicant pool doesnt get in (for reasons like poor school list, applying late, poor interview skills)


Sound pretty accurate?

 

[BabyDaddy]

No. Some 60% of applicants get rejected.

It is a pre-med delusion that determination or dedication alone are substitutes for competence.

OUCH! It's a fact tho. More and more true the further along I get.

 

[BabyDaddy]

It seemed like most of the people on the interview trail who were actually qualified got in somewhere. The numbers you need to get in are widely known, as are the CV credentials and how to prepare for interviews. If you accomplish all those things, you will do fine. People who don't wouldn't do well in Med school anyways.

 

[Med Ed]

If you ignore all the people who gave up on Med school throughout the 4 pre med years, do people who stick with the process and try hard enough generally get in for the most part or do a lot of people have to unhappily change their career after many cycles?

After many cycles we all succeed in dying.

 

[Robin-jay]

Trying hard is not enough. You have to get the grades, MCAT, and then make good decisions when it comes to the application process.

Personally, anyone trying hard should be able to get the grades, and also apply intelligently. However, some people can't beat the MCAT, no matter how "hard they try".

That test is really the only part of the process in which effort is usually not enough.

 

[Walter Raleigh]

I'd define a "serious" premed as someone with a 3.5 GPA and 505 MCAT or better, plus basic ECs.

 

[the Mannis]

Personally, anyone trying hard should be able to get the grades, and also apply intelligently. However, some people can't beat the MCAT, no matter how "hard they try".

That test is really the only part of the process in which effort is usually not enough.

Essentially, the MCAT screens out people by intelligence then, yes? Since effort can sometimes "not be enough". Undergrad classes mostly test what you know, while the MCAT assesses if you can figure things out on the fly.

 

[Robin-jay]

Essentially, the MCAT screens out people by intelligence then, yes? Since effort can sometimes "not be enough".

Standardized test taking =/= intelligence.

 

[the Mannis]

Standardized test taking =/= intelligence.

it must be either lack of preparation or lack of aptitude (or some combination of both). Excluding english as a second language folks, CARS is assessing something akin to the ability to reason quickly, which obviously is related to intelligence.

 

[Robin-jay]

it must be either lack of preparation or lack of aptitude.

Possibly, but I do think there is a category of "good standardized test takers" regardless of both preparation, or intelligence.

 

[the Mannis]

Possibly, but I do think there is a category of "good standardized test takers" regardless of both preparation, or intelligence.

i did have a friend at uni who was as good as anyone at multiple choice tests, but on tests which had short essay questions, he could not figure them out at all. it was bizarre. the n=1 is noted.

 

[Robin-jay]

i did have a friend at uni who was as good as anyone at multiple choice tests, but on tests which had short essay questions, he could not figure them out at all. it was bizarre. the n=1 is noted.

Usually means they have good enough superficial knowledge of the subject, but never learned enough to do deep analysis.

You can have a crappy knowledge bank for the MCAT but do well based on a few testing tricks, which come as more natural processes to some people.

 

[BabyDaddy]

Personally, anyone trying hard should be able to get the grades, and also apply intelligently.

Not really. Tons of people are weeded out because they simply can't make the grades, and some still stick it out through all the classes and apply with unrealistically low GPAs.

The MCAT measures preparation. Usually the people who put in the work and actually learned in their undergrad classes can study hard enough for the MCAT to do well on it. Those who didn't build that foundation can't seem to make the score no matter how hard they study.
And again, there are a lot of people who just can't learn enough in their undergrad classes or MCAT prep to get to a competitive level.

You can have a crappy knowledge bank for the MCAT but do well based on a few testing tricks, which come as more natural processes to some people.

I agree that some people seem to test above their level, but I think you're overstating your case here. People with "crappy" knowledge don't do "well". People with mediocre knowledge can occasionally do well. Generally people with good knowledge do well 🙂

I think a lot of people get bitter at the MCAT because they take it and don't do as well as they think they should based on their grades. (This was me at one point). The difference is that many of the Q's on it test your ability to apply the knowledge (2nd order), while many Q's on your tests in undergrad were straight 1st order questions. If you only got the 1st order questions right, you could generally do well in undergrad!
What I've found in med school so far is that there is a lot of emphasis on ability to synthesize and apply info. Those that struggle with this have a tougher time. There aren't many 1st order questions here. 1st order questions in Med school seem like a gift on exams!

Sorry for the novel.