Hey, I'm fairly new to the site and have just become interested in podiatry. I have been pre-med this entire time and was talking to my friend this year about how he wants to go into podiatry, and it got me thinking if it was an option for me. So I shadowed a podiatrist and loved the atmosphere of his office, the lifestyle, and the way he interacted with his patients. I'm also very interested in surgery. However, I'm still very interested in medicine and am applying to about 12 MD and DO programs. I'm only applying to NYCPM and TUSPM for now, but that's because those are the schools closest to where I live. For the med schools I'm applying to, those are still only no more than 2 hours away from my house. I honestly have such a passion for medicine that I would be happy in either field, so I don't want to give the impression to admissions that podiatry is just a plan B. I am indeed going to apply as soon as the cycle starts (although I know it is a few months after MD and DO schools start). Even still is this going to look bad?
new pre-pod
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First, welcome to the pre-pod forum 
; always nice to see a new face.
Second, since you are talking about Admission Cycles for MD/DO schools, I assume you are a junior and will be applying to the next cycle beginning this June for the following entering class. If not...you missed the MD/DO deadlines a while ago. Anyway, I suppose the MD/DO question can and will come up during podiatry school interviews, and you can only be honest about it. Not sure how to gauge how the schools will react to it though.
Good luck!
; always nice to see a new face.Second, since you are talking about Admission Cycles for MD/DO schools, I assume you are a junior and will be applying to the next cycle beginning this June for the following entering class. If not...you missed the MD/DO deadlines a while ago. Anyway, I suppose the MD/DO question can and will come up during podiatry school interviews, and you can only be honest about it. Not sure how to gauge how the schools will react to it though.
Good luck!
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arez10:
If you are talking about applying next year (for 2010 enrollment) then you are correct. MD/DO apps will open in the first week of July while Pod apps open first week of September. No matter what you decide to do make sure you get your primary's in RIGHT AWAY. Then as MD/DO's start sending you secondaries, get them back ASAP in order of interest. For example: within a week or two you may very well have 7 or 8 secondary apps arriving at your house. Most schools do not screen primaries since they can make a little coin on secondaries where they charge you another $100-200 fee. If School A is your top choice, fill out the School A secondary first and send it back. If School B is a pipe dream then start other apps, get them mailed back, and then start the School B app. PM me if this makes no sense.
As for the appearence of podiatry being a "backup" plan, it depends on what kind of medicine you want to practice (or think you want to pratice since medical school could change your specialty of interest). It might help if I give you two scenarios since I don't know the answer to that question
1. You want to do something in Primary Care. Don't worry about Pod school looking like a backup. You can tell Pod schools that your interest is in primary care but when it came time to applying you weren't sure wether you wanted to be limitied to the foot and ankle. Gastro, endo, gp, etc were still very interesting to you and you wanted to have the option of going that route if you so choose. At this point, however, you do need kind of have your mind made up. Tell them about how much you enjoyed shadowing a pod which led to your interest in applying to their school. I think its reasonable but that doesn't mean much
2. You want to be a surgeon, radiologist, or go into medical research. Pod school will look like a backup IMO, so you will either need to lie to pod schools or just not apply in the first place. A podiatrist is not a surgeon...surgeons do surgery and pretty much just surgery. It's a different mindset. Wheras primary care physicians focus on prevention and treatment, surgeons fix things immediately. For a podiatrist, surgery is typically a last resort when pallative care and other less invasive measures don't work (and a majority of your work will be something other than surgery). Radiologists don't care about helping people, they just want to make money and have plenty of vacation time
Hope that helped...and you don't fall asleep reading all that. See what happens when people ask intelligent questions? *cough*Darklord*cough*
If you are talking about applying next year (for 2010 enrollment) then you are correct. MD/DO apps will open in the first week of July while Pod apps open first week of September. No matter what you decide to do make sure you get your primary's in RIGHT AWAY. Then as MD/DO's start sending you secondaries, get them back ASAP in order of interest. For example: within a week or two you may very well have 7 or 8 secondary apps arriving at your house. Most schools do not screen primaries since they can make a little coin on secondaries where they charge you another $100-200 fee. If School A is your top choice, fill out the School A secondary first and send it back. If School B is a pipe dream then start other apps, get them mailed back, and then start the School B app. PM me if this makes no sense.
As for the appearence of podiatry being a "backup" plan, it depends on what kind of medicine you want to practice (or think you want to pratice since medical school could change your specialty of interest). It might help if I give you two scenarios since I don't know the answer to that question
1. You want to do something in Primary Care. Don't worry about Pod school looking like a backup. You can tell Pod schools that your interest is in primary care but when it came time to applying you weren't sure wether you wanted to be limitied to the foot and ankle. Gastro, endo, gp, etc were still very interesting to you and you wanted to have the option of going that route if you so choose. At this point, however, you do need kind of have your mind made up. Tell them about how much you enjoyed shadowing a pod which led to your interest in applying to their school. I think its reasonable but that doesn't mean much
2. You want to be a surgeon, radiologist, or go into medical research. Pod school will look like a backup IMO, so you will either need to lie to pod schools or just not apply in the first place. A podiatrist is not a surgeon...surgeons do surgery and pretty much just surgery. It's a different mindset. Wheras primary care physicians focus on prevention and treatment, surgeons fix things immediately. For a podiatrist, surgery is typically a last resort when pallative care and other less invasive measures don't work (and a majority of your work will be something other than surgery). Radiologists don't care about helping people, they just want to make money and have plenty of vacation time
Hope that helped...and you don't fall asleep reading all that. See what happens when people ask intelligent questions? *cough*Darklord*cough*
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arez10:
If you are talking about applying next year (for 2010 enrollment) then you are correct. MD/DO apps will open in the first week of July while Pod apps open first week of September. No matter what you decide to do make sure you get your primary's in RIGHT AWAY. Then as MD/DO's start sending you secondaries, get them back ASAP in order of interest. For example: within a week or two you may very well have 7 or 8 secondary apps arriving at your house. Most schools do not screen primaries since they can make a little coin on secondaries where they charge you another $100-200 fee. If School A is your top choice, fill out the School A secondary first and send it back. If School B is a pipe dream then start other apps, get them mailed back, and then start the School B app. PM me if this makes no sense.
As for the appearence of podiatry being a "backup" plan, it depends on what kind of medicine you want to practice (or think you want to pratice since medical school could change your specialty of interest). It might help if I give you two scenarios since I don't know the answer to that question
1. You want to do something in Primary Care. Don't worry about Pod school looking like a backup. You can tell Pod schools that your interest is in primary care but when it came time to applying you weren't sure wether you wanted to be limitied to the foot and ankle. Gastro, endo, gp, etc were still very interesting to you and you wanted to have the option of going that route if you so choose. At this point, however, you do need kind of have your mind made up. Tell them about how much you enjoyed shadowing a pod which led to your interest in applying to their school. I think its reasonable but that doesn't mean much
2. You want to be a surgeon, radiologist, or go into medical research. Pod school will look like a backup IMO, so you will either need to lie to pod schools or just not apply in the first place. A podiatrist is not a surgeon...surgeons do surgery and pretty much just surgery. It's a different mindset. Wheras primary care physicians focus on prevention and treatment, surgeons fix things immediately. For a podiatrist, surgery is typically a last resort when pallative care and other less invasive measures don't work (and a majority of your work will be something other than surgery). Radiologists don't care about helping people, they just want to make money and have plenty of vacation time
Hope that helped...and you don't fall asleep reading all that. See what happens when people ask intelligent questions? *cough*Darklord*cough*
dtrack-
once you are in pod school you'll understand that podiatrists can fill a variety of niches, i personally know pods who work in ortho groups and in hospitals (ortho dept or sugery dept) that do almost solely surgery. i know pods who work almost exclusively with pedal radiography. i know pods who are academics and do a very large amount of research. i know pods who work at diabetes centers with endocrinologists etc. just as an MD student is trained brodly as a physician at the end of school and then decide what route of specialization to take during residency, consistent with vision 2015, new pods are trained as physicians within their education, training, and experience. some choose to practice broadly, some choose to embark upon quite specialized areas. the notion that a podiatrist is not a surgeon is quite ridiculous, though i know what you meant.
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hamlinbeach:
I get what you mean...that's why I'm going into podiatry. The diversity is amazing but what you described is probably 10% of all pods, and the ones that are in those specialties are still limited to F&A. Good luck making a career out of pedal radiography. While you may specialize in it, hardly anybody will do nothing but read pics all day. As for the pods that "do almost solely surgery", thats probably less than 1% of pods...but as for a pod being a surgeon, I know what you meant
I get what you mean...that's why I'm going into podiatry. The diversity is amazing but what you described is probably 10% of all pods, and the ones that are in those specialties are still limited to F&A. Good luck making a career out of pedal radiography. While you may specialize in it, hardly anybody will do nothing but read pics all day. As for the pods that "do almost solely surgery", thats probably less than 1% of pods...but as for a pod being a surgeon, I know what you meant
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LOLOL. you're too funny.
Applying to both MD/DO and podiatry schools probably won't look bad. I actually know a lot of people who did it and they turned out just fine. Although if you applied to two completely different programs, like dental and optometry, that may be a problem (or so I would think). Just be prepared to answer a question like...What will you do in the event you get accepted to both Medical and podiatry school? That's a toughy... good luck!
