post bacc or caribbean?

[sweetsaja]

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I'm having one of my late night I don't know what I'm doing with my life days, so please if anyone could give me some advice, it would be greatly appreciated. i will be graduating this year with a gpa of about 3.4. I plan on taking the mcat soon and hope to do well on it, but for now just assume that I get a 28-30 on it. I have volunteered at a hospital and done a few other extracurriculars, but nothing too spectacular. I really want to go to med school, but I'm not sure what I should do next year. I decided not to apply for 2009 because I haven't taken my MCAT yet. Also, I want to go into peds or IM, no desire to do surgery, radiology, etc. Here are my options:

Masters or post bacc, apply for 2010-but grades won't be helping application
Masters or post bacc, apply for 2011-grades will count, but 2yr delay
Go straight to the caribbean-Ross
Get a job, apply for 2010
Any other options?

 

[Nobuo]

if you really want to become a doctor, you can also consider DO (osteopathic) schools. since you mentioned that you wanted to do peds or IM, DO schools focus more on primary care (IM, general practice, etc), so that may be a good option for you.

caribbean schools are also ok, but i heard it's harder because you have to pass with a higher % on the boards to practice in the states... because you're considered a foreign medical student/graduate or something like that (not sure i just heard from someone).

just throwing out some ideas, hope it helps.

 

[RySerr21]

sincere question: have you ever heard of osteopathic medicine?

I ask because its weird for someone to jump from MD to Caribbean, especially with a 3.4 GPA.

A 3.4 is competitive at almost all DO schools, and if you get in your projected MCAT range of 28-30 you will be set as long as you have decent clinical expereince and ECs.

If you do not know about what a DO is, you can start out with the offiical website of the American Ostoepathic Association www.osteopathic.org

If you have any speciifc quesitions about DOs, feel free to PM me. I have applied to both MDs and DOs so know a fair amount the but similarities and differences.

Good luck!

 

[Mobius1985]

I would choose option 2b: a) "Masters or b) post bacc, apply for 2011-grades will count, but 2yr delay." Don't do a masters, as that would not improve your undergrad GPA. A masters would be looked on as a nice EC, even if you get a 4.0.

If you graduate with a 3.4 (120 semester hours) and do two more years of a post-bac (60 semester hours), getting a 4.0 in all courses, you'd raise your undergrad GPA to 3.6 and be competitive for an MD school if you get a 30 on your MCAT. (If you get a 32-33, you wouldn't need to raise the GPA as high.)

If you don't think you can get straight As attending full-time classes, your best option is to consider the DO path, where you'd be very competitive at the end of this year, with your presumed MCAT score. If you were accepted to a Caribbean school (and you will be, if you have a good credit score), there is a high failure rate in the first 2 years, and if you graduate, only a 50% chance you'd get a residency in the USA. MD and DO school graduates have a 95% chance of completing their medical curriculum, and a very, very high match rate for residency.

 

[littlealex]

I would go DO. It's a much better, higher success probability path than Caribbean schools.

If that's out of the question, I'd do a 2 year post bac to get your GPA as near 3.5 as possible, then bump your MCAT to around a 35+ and you're solid for most mid range MD schools.

 

[sweetsaja]

I've heard of DO but I'm not sure exactly what makes it different besides OMM. Im just thinking that if I apply to DO schools in June 09 for fall 2010, would doing post bacc fall 2009-spring 2010 help at all since the schools would only get my undergrad gpa?? also, do i have ANY chance of getting into md schools?

 

[Mobius1985]

OMM is the only difference between MD and DO. Some might add that DO takes a more holistic approach to the patient.

If you apply DO in 6/09, you will not need to do any GPA repair by doing a post-bac. Doing a post-bac next fall would not help your DO application, but it might help make the first year of med school easier if you took stuff like anatomy, physiology, biochem, micro, etc.

You have a chance of getting into an MD school next season without a post-bac, if you get an MCAT of 33-34+, and you have a recent upward grade trend, assuming the rest of your application is good (lots of clinical exposure/research/leadership).

 

[Isis24]

I've heard of DO but I'm not sure exactly what makes it different besides OMM. Im just thinking that if I apply to DO schools in June 09 for fall 2010, would doing post bacc fall 2009-spring 2010 help at all since the schools would only get my undergrad gpa?? also, do i have ANY chance of getting into md schools?

If you do well on the MCAT, then yes, of course you have a chance of getting into md schools. This is assuming that you apply broadly and that the rest of your application is "good". I have a 3.51 overall GPA and 3.36 science. So far, I have 3 MD interviews.

I think that DO or post-bacc are good options. Not carribean though...