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New SDN Article: “The Boards”: USMLE Overview
I'm really feeling too lazy to go through my school's convoluted offsite library service right now. Irresponsibility was the biggest correlate, not necessarily cheating, that much I remember. I'll dig it up tomorrow when I'm feeling a bit less lazy. But I would, personally, qualify going to a bar or club with a fake ID as pretty damn irresponsible if you know what the consequences are.
They got me mad diversity points in the admission process.
I am talking about the number of applications (not applicants) across all schools and the total number of acceptances offerred across schools (which includes multiple acceptances by individual applicants and waitlists turning into offers. In 2014 there were over 730,000 total applications https://www.aamc.org/download/321442/data/factstable1.pdf
This year there is expected close to 800,000 total application. With about 150 medical schools seating about 100 students each offer 5 acceptance per seat thru the cycle is 75,000 acceptances which i am sure is very high estimate. Obviously many of these are multiple to same indivdual. Which means effectively 600,000 rejections are ultimately sent out.
On an applicant basis, there are 50,000+ applicants reduced to about 21,000 acceptees
I'm sorry, but this is America, and we do have the right to reject laws, if we feel it is unjust, doesn't apply, or punishment is too harsh.
For example, we can use jury nullification in cases we deem the law is messed up in one way or another. It was used often during Prohibition of alcohol in the US.
For example, we can use jury nullification in cases we deem the law is messed up in one way or another. It was used often during Prohibition of alcohol in the US.
I'm a police officer so I'll give you my $0.02
Even if the police say oh you'll be fine just take a class or two and it will all go away. After I arrest you or issue you a summons (criminal citation with mandatory court appearance) then it is completely out of my hands. After writing your arrest report you hardly ever follow up on it, likely never think about it, and where I work you have to go way out of your way to figure out the end outcome. So a cop saying it will be expunged and you'll be fine could be true based on his prior experiences, but your friends fate rests in the prosecuting attorneys office. It's the PA or DA office that makes decisions.
So she needs to follow up with the PA office and figure out if it will really be expunged, they are the people who really make those types of decisions.
Even if the police say oh you'll be fine just take a class or two and it will all go away. After I arrest you or issue you a summons (criminal citation with mandatory court appearance) then it is completely out of my hands. After writing your arrest report you hardly ever follow up on it, likely never think about it, and where I work you have to go way out of your way to figure out the end outcome. So a cop saying it will be expunged and you'll be fine could be true based on his prior experiences, but your friends fate rests in the prosecuting attorneys office. It's the PA or DA office that makes decisions.
So she needs to follow up with the PA office and figure out if it will really be expunged, they are the people who really make those types of decisions.
This study is looking at people who had unprofessional behavior in med school...not people who drank in college at 19. That's a big difference.
The best predictor of future behavior is past behavior. People who do irresponsible things in college are more likely to do irresponsible things in med school. When you're comparing against literally tens of thousands of people without criminal charges, you're kind of going to get a lot more scrutiny, because that's one more strike against you that says you might pose a problem in the future.
I've never had a sip of alcohol, and I'm a non-trad applicant.
I hear it tastes bad anyways.
It's an acquired taste. There's a lot of really great tasting alcohol out there though, even if you're not down with beer or wine.
Does that mean then that because I procrastinate on my work I'm going to get a DUI?
You can't take one irresponsible behavior and apply it to unrelated things whenever you'd like.
This person did something criminally irresponsible, so surely they're likely to do other irresponsible things that are more innocuous. That's the point. If you were given two identical applicant files, and you saw that one had a misdemeanor and the other didn't, and you were trying to build the best damn class you could, which would you pick?
ROUND 2... FIGHT!
I don't think he's saying that it's extremely likely that a small infraction will snowball into worse, just that the applicant pool is so massive that with everything else being equal (GPA, MCAT, volunteering...) why wouldn't you just take someone who wasn't charged with X, even if it's minor? I understand that perspective, even if it's something small you have to work with what you know about someone and go with the least risky option for your school, even if that risk difference seems marginal.
I'll agree that I would pick the applicant without the criminal record if they were otherwise identical applicants, but that really never happens. Adcoms on here say over and over that they don't sit there and compare two applicants side by side.
What I disagree with is your claim that the study you posted has relevance here. I'm unconvinced that kids who drink underage become cheaters in medical school. I mean honestly, the kids I know who cheated in college were the ones whose lives were centered around academic success, and they rarely drank or socialized at all.
I don't know where we went wrong but all these arguments about if you did this bad thing then you will continue to do bad things so you can't be a doctor are so strange to me. It's like when people call the cops on elementary school students for making a gun sign with their fingers or charging them with assault for kissing someone. Making a gun sign with your fingers means you're going to grow up into a school shooter? Or kissing someone on the cheek is a sure sign of a future rapist? People make mistakes, especially kids. What is with this bizarre zero tolerance society that we live in?
Hey gonnif, using a fake id is a precursor to rape? Are you seriously making this claim as if it has any basis in reality? Because I really don't care if 19 year olds are using fake ids to get themselves a drink but I think my integrity is just fine. I've gotten a ticket for going 4 miles above the speed limit on the highway. Cop wrote that I was going 69 in a 55 zone when it was actually a 65. Should I be banned from driving forever because I got a speeding ticket? Jesus Christ.
Hey gonnif, using a fake id is a precursor to rape? Are you seriously making this claim as if it has any basis in reality? Because I really don't care if 19 year olds are using fake ids to get themselves a drink but I think my integrity is just fine. I've gotten a ticket for going 4 miles above the speed limit on the highway. Cop wrote that I was going 69 in a 55 zone when it was actually a 65. Should I be banned from driving forever because I got a speeding ticket? Jesus Christ.
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I think the sort if people that are willing to procure and use fake IDs are the sort if people who will cut corners with documentation, because both are relatively minor ways of disregarding unnecessary laws.
I think Gonnif is usually pretty reasonable and gives great advice.
However, here I really have to respectfully disagree with the good intentions adcom.
Using a fake id as a precursor to rape is just ridiculous. Furthermore, Psai has hit the nail on the head.
I'm serious- you should see some of the poor documentation I've seen by doctors that just don't give a ****. Like, straight up copying notes from medical students, nurses, etc and using them as their own, then charging direct contact time for it- it's super lazy and actually illegal, plus it makes everyone else's job harder because their notes are completely useless. But they figure it's not a big deal, that documentation is just a formality that has been annoyingly imposed on them. Trust me, when you're in the hospital, you'll quickly understand why the attitudes are very equivalent, as they're both examples of people skipping past minor legal hurdles to commit a usually victimless crime.
My kids are going to hell... or jail. /jk
In my defense, I didn't know that they had fake IDs until they were old enough not to need them.
Fake IDs are ubiquitous on college campuses. Underage drinking is ubiquitous and stings are relatively common, too. Sometimes the only difference between a kid with a record and one without is that one of them got caught. (Same can be said for speeding tickets among drivers of all ages.)
I do worry that intoxication puts women at increased risk of victimization but that is separate from fake IDs. It is also part of our culture where drinking as a forbidden activity for most college-age students becomes all the more enticing.
I do agree with the bolded portion of your quote. What you are describing is a very real problem that tons and tons of physicians are actually guilty of doing. Some physicians have some of the most embarassing charts I've ever seen. We are talking 1 liner sentences in the HPI that arent even grammatically correct, nor do they explain what is going on.
I disagree with the rest.
I guess it must have just not been a thing where I lived- our state IDs are just too hard to fake, raids were common (some bars seemed to get raided every other week near campus) and the penalties are pretty severe, so few people bothered risking it. Drinking on campus was extremely common, but sneaking into bars was a good way to get charged with a misdemeanor, get an IA, or get thrown out of school if it was a repeat offense.
You honestly believe that someone who is willing to skirt the law is no more likely than someone who does their best to avoid breaking any laws to be lax about following the tedious and often pointless mandates we have to deal with in healthcare? I'm not saying they are bad people, not in the slightest, just that people who tend to have a record of disregarding authority are probably statistically more likely to disregard authority in the future.
No, you have a rational argument. What I am saying is that it is highly unlikely that having a fake ID as an undergrad is the factor that necessarily indicates that someone is going to keep poor documentation as a physician.
I am saying that the physicians who do keep poor documentation were going to do that either way regardless of whether or no they had a fake ID. Having a fake ID just should not be used as a correlate for poor documentation. Again, I understand your side of the argument and it is a rational one.
No one can say for sure what an individual will do without more concrete evidence.
I never said it was the factor. Just that it was a factor. Evidence against character.
You're implying that I am saying A=B. I'm not. I'm saying A increases the likelihood of B by a small amount.
Indeed, well I worded my response incorrectly. I am saying that in this case, the context in which A occurs is so minsicule and temporally irrelevant that it should not be used as a factor for a person dealing with patients 10-15 years down the road.
A fake ID is obtained as a college student when you are young, stupid and foolish with all the rage to go party. Apparently its the cool thing to do.
As a physician, documentation for patients is an entirely different thing. I'm saying fake ID's are so irrelevant to the context of who you are as a physician compared to who you are as a college student, that it shouldnt even be used as a factor for it.
Physicians who are overworked and work in underserved areas are especially prone to bad charting. They have no time to do them, and have to rush to do everything when they have like 40 patients in a day. There are many more relevant factors that actually would affect how a Physician does his or her charting. Even general laziness would be more relevant than a fake ID the said physician made when they were 19 years old in college.
It's more likely that if B occurs then it's more likely that A also occurred, not the other way around.
If B occured and A is more likely to have previously occurred, that means there is a correlative relationship between A and B. I'm not saying it's causative, just correlative. And correlates are enough for me, when I've got plenty of people who could fill those spots that lack negative correlates. Now, if a person adds enough positive correlates to their app, I could easy overlook the negative one. But that's the whole point here- this is a negative mark that can be overcome by demonstrating positive character via ECs.
Lol that doesn't make sense. Correlates don't work in the opposite direction. For example, drinking spoiled milk may lead to puking, but puking doesn't lead to drinking spoiled milk.
It's impossible for us to say without an expensive and exhaustive study. I chose to believe irresponsible behavior is a predictive correlate of future irresponsible behavior. Responsible behavior is a predictive correlate of future responsible behavior. It's pretty simple.
You can't pick and choose though which behaviors you analyze as indicators. Besides using fake ID's and drinking underage, I was completely responsible. You can analyze my incredibly responsible behavior now and say that's indicative, but then that conflicts with what my underage drinking indicates.
Well it sounds very simple when you put it like that, but putting a simple statement like that in a context like this does not make the said simple statement correct even if it was correct before you put it in this context.
At the end of the day, actions have consequences, and criminal or institutional records affect your application, as they reflect upon your character. If people do not want to face those consequences or have their character called into question, they should not engage in those activities. This is, to me, a relatively small ding on someone's character and judgment, but it's there nonetheless. Own your actions and move on, that's all you can do. Nothing, to me, it's more annoying than the "everybody is doing it" excuse, as that says "I do not take any responsibility for this." "I made a stupid mistake and I got caught, but that isn't who I am" is the proper approach, as demonstrated by some good letters and ECs.
Yea, I mean I def see your side of it. Its a rational argument.
Own your actions and move on, that's all you can do. Nothing, to me, it's more annoying than the "everybody is doing it" excuse, as that says "I do not take any responsibility for this." "I made a stupid mistake and I got caught, but that isn't who I am" is the proper approach, as demonstrated by some good letters and ECs.
Alcohol is overrated anyways.
Mostly because I've never had any.
I think the correlation vs causation point he was making is valid. He's not saying that puking leads to drinking spoiled milk, just that if someone is puking they're more likely to have drank spoiled milk than someone who isn't puking.
In the same vein, using a fake ID may not lead to other offences, but are you as certain that people who have been caught using fake IDs don't have a higher occurrence of other infractions? Personally I think this offence is mild enough to correlate quite poorly with other offences, but I understand why an adcom might use this reasoning, especially with worse offences. It doesn't have to be an unquestionable logical conclusion, just enough for an adcom to suspect a correlation.
The bolded is kind of how I feel about it. this is why I've been saying Jack has a rational argument.
Still doesn't work that way. You can't reverse the direction because multiple variables may be correlated with B. In this example, someone may be puking because they have the flu or food poisoning. Thus, you can't say that B necessarily is associated with A.
You do realize that there is a such thing as predictive correlates right? And that we use them a lot in medicine? You add a bunch of predictive correlates up to determine overall risk. This is an example of something that you add into the mix for "potential for future problems."
But we have no reason to believe that underage drinking is predictive of future illegal behavior. The arguments here have all been hypothetical and depend on faulty logic.
I didn't say necessarily, that's the point. That would be "Johnny is puking therefore he drank spoiled milk" whereas I said "Johnny is puking therefore he is more likely to have drank spoiled milk than Ted who is not puking". The main point here is that this isn't about logical necessities, just about what an adcom will suspect to correlate with future behaviour. The burden of proof is extremely low, you can't give them any reason to suspect anything.
I don't want to get in a FIGHT over here, but thats causation.
For example: If you took a poll of all humans beings about whether or not they drank spoiled milk within the last day, the ones puking their guts out during the poll are more likely to have done so than the general population. Thats correlation. Correlation can backtrack.
It's irrelevant though, tbh. This is all based on speculation since no one has any hard data for the relationship in question.