Ive been seeing a lot of this...

[radian313]

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Of late Ive seen a lot of XYZ vs XYW DO school.....

As a first year OMS at a well established school and have friends who attend different schools here is what I have to say....

Almost all the schools will give you the "same" quality of education, sure there are minute differences, but going to one DO school versus the other aint going to make much of a difference in terms of this. Many folks want that super formula of success at their choice of DO school, sorry for the breaking news but....it comes down to you. If you put in the work at any school, success is waiting a short distance away. This means, you have to sacrifice certain things, so for those wanting to stay nearby home (2-3 hours away), you may want to think about this one, as some folks often jump to home every 1-2 weeks which can be detrimental to your education if you cant balance it. Nightlife? Not sure why this is asked often, but frankly if you do things right in medical school, your "relax time" will encompass of watching Hulu, Netflix, or simply going to Walmart and getting fresh ingredients to getting a formal meal, and if you are engaged or married you can throw in Facetime here too. But there are folks who can't stay out of the bar scene, while it may be a social outlet for many, and totally acceptable, it becomes a vicious cycle for many at the wrong times. Tuition, a few thousand shouldnt sway your decision about going to a certain school versus the other. Especially, if you intend to go into primary care, many post graduate institution/hospitals are offering great monitory incentives to join up, but this shouldnt be a "deal breaker" for many.

What you SHOULD be doing....

1. Visit the school if you can, and when you are going to an interview, look around campus and look at the student's body language, that will tell you A LOT in terms of how THEY feel about the school

2. Look at the bare necessities...how close is the closest bank? Walmart? Gym (if not on campus)? Distance to an airport?

3. Reach out to recent graduates and 4th year students, they have been through the system and will tell you exactly what you need to hear in terms of rotations, and electives specifically.

4. Directly request (kindly) from Admissions of their recent residency placement from 1 and 5 years ago and compare/contrast, what sort of trends you can see (i..e is it more specialty focused or more primary care). This also points into, board scores, what are the students getting? Request this info if not found, and look at trends. Don't just look at a specific year and accept for what it is, analyze the numbers across the years and see if they are improving or getting worse.

5. Location - yes this is a double edged sword, its good to be close to home, and while it can be distracting for some to go back home every 1-2 weeks, some folks can easily manage it, especially with non-mandatory lectures and its a good break away

and finally the most important thing (atleast for me)

Mandatory vs non-mandatory lectures

This is a deal breaker for me. This is 2 years of your life, are you the type of student who sleeps and clocks out within 10 minutes of hearing in lecture? or someone who thrives? This is something you need to answer for yourself because after all the tuition savings, being close to home, and having nearby accessibility, it is YOU taking the exams and studying and if that process is hindered in the process of you having to go against your natural habitat of studying (i.e. mandatory lectures), then it will be a complete waste of your time considering this route let along, dangerous at times as it may and will likely affect your performance.

Just my two cents and opinion based on what I read so far.

 

[Peach Newport]

I'm voting 5/5 for sticky

 

[GrignardsReagent]

As someone who is struggling with XYZ vs XYW decision. Thank you for that post.

 

[poloboy]

Of late Ive seen a lot of XYZ vs XYW DO school.....

As a first year OMS at a well established school and have friends who attend different schools here is what I have to say....

Almost all the schools will give you the "same" quality of education, sure there are minute differences, but going to one DO school versus the other aint going to make much of a difference in terms of this. Many folks want that super formula of success at their choice of DO school, sorry for the breaking news but....it comes down to you. If you put in the work at any school, success is waiting a short distance away. This means, you have to sacrifice certain things, so for those wanting to stay nearby home (2-3 hours away), you may want to think about this one, as some folks often jump to home every 1-2 weeks which can be detrimental to your education if you cant balance it. Nightlife? Not sure why this is asked often, but frankly if you do things right in medical school, your "relax time" will encompass of watching Hulu, Netflix, or simply going to Walmart and getting fresh ingredients to getting a formal meal, and if you are engaged or married you can throw in Facetime here too. But there are folks who can't stay out of the bar scene, while it may be a social outlet for many, and totally acceptable, it becomes a vicious cycle for many at the wrong times. Tuition, a few thousand shouldnt sway your decision about going to a certain school versus the other. Especially, if you intend to go into primary care, many post graduate institution/hospitals are offering great monitory incentives to join up, but this shouldnt be a "deal breaker" for many.

What you SHOULD be doing....

1. Visit the school if you can, and when you are going to an interview, look around campus and look at the student's body language, that will tell you A LOT in terms of how THEY feel about the school

2. Look at the bare necessities...how close is the closest bank? Walmart? Gym (if not on campus)? Distance to an airport?

3. Reach out to recent graduates and 4th year students, they have been through the system and will tell you exactly what you need to hear in terms of rotations, and electives specifically.

4. Directly request (kindly) from Admissions of their recent residency placement from 1 and 5 years ago and compare/contrast, what sort of trends you can see (i..e is it more specialty focused or more primary care). This also points into, board scores, what are the students getting? Request this info if not found, and look at trends. Don't just look at a specific year and accept for what it is, analyze the numbers across the years and see if they are improving or getting worse.

5. Location - yes this is a double edged sword, its good to be close to home, and while it can be distracting for some to go back home every 1-2 weeks, some folks can easily manage it, especially with non-mandatory lectures and its a good break away

and finally the most important thing (atleast for me)

Mandatory vs non-mandatory lectures

This is a deal breaker for me. This is 2 years of your life, are you the type of student who sleeps and clocks out within 10 minutes of hearing in lecture? or someone who thrives? This is something you need to answer for yourself because after all the tuition savings, being close to home, and having nearby accessibility, it is YOU taking the exams and studying and if that process is hindered in the process of you having to go against your natural habitat of studying (i.e. mandatory lectures), then it will be a complete waste of your time considering this route let along, dangerous at times as it may and will likely affect your performance.

Just my two cents and opinion based on what I read so far.

We need more of you on SDN to give us, indecisive premeds, important tips like this. Thank you!

 

[NecrotizingFasciitis]

 

[radian313]

I'm voting 5/5 for sticky

As someone who is struggling with XYZ vs XYW decision. Thank you for that post.

We need more of you on SDN to give us, indecisive premeds, important tips like this. Thank you!

View attachment 211254

No worries folks, we're all in this together. Im glad me speaking my heart on this, offered some valuable insight. I was once just like this, I wanted the super secret formula to success, and it hit me, there is none. Its just sheer hardwork and dedication that will get you through medical school. Sure there are differences like I said, but analyze everything. Some folks in my program, thrive on coming to lecture. Great more power to them. Some love to sit in their PJs and do it from home, thats great too. Its like I first started medical school, I wanted to know....should I answer objectives, memorize slides, or keep reviewing the slides, or do more questions? For me it was, listen to the lecture first, review the slides the same day, and then on the weekend review again, and then Sunday (+football), I would talk it out with my friends, by the time the week was over, I saw the material like 4 times. Before exams, Id answer the objectives in my head and talk them out with my group. The goal for me was to look at the material atleast 5 times before the exam. Some folks require more, some folks dont do what I did, they just memorize slides. I cant do that. And also know, you will build intuition on this, in that, some modules are more conceptual (i.e. Cardiovascular) than Skin (rote memorization), hence you will have to tweak this, and this ability comes with time. Heck, Im still not perfect on this.

In the end, you will all be doctors if you do the basics right, be it at XYZ DO school or XYW. Success is measured based on how much effort you put in, not how much your program costs or how much the school helps you. This comes from someone who didnt do a great job on their MCAT nor did I have an awesome GPA, but I sit right now with a 90%+ average in all my courses so far. You can PM me if any of you want to simply talk about things specific to your own situation. Always happy to help. Never be afraid to ask for help, there are still a lot of good people left in this world, you just have to reach out.

Good luck. Be strong, be patient, but be ferocious in your intellectual pursuit of medicine to help others.

 

[OrdinaryDO]

I think you are correct for the most part, but there are some issues you left out or didn't clearly articulate.

Issue #1 - XYZ vs XYZ school DOES matter, quite a lot actually. People aren't concerned about the first 2 years of education -- aside from OMM, almost every medical school in the nation (DO and MD) will have almost the same exact curriculum being covered, maybe through different methods, but it is still covered. However, the deal breaker comes in years 3 and 4. One of the biggest reasons, aside from research and reputation, people choose MD over DO is because of the rotation sites during MS3 and MS4. Your rotations and clinical experience is where you will do the majority of your learning and where you will become acclimated to the healthcare environment. These two years are arguably the most important years of medical school in terms of getting into a good residency and really learning your clinical stuff.

Success is exactly what you say, the amount of work you put in will correlate with the amount of success you get out of the program. The school can only do so much, the rest is on you to keep up with the material, put in the time, and actually learn the material for boards and clinical rotations.

Issue #2 - I feel like you directly contradict yourself. You are telling people to request all of this information that doesn't pertain to YOU as an individual. A school's average board scores (which you may never see, ultimately), match rate, etc. are based on the results of each individual student. If you have an extraordinary student who gets into Mayo or Johns Hopkins residency, that in no way insinuates you have a chance in heck to get into that residency. Just because a school has placed someone in that residency doesn't mean they will ever do it again. Likewise, just because a school has never placed someone in a specific residency, doesn't mean they never will.

From my experience, I would heavily persuade students to choose a school that will keep their morale and drive up and going. Pick a school that makes you feel welcome, that fulfills your basic needs, and don't be afraid to give up a little something in order to attend a better school with a much better chance for success. If you are a person who cannot stand the thought of not being home every weekend, then I don't care if you made it into Harvard you are probably going to be miserable and hate your life and truth be told you will probably fail because of it. Pick a place that makes you happy to be there..

Don't take this as a post to disregard or pick apart what you have stated above, because I agree with 99% of it, but I do think the things I mentioned above should be at least considered or brought to the attention of pre-meds who aren't necessarily in the "know."

P.S. He/She isn't kidding about the mandatory lectures part. Luckily for me, my school REWARDS you for perfect attendance as opposed to making you come to every class and penalizing you for not showing up. I attend every class possible, because I believe you can never hear something too much, but I also like to hear everything from the professor first, before I go online and listen to it on the mp3. I am just that kind of person, I fear that maybe I missed a huge piece of information if I'm not there to hear it first-hand.

best of luck to you all! 🙂

 

[Doctor_Strange]

I think you are correct for the most part, but there are some issues you left out or didn't clearly articulate.

Issue #1 - XYZ vs XYZ school DOES matter, quite a lot actually. People aren't concerned about the first 2 years of education -- aside from OMM, almost every medical school in the nation (DO and MD) will have almost the same exact curriculum being covered, maybe through different methods, but it is still covered. However, the deal breaker comes in years 3 and 4. One of the biggest reasons, aside from research and reputation, people choose MD over DO is because of the rotation sites during MS3 and MS4. Your rotations and clinical experience is where you will do the majority of your learning and where you will become acclimated to the healthcare environment. These two years are arguably the most important years of medical school in terms of getting into a good residency and really learning your clinical stuff.

Success is exactly what you say, the amount of work you put in will correlate with the amount of success you get out of the program. The school can only do so much, the rest is on you to keep up with the material, put in the time, and actually learn the material for boards and clinical rotations.

Issue #2 - I feel like you directly contradict yourself. You are telling people to request all of this information that doesn't pertain to YOU as an individual. A school's average board scores (which you may never see, ultimately), match rate, etc. are based on the results of each individual student. If you have an extraordinary student who gets into Mayo or Johns Hopkins residency, that in no way insinuates you have a chance in heck to get into that residency. Just because a school has placed someone in that residency doesn't mean they will ever do it again. Likewise, just because a school has never placed someone in a specific residency, doesn't mean they never will.

From my experience, I would heavily persuade students to choose a school that will keep their morale and drive up and going. Pick a school that makes you feel welcome, that fulfills your basic needs, and don't be afraid to give up a little something in order to attend a better school with a much better chance for success. If you are a person who cannot stand the thought of not being home every weekend, then I don't care if you made it into Harvard you are probably going to be miserable and hate your life and truth be told you will probably fail because of it. Pick a place that makes you happy to be there..

Don't take this as a post to disregard or pick apart what you have stated above, because I agree with 99% of it, but I do think the things I mentioned above should be at least considered or brought to the attention of pre-meds who aren't necessarily in the "know."

P.S. He/She isn't kidding about the mandatory lectures part. Luckily for me, my school REWARDS you for perfect attendance as opposed to making you come to every class and penalizing you for not showing up. I attend every class possible, because I believe you can never hear something too much, but I also like to hear everything from the professor first, before I go online and listen to it on the mp3. I am just that kind of person, I fear that maybe I missed a huge piece of information if I'm not there to hear it first-hand.

best of luck to you all! 🙂

I was just about to write this myself. Rotations are a deal-breaker between why I am choosing LECOM-SH over BCOM. I felt a more welcoming and overall enjoyable experience during interview day at BCOM, but the shiny bells and whistles aside, I will endure the Pennsylvania winters simply because LECOMs 3rd and 4th year clerkship are more established. I think if a student is fortunate enough to choose between DO schools, don't go with the "how welcoming and compassionate all the faculty were on interview day" line of thinking--go with the schools's infrastructure, organization, and track record. I was just reading posts on one of the school-specific forums and was kind of amused some where selecting said school because the faculty and interviewers were so nice and smiling all day. But to each their own. Forge your own path as some would say (but I agree with the underlying message from OP).

 

[FutureD.O]

Recorded lectures FTW!

 

[radian313]

I think you are correct for the most part, but there are some issues you left out or didn't clearly articulate.

Issue #1 - XYZ vs XYZ school DOES matter, quite a lot actually. People aren't concerned about the first 2 years of education -- aside from OMM, almost every medical school in the nation (DO and MD) will have almost the same exact curriculum being covered, maybe through different methods, but it is still covered. However, the deal breaker comes in years 3 and 4. One of the biggest reasons, aside from research and reputation, people choose MD over DO is because of the rotation sites during MS3 and MS4. Your rotations and clinical experience is where you will do the majority of your learning and where you will become acclimated to the healthcare environment. These two years are arguably the most important years of medical school in terms of getting into a good residency and really learning your clinical stuff.

Success is exactly what you say, the amount of work you put in will correlate with the amount of success you get out of the program. The school can only do so much, the rest is on you to keep up with the material, put in the time, and actually learn the material for boards and clinical rotations.

Issue #2 - I feel like you directly contradict yourself. You are telling people to request all of this information that doesn't pertain to YOU as an individual. A school's average board scores (which you may never see, ultimately), match rate, etc. are based on the results of each individual student. If you have an extraordinary student who gets into Mayo or Johns Hopkins residency, that in no way insinuates you have a chance in heck to get into that residency. Just because a school has placed someone in that residency doesn't mean they will ever do it again. Likewise, just because a school has never placed someone in a specific residency, doesn't mean they never will.

From my experience, I would heavily persuade students to choose a school that will keep their morale and drive up and going. Pick a school that makes you feel welcome, that fulfills your basic needs, and don't be afraid to give up a little something in order to attend a better school with a much better chance for success. If you are a person who cannot stand the thought of not being home every weekend, then I don't care if you made it into Harvard you are probably going to be miserable and hate your life and truth be told you will probably fail because of it. Pick a place that makes you happy to be there..

Don't take this as a post to disregard or pick apart what you have stated above, because I agree with 99% of it, but I do think the things I mentioned above should be at least considered or brought to the attention of pre-meds who aren't necessarily in the "know."

P.S. He/She isn't kidding about the mandatory lectures part. Luckily for me, my school REWARDS you for perfect attendance as opposed to making you come to every class and penalizing you for not showing up. I attend every class possible, because I believe you can never hear something too much, but I also like to hear everything from the professor first, before I go online and listen to it on the mp3. I am just that kind of person, I fear that maybe I missed a huge piece of information if I'm not there to hear it first-hand.

best of luck to you all! 🙂

Thats why medicine is a team effort, so we can fill in areas of concern that I have missed like you filled in for other students. No offense taken my friend. Thanks for your input and best wishes to you as well. 🙂