OHSU vs. UW (WWAMI)

[Throckmorton_MT]

Hey guys, I was recently admitted to OHSU, which was one of my top choice schools. However, today I was removed from the alternate list at UW. To make it even more interesting, I was so excited about OHSU that I wrote them a letter of intent immediately after my interview and already have an apartment lined up down there. I'm kind of between a rock and a hard place.

UWashington (WWAMI)

Pros:
-cheaper by a big margin considering in-state tuition and lower cost of living
-higher rank
-close to family
-I like my home state
-lots of friends in the program

Cons:
-curriculum seems too new
-have lived here all my life and would love to experience the city
-facilities are meh
-you move around A LOT and don't necessarily have a say in the matter.
-have heard mixed reviews about the quality of education in a rural environment
-I don't want to do rural medicine
-limited job opportunities for SO
-limited research opportunities

OHSU

Pros:
-awesome facilities
-Knight Cancer Research Institute for research
-Portland is great.
-have scholarship for in-state tuition.
-more job opportunities for SO
-still have family there
-curriculum seems better established
-could see myself there long-term
-I was accepted outright here; that may not matter, but it makes me feel like the fit was better

Cons:
-cost of living
-open spaces are harder to come by
-lower ranking
-may have difficulty adjusting to new lifestyle
-traffic and general drawbacks to living in a big city
-won't be close to immediate family

If anyone has any advice, I would love to hear from you!



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[pinacol]

This is the exact same situation that I was in last year. I made a very similar pros and cons list to the one that you made, and I ended up deciding to go to UW at one of the regional sites (almost two weeks to being done with my first year of medical school!). I'm pasting your list and addressing some relevant points in relation to my experience at UW and the reasons I decided not to go to OHSU (I made a summary statement at the bottom because I realize that I made this a pretty long answer, but I have a lot to say):

Pros:
-cheaper by a big margin considering in-state tuition and lower cost of living. This point was a big deal for me. Even with scholarship funds to go to OHSU, going to UW at my regional site would save me $150,000 in debt at the end of four years (not including interest). The price couldn't be beat, and combined with knowing that UW is higher ranked made this one of my main decision factors.

-higher rank To paraphrase another post that compared UW to other schools (incuding OHSU), OHSU will open doors, but UW will open the door and throw you through it.

-close to family This shouldn't be underestimated. I lived in Portland before coming to medical school, and I really learned to love my independence. I thought that going back to my home state would be hard and that I would lose some of that independence being so close to home. However, being close to my biggest support group has been a life saver during some of the more difficult times. It's been wonderful having them.

-I like my home state Good! 🙂

-lots of friends in the program

Cons:
-curriculum seems too new This was the biggest con for me, too. However, the curriculum isn't much newer than the OHSU curriculum (and they are actually quite similar). Sometimes the curriculum feels obviously new and kind of frustrating, but the faculty work so hard to improve on it. It's really nice to see how quickly they take your feedback to heart (and there is plenty of opportunity to give good feedback). I've heard of some changes that they are already making for next year, and it already sounds a lot better than what we just went through. Also, from what I've heard (I don't know the exact numbers), the curriculum didn't seem to change how well UW students performed on Step 1. I'm not sure if that's a pro or a con, but it's something to consider. Also, as an FYI, UW is not known for its didactic preparation for Step 1, it's really about the clinical stuff afterward and good performance on Step 2. My plug for this is that the new curriculum gives UW students more time to experience what UW is really good at without rally harming Step 1 scores (if that makes sense).

-have lived here all my life and would love to experience the city. Portland is amazing and I miss it every day. I can't argue this point at all.

-facilities are meh Depends on where you are at? Ours are pretty amazing.

-you move around A LOT and don't necessarily have a say in the matter. This is something that I wished that I would have considered more. However, you don't have to move around if you don't want to. There is an option to "track" at several sites around the region so you don't have to go on the "WWAMI Safari" if you don't want to. Going into the program I was set on doing the safari and experiencing everything that I could around the region, but now I feel kind of rootless, which is frustrating.

-have heard mixed reviews about the quality of education in a rural environment I disagree with this. I don't know what site you will be at, but I know that my regional site usually has a better exam average than Seattle. They work very hard to standardize the material across the region, and I think they do a good job of that. The biggest thing that isn't standardized across sites is club/speaker opportunities (obviously we don't have as many specialists or famous scientists living out in the region)

-I don't want to do rural medicine Neither do I, and you don't have to. Most people seem indifferent about it. They definitely don't push the rural medicine stuff down your throat (but they do push primary care pretty hard--which some people don't want to do either).

-limited job opportunities for SO

-limited research opportunities I would disagree with this point, too (although it was also on my cons list when I was making this decision). There may be limited research at your site, but you can still do research over the summer (I'm going to Seattle to do research this summer through UW). You have equal access to summer research opportunities as the Seattle students, and there really isn't enough time to do research during the year anyway, so you aren't missing out on much.

OHSU

Pros:
-awesome facilities Agreed! That anatomy lab was the most beautiful thing I have ever seen.

-Knight Cancer Research Institute for research But will you have time to do it?

-Portland is great. Yes, it is.

-have scholarship for in-state tuition. That's great, but it's still very expensive (I'm assuming WICHE)

-more job opportunities for SO Important to talk about with them.

-still have family there Good.

-curriculum seems better established I'm not sure how much it is. As a side note: Although their anatomy lab is beautiful I know they cram it all into a few weeks in February, which isn't great, and I've heard that a lot of people do poorly on it. At UW anatomy is integrated into each block and we work with the same donor all year.

-could see myself there long-term This is important, but what I told myself is that "if you really want to be there, you can go back." Have you lived in Portland before or just in Oregon?

-I was accepted outright here; that may not matter, but it makes me feel like the fit was better I didn't experience this, but I understand what you mean.



Cons:
-cost of living Agreed.

-open spaces are harder to come by

-lower ranking It's not much lower ranked, but the name doesn't throw doors open like UW.

-may have difficulty adjusting to new lifestyle I'm not sure what you mean by this, but medical school is a huge adjustment in itself.

-traffic and general drawbacks to living in a big city Unless you are trying to get on I-5 or Barbur at rush hour, you shoudl be fine.

-won't be close to immediate family

Summary: My number one reason to pick UW over OHSU was the cost and the fact that it "throws open doors." The clinical portion of the curriculum is one of the best in the country, and it doesn't do a terrible job at preparing you for step one. For me, it was too good of a bargain to pass up even though I wanted to stay living with my friends in Portland. That said, I do still wonder if I made the right choice in coming to UW. I loved Portland and my community there, and on particularly bad days here (especially if its a day when the newness of curriculum is showing), I think, "what have I done??" However, I think that's a feeling that a lot of people experience when making a hard choice, and I probably would have wondered the same thing if had I gone to OHSU.

Making this decision was one of the hardest decisions that I have had to make, but knowing what I know now, I would still pick UW over OHSU. I understand your predicament, and I wish you the best of luck. Please pm me if you have more questions. I literally spent months thinking about this decision last year, and would be happy to help in any way that I can.