Lowest MCATs for MD/PhD or MSTP programs

[isux]

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what is the lowest MCAT scores that you have heard of for someone who is accepted into the MD/PhD programs..i am just curious.
Is anything under 30 hopeless?? what about 25-29?

 

[Gfunk6]

30 (10, 10, 10). Below that, I don't know.

 

[randallB]

The lowest I've read is 27...some schools post ranges of scores to go along with their average mcat. If your score is 25-29, be prepared to demonstrate a strong gpa and you should probably save a small child from a fire or something. jk

good luck!

 

[dave613]

If I am not mistaken, there was a hispanic person on SDN , who had a 4.0 but scored less than a 30 on his MCAT. I think he was a URM though, but he got into NYU MSTP among others.

Hope that helps.

 

[Maebea]

what is the lowest MCAT scores that you have heard of for someone who is accepted into the MD/PhD programs..i am just curious.
Is anything under 30 hopeless?? what about 25-29?

30 seems to be the point at which your chances significantly deteriorate. Lowest I've seen has been a 26 for a non-URM (who got into the MSTPs at a few top-5 med schools) and a 22 for a URM student. Saving a small child from a fire wouldn't hurt, but above all you have to be an outstanding undergrad researcher. The same goes, however, for someone with a 42 MCAT; there are plenty of candidates with high MCATs and GPAs who do not gain admission because their research stunk. As others have said, the 3 most important things for MD/PhD programs are: Research; Research; and Research.

 

[randallB]

shoot, I only have "research, research...blank"

 

[Energon]

A URM student from my college got into our state school with a 24. English was his second language... but make no mistake he was freakin brilliant, he had won some sort of an undergrad scholarship to the NIH to do cancer research and had a couple of super publications in Blood and two oncology journals. The last I checked he had finshed M2 and started his PhD work.

 

[AliatUofT]

I think given that the MSTPs are so competitive you need both a good GPA, hight MCATs and very strong research experience.
i have cummilative undergrad GPA of 3.25 and my MCATs were a 29Q but i have a very strong research background 4 fisrt author publications, and numerous co-authorships, but i only got one interview at MT. Sinai in NY.
so i will think for you to get a number of interviews and to get in somewhere you need all 3.
however given that i am a canadian citizen, i am sure that also had a lot to do with all my rejections from MD/PhD programs

cheers
Ali

 

[itsaliger]

i've written about this before, but i disagree with the poster above who stated that this was above-all the most important.

i don't know how the admissions process really went for anyone other than me, but from my experience, one does not have to have ground-breaking publications to get into an mstp.

i have never been published. not first author, not second author, not third. i did write a 90-page thesis for my undergraduate institution (small college), and worked on this project during the summer before and during my senior year (along with other classes). someday, the data might find its way into some secondary behavioral neuroscience journal, but it also might not.

other than this experience, i had only one other summer of research, in a chemistry lab also at my college.

in other words, i did not have "research, research, research."

what i had:

- good grades at a good college
- a good mcat score
- good letters of rec, esp from my thesis advisor
- a very solid understanding of my project/other literature in the area
- a good attitude and well-thought-out reasons as to why i wanted to be an md/phd
- two x chromosomes. i have to think this probably helped me, or i would be fooling myself. just to clarify, i don't mean this in an "i'm hot and i pulled a sexy bend-and-snap after all interviews" way, but in a "program director seems eager to balance out the program" way.

i applied to 16 schools, all in the so-called top 25 (except for one, i think, my state school). i got interview offers from 11 schools (actually 10 md/phd, one md/only, which i didn't attend), went to 8 of them, was waitlisted at 2, and was accepted at 6. i attend a top5 school and i like it a lot, for the most part.

i shudder when i think that i might have been reading this forum 3 years ago while applying and thinking, "oh, i might as well not even bother, because i don't have NEARLY enough research experience." i would have been wrong. i just posted this to save someone like me from drawing the wrong conclusions.

 

[dave613]

i've written about this before, but i disagree with the poster above who stated that this was above-all the most important.

i don't know how the admissions process really went for anyone other than me, but from my experience, one does not have to have ground-breaking publications to get into an mstp.

i have never been published. not first author, not second author, not third. i did write a 90-page thesis for my undergraduate institution (small college), and worked on this project during the summer before and during my senior year (along with other classes). someday, the data might find its way into some secondary behavioral neuroscience journal, but it also might not.

other than this experience, i had only one other summer of research, in a chemistry lab also at my college.

in other words, i did not have "research, research, research."

what i had:

- good grades at a good college
- a good mcat score
- good letters of rec, esp from my thesis advisor
- a very solid understanding of my project/other literature in the area
- a good attitude and well-thought-out reasons as to why i wanted to be an md/phd
- two x chromosomes. i have to think this probably helped me, or i would be fooling myself. just to clarify, i don't mean this in an "i'm hot and i pulled a sexy bend-and-snap after all interviews" way, but in a "program director seems eager to balance out the program" way.

i applied to 16 schools, all in the so-called top 25 (except for one, i think, my state school). i got interview offers from 11 schools (actually 10 md/phd, one md/only, which i didn't attend), went to 8 of them, was waitlisted at 2, and was accepted at 6. i attend a top5 school and i like it a lot, for the most part.

i shudder when i think that i might have been reading this forum 3 years ago while applying and thinking, "oh, i might as well not even bother, because i don't have NEARLY enough research experience." i would have been wrong. i just posted this to save someone like me from drawing the wrong conclusions.

You were probably accepted because of that 90 page thesis--i would consider that solid research.

 

[Maebea]

i've written about this before, but i disagree with the poster above who stated that this was above-all the most important.
.

Ok, so maybe it is just Research, Research. Programs do want individuals to have a reasonable personality, maybe a modicum of social consciousness, and a strong academic background. Using those criteria, you screen out maybe 3% of the applicant pool as being not appropriate for MD/PhD training. To differentiate among the others, MD-PhD programs try to determine which candidates have the highest probability of being successful researchers. (The NIH spends >$30 million annually on MD-PhD training, and they expect programs to turn out good researchers.) Programs assume, rightly or wrongly, that the quality of past research efforts is an indicator of the likelihood of future success in research. Programs do not expect applicants to have publications, nor do they even expect the research to have yielded positive results. They do, however, expect the research experience to have demonstrated that the applicant is bright, creative, independent, resourceful, motivated, etc. I know that this is what I looked for in the thousands of MD-PhD applications I read over the years.

 

[dave613]

Ok, so maybe it is just Research, Research. Programs do want individuals to have a reasonable personality, maybe a modicum of social consciousness, and a strong academic background. Using those criteria, you screen out maybe 3% of the applicant pool as being not appropriate for MD/PhD training. To differentiate among the others, MD-PhD programs try to determine which candidates have the highest probability of being successful researchers. (The NIH spends >$30 million annually on MD-PhD training, and they expect programs to turn out good researchers.) Programs assume, rightly or wrongly, that the quality of past research efforts is an indicator of the likelihood of future success in research. Programs do not expect applicants to have publications, nor do they even expect the research to have yielded positive results. They do, however, expect the research experience to have demonstrated that the applicant is bright, creative, independent, resourceful, motivated, etc. I know that this is what I looked for in the thousands of MD-PhD applications I read over the years.

You read? Are you part of an adcom of some medical school? and otherwise i agree with you. They want to see if you're productive and worth the free tuition+grants. Sometimes they can evaluate that based on your mcat score and gpa mostly, with little research. This is done on a case by case basis. Bottom line, to be on the safe side, you must try to do as best as you can on the MCAT.

 

[sylvamoon]

hey. how about this?

really bad undergraduate grades (~2.5)
low MCAT score 24 (waiting on august)
Whole bunch of pubs. 2nd author science, numerous first author, second, and third authors?

 

[dave613]

hey. how about this?

really bad undergraduate grades (~2.5)
low MCAT score 24 (waiting on august)
Whole bunch of pubs. 2nd author science, numerous first author, second, and third authors?

Ok, the research is good, but you're going to have to do some serious explaining with respect to your grades. And, even with the science publication, I wouldn't be surprised if you lose interviews at the upper tiers simply because they expect higher mcats and gpas. You should ask the previous poster, maebia, he's on adcoms at an upper tier school, he can tell you the truth of your chances.

 

[thinkpositive]

yeah...I was wondering about mine too - I have a 3.86 GPA, MCAT's not here yet but expect somewhere in the high 20's...I did a summer research internship with HHMI, I also have leadership (RA), shadowing (hospitals) and service (volunteering) experiences.

So how does it look in your opinion ? 😱

 

[dave613]

yeah...I was wondering about mine too - I have a 3.86 GPA, MCAT's not here yet but expect somewhere in the high 20's...I did a summer research internship with HHMI, I also have leadership (RA), shadowing (hospitals) and service (volunteering) experiences.

So how does it look in your opinion ? 😱

Well your gpa is nice. What's your major(s)? not that that matters so much. One summer internship, even if it meant a lot and you gained a ton from it , including getting published, is not going to cut it. I mean you might have a shot at the lower tiers, but in general, mstps require at least two summers of research. And, your mcat score must be in the 30s to even have a shot at the lower tiers with only one summer of research. So, as of now, you need a strong mcat score 32+, and more extensive research to have a serious shot.

Hope that helps!

 

[thinkpositive]

hey thanks for the reply and the tips, I am a biological sciences major 🙂

 

[dave613]

hey thanks for the reply and the tips, I am a biological sciences major 🙂

It's my pleasure.

 

[BandGeek]

It's my pleasure.

I took the stupid MCAT twice and got the same score (29), however, when you took the best of both, I had a 32. With a 4.0 GPA, two presentations at international meetings, and a pending publication (first author, Biology of Reproduction), I didn't have a problem getting accepted at two MSTP schools. GOOD LETTERS of recommendation, plus ANY national scholarships (Goldwater, National Merit, etc...), leadership, and other activities (travel/study abroad) help as well.
I think interview performace matters the most as to final acceptance. The MCAT and other factors just get you in the door. If your MCAT is weak, make the rest rock.
Therefore, the MCAT isn't the bottom line, but it is a factor.
Good luck.

 

[dave613]

I took the stupid MCAT twice and got the same score (29), however, when you took the best of both, I had a 32. With a 4.0 GPA, two presentations at international meetings, and a pending publication (first author, Biology of Reproduction), I didn't have a problem getting accepted at two MSTP schools. GOOD LETTERS of recommendation, plus ANY national scholarships (Goldwater, National Merit, etc...), leadership, and other activities (travel/study abroad) help as well.
I think interview performace matters the most as to final acceptance. The MCAT and other factors just get you in the door. If your MCAT is weak, make the rest rock.
Therefore, the MCAT isn't the bottom line, but it is a factor.
Good luck.

which mstps were you accepted to? i'm just curious

 

[thinkpositive]

thanks ! so I should apply even if I think that my mcat might be lower than a 30 ? or should I wait till I get the score ?

and also, how much weight does the GRE carry ? - since some schools tell you to submit it if you took it...

thanks !

 

[mytirf]

I really do not think there is an exact formula of grades, MCAT scores and research that MSTP programs look for. It does seem that some of the top schools have cutoffs for MCATs and GPAs, but in general if you have a reason for a lower score, it is usually not that significant. As far as research is concerned, I do believe this area has more weight, especially if someone is not as competitive in other areas. However it is not the number of publications or where they are published that is important according to my PI (who is the head of the admissions committee at my school), but does the student actually understand the research and is excited about scientific investigation.

Too often I read about people applying for MSTP or MD/PhD programs because it looks good on a residency application or makes them superior to other students. Do not be fooled! Admission officers know this and will press you about why you want to pursue the dual degree. Furthermore, it is a difficult path, both from a time perspective (6-9years), and you will often feel like an outsider and behind your colleagues especially during the transition from medical school to lab and from the lab to the clinics. I encourage people to really think about the entire process and really why they want to do an MD/PhD.Ddon't do it "just because" or for some sense of glory or superiority, do it because you love science and want to learn and be engaged in the practice of medicine.


-V

 

[thinkpositive]

thanks, that helps a lot ! and I am not doing it "just because" 🙂

 

[smiles8642]

I have extensive research (2 years in genetics and 2 other internships) and have never been published. For my genetics work I received 2nd place at an exhibition of student research at my university. My grades are not stellar (3.76 cum, 3.58 sci, 3.97 non sci) and when I first took the MCAT I got a 26S. Retook the MCAT in August and this time I had time to study and prepare for it. Expect at least a 30 on this one.

How competitive do you think I am for an MSTP program? I have applied to 11 schools and have received secondaries from 10. The 11 schools include two state schools while the rest are ranked schools. I applied on the basis of their PhD aspects.

After reading this thread, I was wondering how much emphasis schools really seem to place on each one of these aspects.

Also, I am working on my MSTP secondaries, while I was doing this I was wondering if there were any specific disadvantages/advantages of doing MD/PHD instead of just doing MD and then doing a fellowship that I hadn't thought of already? Being trained as a scientist seems to be a major advantage to the program and time is not an issue for me as I am very young (just turned 18) and love the possibility of being able to be a part of translational research and teaching as a physician scientist. Anyways, just wondering what you guys think about these things! Thanks, feel free to e-mail me if you like.

 

[pathdr2b]

time is not an issue for me as I am very young (just turned 18) and love the possibility of being able to be a part of translational research and teaching as a physician scientist.

Time isn't an issue for me either and I'll soon be 38. 😉

I love the possibility of being able to be a part of translational research and teaching as a physician scientist.

Me too, so I guess true passion has no age limit!

PS- I personally won't be applying MD/PhD without a complete , competitive application, so April 2005 MCAT, here I come!