MD/PhD in Biomathematics or Computational Biology

[Beckie]

I am interested in an MD/PhD in biomath. I have my undergrad degree in mathematics.

1. How long would it take me to complete the MD/PhD program to getting my first job working in industry? I've read that it takes 7-8 years for the MD/PhD part, but to work in industry would I have to do a residency or fellowship?

2. If I get a master's degree in biomathematics before applying to the MD/PhD program, would I still have to take some prereqs to get into med school or will the master's degree be enough? I still need to take one chem class and two organic chem classes.

Thanks in advance!! 🙂

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[Beckie]

I'm interested in cancer research (tumor growth in response to chemotherapy, etc).

 

[Beckie]

Anyone? 🙂

 

[Awesome80s]

1. 7-8 years is probably accurate for the MD/PhD portion of your training. Some quantitative PhDs (e.g., biostatistics, bioinformatics) can tend to have slightly larger course requirements than other MD/PhD concentrations, because there is less overlap with medical coursework. This varies from school to school and program to program, but it may mean you would be closer to 8/9 years. Look up specific programs that you are interested in.

After that, if you are not interested in practicing, you would not need to complete residency or fellowship, which are only needed if you want to practice. Most MD/PhDs end up doing a residency, but there are always some who are no longer interested in practicing and head right for a post-doc, faculty position, or industry.

2. You would still have to take all premedical prerequisites in order to be considered for medical school or MD/PhD. Very few schools, if any, waive these requirements, even for exceptionally well-qualified candidates.

Hope this helps.

 

[Beckie]

Thank you so much! Your post was extremely informative. 🙂

 

[Choculitis]

Why would you do an MD if you don't plan on doing a residency? I don't really see the point if you're planning on going to industry right away.

 

[Neuronix]

1. 7-8 years is probably accurate for the MD/PhD portion of your training.

8 +/- 1 year is my experience. If anything, the quantitative PhDs graduated faster in my experience. See my blog entry: http://www.neuronix.org/2011/09/meeting-about-return-this-past-week-i.html

After that, if you are not interested in practicing, you would not need to complete residency or fellowship, which are only needed if you want to practice. Most MD/PhDs end up doing a residency, but there are always some who are no longer interested in practicing and head right for a post-doc, faculty position, or industry.

I strongly recommend anyone complete a residency because, well to copy from another recent thread: Remember, the PhD job market is TERRIBLE. You do not want to give up your clinical medical abilities. If you do this, you are in the same place as the PhDs. Your MD does not mean anything without board certification/eligibility. But, being a practicing or eligible to practice physician you are much more valuable, including on the research side.

TL;DR: my post-doc advisor's advice (a 100% research MD/PhD): "Doing an MD/PhD program without completing a residency is ****ing stupid."

The number who don't enter residency from an MD/PhD program is well less than 10%. I have the percentage who went to "post-doc" as 4% from an old thread based on a PDF that I can no longer find (http://forums.studentdoctor.net/showpost.php?p=1429866&postcount=26). That does not count graduates to industry, however I can speak for the one MD/PhD I know who went to industry instead of post-doc, and he was listed on our match list as post-doc. Graduates of the program I graduated from are heavily dissuaded from going straight from the program to industry, as it is generally assumed that one needs additional training after graduate school to become a principal investigator, which is generally the research goal of the program.

2. You would still have to take all premedical prerequisites in order to be considered for medical school or MD/PhD. Very few schools, if any, waive these requirements, even for exceptionally well-qualified candidates.

Agreed. A master's degree means nothing on its own. I generally don't recommend people do them at all if they are interested in MD/PhD. You need to focus on getting the med school pre-reqs and getting straight As in them while pursuing additional research. Master's programs include a lot of advanced coursework, teaching, and thesis writing that generally are not necessary for MD/PhD programs. This doesn't even include the cost you don't want to incur this early before a long training process. Is there some reason I'm missing about why you want the master's degree?

 

[Awesome80s]

8 +/- 1 year is my experience. If anything, the quantitative PhDs graduated faster in my experience.

I could imagine that the thesis component of a quantitative PhD might be shorter than other, more traditional PhDs, simply because quantitative PhDs don't have to wait for cells to grow (for example). I meant to highlight that some quantitative programs can be quite long because the coursework is quite heavy. At the program I interviewed with last week, they told me I shouldn't expect to begin thesis work until PhD year 3, because there are two years of full-time classes, without which you aren't much use as a researcher. Not all places, of course, are like this--indeed, I think that the quantitative PhDs are quite variable program-to-program.

I strongly recommend anyone complete a residency because, well to copy from another recent thread: Remember, the PhD job market is TERRIBLE.

Agree. Original poster seemed to want to know what the requirements are, and there is clearly no requirement that one completes a residency (indeed, three of my recent interviewers had skipped their residencies and gone on to be quite successful in their academic careers). But I agree--why get an MD at all if you're not going to see the training through.

 

[Neuronix]

I meant to highlight that some quantitative programs can be quite long because the coursework is quite heavy.

This is institution and department specific. The not focusing on thesis work until year 3 was true of the Neuroscience department when I started where I trained. Conversely, if you did your PhD doing molecular interaction modeling, you would be 100% thesis focused starting at the beginning of year 2.

Be careful of certain top-tier "prestigious" departments. They often do demand more time wasted of their MD/PhD students.

(indeed, three of my recent interviewers had skipped their residencies and gone on to be quite successful in their academic careers).

This was a lot easier in the Clinton era when the NIH budget doubled. The job market was once good for PhDs. The funding rates for common grants were rumored to be as high as 50%. It's easier to get grants when you're established rather than new. So those who were successful in a path in the past when funding was better may not be successful now. Take all advice from your seniors (including mine) with a grain of salt.

 

[Lil Mick]

Current student chiming in. Depending on the school and department, you may have to start from scratch on the PhD (ours doesn't exempt MD/PhD students from any course work in mathematics or statistics). Mathematics PhDs usually take 5+ years to complete, which would put you at 9+ years for the program. Friendly word of advice, look into your reasons for doing an MD/PhD if you're doing something quantitive for your research. Very few people in this field of research have an MD or even a BS in biology/biochem... If you're thinking of practicing and doing research, MD/PhD will be a good option. If you're doing it to get training in biology/medicine for your research, you may be miserable in your medical school years (not fun and potential for dropping out or taking a break during medical school). PM me if you want to talk about these programs more 🙂

 

[ellealla]

I am doing an MD and a PhD in Computer Science. Even if you don't want to do a residency, the MD will provide you with a perspective and vocabulary that would be very difficult to acquire in any other way. If you want to do medically-relevant computational work, I think that's a valid reason to get an MD. Without an MD, you'll have a harder time talking to doctors (it's like a different language), and you'll have a harder time figuring out what to work on. I've seen a LOT of projects that went in the wrong direction because the participants had computational expertise but no medical background. If you have a computational PhD and a medical background, you'll have a TON of opportunities in both industry and academia. MD PhDs do take a long time - yes 7 - 8 years - but it's worth it, if you want to do medically-related research. With regards to residency, you should do residency for only one reason: you want to treat patients.

 

[rtn1]

Dude come on why are you bumping threads from like 7 years ago?