Medical Schools that don't require 3rd quarter of O-Chem?

[cerebellumcat]

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Apparently some of my pre-med friends are saying not all medical schools require the 3rd quarter of o-chem?
I have already taken my MCAT (yay 520), but had to self-teach the 3rd quarter of o-chem. I'm in my first week of the last quarter and have a lot of my plate and am wondering if it would look super bad to not take the 3rd quarter of o-chem for applying to medical school?
Please be nice. Thanks!

 

[Raryn]

Apparently some of my pre-med friends are saying not all medical schools require the 3rd quarter of o-chem?
I have already taken my MCAT (yay 520), but had to self-teach the 3rd quarter of o-chem. I'm in my first week of the last quarter and have a lot of my plate and am wondering if it would look super bad to not take the 3rd quarter of o-chem for applying to medical school?
Please be nice. Thanks!

A significant proportion of med schools don't anymore if you take biochem. I'd say maybe even as many as half require a year *total* between o-chem and biochem (in addition to a year of gen chem of course) - but you need to look at the individual school websites for the ones you're interested in. Unfortunately, not even the MSAR is 100% accurate for pre-reqs.

This table is OK, but it's also 4 years old, and more schools have gone away without requiring the full year of o-chem since then.

 

[chemphysicsinstructor]

Taking more science classes is usually not a bad idea. In fact, for organic chemistry 3 (the third quarter), it can reinforce and review ideas that you learned in prior terms. In the organic chemistry courses I teach, both the textbook and I use a "tiered iterative approach" in which we review material from previous terms. I also do the same for my general chemistry courses.