Medical Non-Trad nursing background, but would like to go into medicine. What should I do?

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I graduated in May 2019 with my BSN, 3.4 GPA, and have been working in a Pediatric ICU as a nurse. I have always wanted to go to medical school, but was discouraged by my family and was not confident enough to pursue it. I thought I would be satisfied with becoming a nurse practitioner, but I am in my first semester of a pediatric NP program and I know it is not for me. I want to go to medical school to gain a deeper understanding of the pathology and have more autonomy in my practice. I feel stuck right now in terms of being in the NP program, but wanting to get started on pre-reqs and MCAT studying. Any advice? Do I even have a chance of being accepted due to my nursing background and starting NP school?
Being an RN does not preclude acceptance to an MD or DO program, nor does becoming an NP. But you would do better to have a few years of experience under your belt before applying. Staying in an NP program, thinking not to complete it, and applying to MD/DO at the same time to hedge your bets would not end well as professional programs don't like to poach from other professional programs.

If you are aiming for MD programs, you might need to do some GPA repair first. A cGPA of 3.4 is competitive for DO med schools, though. Have you calculated your BCPM GPA and sGPA by any chance?

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What is it about your current situation that you don't like? Why do you think being a doctor would necessarily be better?

It depends on scope of practice and area of specialty but a lot of times the NP or PA has more interaction with patients than the physician. I think you an be a good candidate if you can show us situations where your perspective as a NP informs us how you would be as a physician.
 
I have not calculated those, I only have a few science courses as most of them are nursing which I believe don’t count for the science GPA.

Since I don’t have most of the required pre-reqs, I would need to do a post-bacc of some sort. This would also help to boost my GPA is what I was thinking.

I figured my best bet would be to finish this program, and it makes sense to have a few years of experience. Then it will be easier for me to show that I’ve worked as a nurse practitioner and still want to pursue Med school.

Thank you for your reply!
For AACOMAS DO medical schools: sGPA includes Bio, Chem, Physics, Other Science (which includes Nursing) AACOMAS Course Subjects
 
I did not realize that! Assuming I calculated correctly, it looks like my sGPA including nursing courses is 3.04....I'm assuming this isn't very competitive. It seems like my application would rely heavily on grades from a post-bacc. Not sure how MSN gpa would be factored into this?
DO schools would factor MSN grades into composite, overall GPAs.

MD schools never merge undergrad and grad grades together, as undergrad BCPM GPA is the primary parameter they use for comparison.
 
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Ok, just to clarify - for MD schools how would a post-bacc factor into GPA? Is it even worth considering MD schools with my undergrad gpa of 3.4 or should I strictly consider DO?

Thank you so much for your replies!
Undergrad postbac grades are calculated together with your college grades. You might calculate out how many postbac science and math grades with As you'd need to raise your BCPM GPA to a competitive level.

Here is what the BCPM GPA includes: https://aamc-orange.global.ssl.fast...ab328dc/amcas_course_classification_guide.pdf

Here is an AMCAS calculator to help you figure it out: AMCAS GPA Calculator (Revised)

And of course the MCAT score is an important factor in considering one's competitiveness also.
 
This is so helpful!! Thank you so much. What science gpa should I be shooting for to be competitive? I'm guessing at LEAST a 3.5?

Also, does an upward trend help at all? All of my science courses are from freshman/sophomore year. Does doing well in a post-bacc now help me at all? Or will it be strictly off of GPA?
An overall sGPA of 3.5 for AACOMAS DO schools would be very competitive. A postbac BCPM GPA of 3.7+ for 20-32 hours would make you competitive for a few MD schools. A steep upward postbac grade trend to a 3.7+ makes you competitive for MD schools that weight recent grades higher. All MD schools appreciate an upward grade trend, but many will still judge your application by overall undergrad GPAs. Some MD schools take graduate level grades into account (but the vast majority don't).

So there is no generalization that can be made as each med school has their own policies. As you continue to read these forums, you will get ideas of which schools will most appreciate your GPA repair, so you can target schools most likely to offer you an interview (and not waste money using the "spray and pray" approach).
 
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