PHD Factor

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gibna

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I am going to get my PhD next year and I am thinking about applying to medical school next year. Do you guys have any idea how adcom's look at applicant's with PhD degrees.
By the way my undergrad GPA was 3.45, and my grad GPA os 3.68, and I am going to take the MCAT's this April.
 
Well, I have seen somewhere on the web this one guy with a PhD in computer science going for an MD. As far as I remember he was also interested in bioinformatics.
I myself have two MS degrees in engineering with emphasis on biomed field. I am also planning to try for an MD [maybe MD-PhD]. I have been advised to apply for MD-PhD due to my research background.
In my opinion you will have to justify why you want to leave the area of your expertise.

best
 
That suck's. My real reason is the money. My future goal is doing research during the day and moonlighting in the ER. Research salaries are so low, I need something to back me up financially.
 
Sorry to burst your bubble...

But Medicine is not a back up profession. I think any Adcom would look down on you if you told them why you want to go to Med school...🙁
 
I know that! I am not that excited about the idea of being around patients all day, but I am the kinda of guy who likes to help people out, so hopefully working in the ER will be interesting and challenging at the same time, I have a couple of MD's in my lab who are MD residents. But what can I say, I love working in the lab and hope I will not need to leave it after medical school.
I was just wondering if they prefer students who apply straight out from undergrad as opposed to someone who has been in a genetics PhD program for the last 3 years. And also how they look at your undergrad / grad GPA? And what kind of MCATs I should be aiming at.
 
From what i know, almost every school has some reservatione, may be one or two seats, for those who have finished their PhD and u become a very attractive candidate. Your research and publications will get u thru. However, u do not have to tell them that u are doing this for money. That would be not work in your favor. Good luck!!
 
Originally posted by gibna
That suck's. My real reason is the money. My future goal is doing research during the day and moonlighting in the ER. Research salaries are so low, I need something to back me up financially.

I think this should be the thesis of your personal comments essay, since the topic is your motivation to enter medicine.
 
Gibna, do the world a favor and stay in the lab and out of hospitals.😉
 
that's awsome, now I can stress less from taking the MCAT's.
And no I am not going to use that in my personal statement.
 
gibna, have you looked into working at a biotech company or a pharmaceutical company?
if i were in your position, i would be worried about incurring 100K+ debt for med school. plus most residencies pay on the order of 35-40K for the 4+ years you're a resident. all in all that aint great.
arent most post doc positions 40K now?
so rather than carry the additional debt (with monthly repayments on the order of $700) why dont you just apply to work in the pharm industry, where M.A's start at like 50-60K or suck it up, work in a post doc for the 4 years you would go to med school and start pullin in some big numbers by moving to pharm afterwards. with the additional experience of a couple post docs under your belt, you should at least get 80K in industry...
my $0.02
 
I don't want to do that. I love acadamics and getting an MD will help me. So unless post docs start making more then 60 grand I will change my mind. And besides, why don't you want me to get into medicine, I will be applying next year so I won't be competing with you, so just chill out.
And why are you people keep changing the subject. Till now I got only one response for my question, and thank god (you know if god does exist) it was a positive one. Does anyone have other oppinions, and what kind of a MCAT score should I be aiming out.
 
I am still waiting for good advise or recomendations. Anything will be appreciated
 
I say go for it. I went for it and got accepted, although the process did not seem to favor Ph.D. too much. I got my Ph.D. last October, and have applied to 21 schools, got 14 secondaries, and then 4 interviews, 2 acceptances, 1 waitlist, and 1 post-interview rejection. The reason is because, I wanted to be a clinical research investigator (namely a physician who does translational research), and that didn't sound well to those primary care-emphasizing schools. My reason for doing a M.D. is following:
4 years of post-doc is a pure waste of your youth and time, and in the end, you might have to do a 8-10 year post-doc to land a faculty job somewhere decent. Pharm jobs sounded enticing, but how would you feel if you were laid off with 6-month notice after 15 years of devotion in that company (laid-off does not come to M.S. workers, only high-pay Ph.D. in companies gets cut first. I have seen at least 5 such examples among the parents of my friends.) You don't want to go through that... trust me... If you want a Pharm job, just get a Masters, never a Ph.D. Now, instead of wasting 8 years as a post-doc trying to land a assistant professor job, I rather invest the time in a M.D. and a brief residence, and after that 8 years, a M.D. Ph.D. is guaranteed a faculty job somewhere in an academic medical hospital. I am 26 right now, and I specialize in cancer research, and I think doing a M.D. will only enhance my experience, at not at all at the expense of my time. Of course, some say, with a Pharm job and wise investment schemes, you may land millions in a few years, but with the way the stock market is going and the job market is declining, doing a M.D. is a sure bet. That is my 2 cent.
 
That is kind of the same reasoning that made me interested in getting an MD. So could you tell me what kind of MCAT's I should be aiming at, again my undergrad GPA, UCLA, was 3.45, 3.43 science with an honors in biology and a minor in physics, and Grad GPA, NYMC, of 3.68.
I am kind of stressed out just thinking about taking the MCAT's, I seriously hate standarized exams!
I am also not sure where I should apply, I guess my GPA is too low to get into a top ten school.
 
Hi gibna,
I would say aim for a score of 32 or so. To be safe, just think of it this way: If you didn't have a PhD, what MCAT score would be competitive? Forget the PhD factor when it comes to that. It all depends also on LOR's and EC's as well. You will have to worry about your PhD when it comes to the point of justifying why you want to attend medical school after receiving your PhD. Good luck.
 
Originally posted by gibna
I know that! I am not that excited about the idea of being around patients all day, but I am the kinda of guy who likes to help people out, so hopefully working in the ER will be interesting and challenging at the same time

It sounds to me like you don't have a good grasp of what you're in for, in med school and beyond...the phd won't be a hindrance, but if you don't have a clear vision as to why you want an MD than the adcoms will see right thru you. And I hope you weren't serious when you said your motivation is the money. As an MS1, I can tell you that at a lot of med schools you will be around patients beginning early your first year. And if your med school is in a major city, the people you will be seeing will more than likely be homeless or drug addicts, etc. If you do not like working with people than this is not the area for you. If you like the lab then, for heaven's sake, stay there. I would say you need to get some clinical exposure before you even try to apply. Med school is a tough road and when you're up to your ears in anatomy, biochemistry, histology, embryology, etc you need to know that this is what you want to do or you won't have the drive to persevere.
 
The schools I am going to apply to are not that competitive, you know schools like NYMC, wright state, wayne state, and michigan state. last time I checked their average MCAT scores they were in the range of 9- 10 in each section so I guess I will be aiming to get that. I just started practicing taking the MCAT's last week and I got 7/ 10/ 11 this first time I took it and 7/ 10/ 10 the second time. So think I am kind of in their range. getting a 32 is way out of my league, and I don't have much time to study for them, you know how it is in lab, you are constantly busy and trying to fudge your data.
Well thanks for your help, if you guys know of any stories who are applyied after getting their PhD please post their stats and how well they did in the application process.
Oh yeah and I do love science, I am kind of like a nerd in that way, and classes like physiology, anatomy, and biochemistry don't stress me out they actualy seem interesting to me. And to those people who think that money doesn't matter well I just have to say I wonder how you guys are going to charge your patients in the future. I always hear physicians complaing about medicare and how insurance companies are screwing them. While they all make more then 200 grand a year. Physicians aren't as altruistic as you may think. And if you think otherwise your either the exception or a hippocrite.
 
You don't need to lecture me on what is involved in a phd program since before med school I was taking grad classes while holding done a full-time research job...what I am saying is that from what the OP said, it appears he has the wrong motivations and if he has no desire to spend time with patients, then I don't see why he is interested in being in the ER (which doesn't have anything to do with his research)...never did I say medicine was any less difficult than other fields...I just think that the OP needs to see what medicine is really about before he goes into it.
 
This whole argument is cracking me up. Please don't worry about me I will manage. If you realy want to know why I want to do an ER residency well it's because my advisor is just that. He is an MD and he realy convinced me to get one. You know, ten years from now I'll be making only 40 - 60 grand a year, and if I want to have kids in the future I will highly unlikely be able to help them out the way my parents did. And since I am working in a lab that focuses on Brain research I am also realy interested in medicine. I mean its so cool to understand how our brains stores memory, syntesizes proteins, and sometimes commits into killing itself in stressful environments. And when my advisor tells me stories on how he saved someones life because of how he related something we did in lab with diagnosing someone who is having a heart attack it realy gets me exicted.
But you are right, I do prefer working in a lab but that doesn't make me not like working as an ER doctor or a surgeon. It just means that I don't want to be in the primary care business and having to get to know evey patient personaly. Maybe I'll change this mentality once I get into medical school.
 
heelpain, give me a break, I am not saying that it isn't difficult to pass your comps/defend a thesis...I'm sorry my last post wasn't clear enough for you...the bottom line that I'm saying is that you have to love what you're doing and be focused on your goal or it will be very difficult to keep up the motivation needed to complete it, be that research or coursework or rotations or anything else.
 
The focus on you during a medical school interview will be your desire to do basic science research and gain additional perspective (and maybe patient interaction) from the MD. There is not basic science research in emergency medicine, and so I think you need to come up with a different specialty with which to use the medical degree. If you're looking to make a career change now to medicine only, I guess you could argue that, but I don't think it would go over that well with adcoms.

You are right that MD/PhDs are in greater demand, but I still disagree that you will be making more in academia with a MD/PhD than with a PhD. However, it will be somewhat easier for you to get grants, advance in position, etc because of the translational ability of the combined degrees.

Remember that you will be spending another 4 years in school, more of that treating patients than in classrooms learning more science. You will also maybe want to do a residency which is more years of training. If this doesn't turn you off, that's fine. But, more years of low money and being at the bottom of the social heirarchy could be reasons to deter you from going to medical school.

If you want more advice, I think that perhaps the pre-MD/PhD forum may be a good place for you to post.

Good luck
 
A PhD doesn't often help. You'll get a lot of questioning as to why you're switching fields - and you best have a better answer than financial concerns.

Additionally, your grad GPA will not make much difference. Adcoms want to see how you did in core classes, even if it is ten years ago.

The MCAT is a tough one to endure during the process, especially since they test stuff you haven't seen in years. But practice, and do well. Coming out with a PhD and a 27 on the MCAT might raise some eyebrows.

And as with other responses, reevaluate your decision. You're going into something that takes more determination than financial security. You can make more in the next ten years working in industry than you will in that time as a medical student/resident/fellow/postdoc.
 
Hi guys, sorry to be posting a bit late in the game here. I am a PhD student who is applying to med school myself and I just wanted to make a comment on what was posted on the previous post in regards to the 27 MCAT score.
Think about it: you are a PhD student, who should know tons of stuff about molecular biology and chemistry (assuming that genetics is your field, and I think this is gibna's field). Also, you should be used to reading tons of journal articles and challenging the data that are presented instead of reading the researcher's conclusions and discussions and going with that. My research advisor, who received a PhD and then pursued an MD himself, told me that adcoms frequently expect to see higher MCAT scores than your average straight-out-of-college applicant, specially in the verbal reasoning section. I agree that a PhD can make you a more attractive candidate, but that is no reason to assume that adcoms will swallow a lower MCAT score just because of that.
 
Keep in mind that the adcoms put people in groups. You will be judged against other PhD applicants. Since I would expect PhD applicants to have the least amount of clinical exposure vs. traditional applicants, it would be a good idea to get some of that so you can set yourself apart.
 
Good advice, I didn't know that the MCAT was so hard till taking it a couple of days ago, I am just not good in standarized exams. I just hope that the adcoms will like me for me and not my grades, I kind of sound gay now, well anyways thanks again and I hope you all get in this year.
 
Originally posted by gibna
I just hope that the adcoms will like me for me and not my grades

They will like you for your grades/MCAT scores first, then like you for you in an interview. If your grades/MCAT scores are too low, you will never get an interview.

Don't worry, it's a common trap for grad students who decide to go to med school to feel overconfident for the MCAT and then bomb it. If your score is under a 28, pack it up and go do a post-doc.
 
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