Is a DO looked down upon?

[keevwu]

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I think your mistake was applying to only four MD schools. I think the average is closer to 20. I sent secondaries to 19 schools, received interview offers from four. That's with 50% chance of acceptance according to AAMC.

may I ask where you found the statistic # of interviews vs acceptance?

 

[sundancing]

I think your mistake was applying to only four MD schools. I think the average is closer to 20. I sent secondaries to 19 schools, received interview offers from four. That's with 50% chance of acceptance according to AAMC.

I meant that I applied to 18 MD schools and interviewed/will interview at 4.

 

[derpina]

If people knew that you had the same opportunity for clinical rotations as the same-tier MD school, they would probably change to "it doesn't matter." The only problem that DO students really face is getting the quality clinical rotations to get out of the whole "I have to go into PC with my degree." If you get into a DO school in an area/state with a lot of hospitals, then you have a great chance to match into a more-specialized residency program. The age of the DO school also matters. Places like PCOM, AZCOM, Touro Med, and Goro's school has had great match lists (at least that's what Goro tells us 😉.)

Once the DO school has established itself in the state with creating great and competent physicians, then that DO school is a great option for you.

The question requires you to matriculate, hypothetically, so you have to pick like you do in real life. Those people who say they won't choose are copouts. You have to pick one or the other.

 

[Aloft085]

I meant that I applied to 18 MD schools and interviewed/will interview at 4.

Ah, roger that. That makes more sense. I renounce my previous comment!

 

[Redpancreas]

See, I'm excited about attending a DO school because I hope to meet other artsy/entrepreneurial/nontraditional/creative peeps who've had some experience out in the working world.

Wow...I didn't realize how much of an ass I was a couple months ago. Apologies to all my future DO colleagues. Even though MD students are more academically accomplished on average while matriculating, seeking to compete with medical students is a terrible metric for picking a medical school. Competing in medical school would not make one a better person. It will just make one a neurotic person who knows the basic sciences marginally better than another person for the cost of a social life.

That being said, I still would prefer the M.D. for name mainly and residency options, but what I said up there was terrible and, again, I am sorry.

 

[bc65]

I will answer your question , OP.

1. Many med school applicants have never heard of DO schools.

2. Many MD physicians have never heard of DO schools or degrees. I had not heard of it until recently, and I have been in practice for many years.

3. In an informal survey of the MDs I work with, many or most had not heard of DO schools until after they started practice.

3. Many of the doctors I works with have DO after their names on their ID badges or white coats ( primarily in the ER ) and I only recently noticed this after working with them for years.

4. Most of the general public is unaware or confused about the DO degree. However, most people don't know or care. After all, they go to chiropracters and homeopaths, so a different type of medical degree won't faze them.

5. Yes, some people who do know what the degrees are will assume that you couldn't get into an MD school. Some people will look down on a DO degree, just as they might look down on a foreign degree. It will definitely be much harder for you to get into more competitive residencies. Overall, though , it's my impression that over the years, as the number of DO schools and DO graduates has increased, that knowledge of, and respect for the DO degree has been increasing as well.

6. Some applicants choose DO schools over MD schools for a variety of reasons.

7. With a 3.5 GPA you should probably apply to both MD and DO schools.

8. You really should use Google and the search function here.

 

[EventualMD]

I asked two close MD relatives of mine what they thought. They said that they don't judge DOs any different than MDs in their practice and some DO colleagues are better doctors than some MD colleagues but you might have trouble getting a competitive specialty. If you want to be a doctor outright, it won't matter in your day-to-day practice. If you want to be a certain kind of doctor, it may matter. An MD isn't a guarantee to competitive specialties though.

So just base your decision on that information and you're golden.

 

[Greenberg702]

What's "good" or "better" for the average DO matriculant is different than what is good for the typical MD matriculant. At my school, for example, a lot of people are interested in very competitive specialties and academics. It's just what they want to do. The kids I know who went DO couldn't care less about matching derm/ortho and just want to go into primary care private practice. For the former path, MD is absolutely, positively without question "better" than the DO route in the sense that it's much easier to break into academics/competitive specialties through MD. Many academic programs in non-competitive specialties as well as competitive ACGME specialties screen DOs, meaning that they'll never even read your app unless they personally know you.

From reading SDN, I'm getting the sense that many people's eyes get wide when they hear about matching NYU derm, HSS ortho, or CHOP peds. If that's your goal and what will make you happy (and for some people it definitely is) you must go MD (and do very well there) to have any realistic chance. I think that this is where the majority of the MD>DO comes from. SDN self selects for a greater proportion of people interested in gunning for highly competitive specialties. If you simply want to practice medicine/primary care going DO may be good, but "good" is subjective based on who you ask.

 

[Aloft085]

may I ask where you found the statistic # of interviews vs acceptance?

The statistic that I quoted was for GPA/MCAT score vs acceptance. To answer your question though, schools generally tell you how many people they interview per year. With that number and the total number of students, you can guesstimate your odds for each interview. Of course most schools will extend 50% or so more acceptance offers than they want students. This is all assuming that you're an average candidate for that school.