quick question about med school

[ixi]

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I've never considered med school as an option but recently after hearing all my classmates talk about med school after graduation, I've decided it might be something I want to do.

I'm a chemistry major and I love chemistry. I always thought I would continue along this field. I'm already a junior so I have to start applying for grad school next year and it's too late for med school.

So i was thinking I would perhaps either work after graduating or get my Masters. My question is, is it bad to take a few years off after getting a BS then applying to med school? because everyone i know is going to med school right after they get their BS.

 

[kami333]

If it was that bad everyone in this forum is screwed😀

They might be applying but who knows if they get in? The average age of matriculants is something around 24, of course there are the old people (the 30+s😉) who go to med school but not that much so it shows that a lot of people do take some time off.

Personally I think it is a good thing to take a couple years off, I'm not sure if I would have taken med school seriously if I had gotten in right out of college (not that I would have gotten in with my GPA). I was a premed for a while in college, got tired of it, graduated and worked abroad for a couple of years, decided I didn't like working in IT so I went back to science, my PI is a MD/PhD so I got interested in medicine again. I think it helped me get a perspective on things after living a "real" life for a while and thinking what I really wanted to do as a career. Hopefully I can use that in my interviews to show that I have wide interests and experiences.

 

[Law2Doc]

So i was thinking I would perhaps either work after graduating or get my Masters. My question is, is it bad to take a few years off after getting a BS then applying to med school? because everyone i know is going to med school right after they get their BS.

Um, no. Actually people who have the grades and also spend a year or two gaining experiences tend to do better in the process. The fact that everyone you know is a traditional student doesn't make alternatives "bad", it just means you don't know any nontrads.

 

[ixi]

sry, i didn't mean bad, i meant would i be at a disadvantage, but that doesn't seem like the case.

 

[Renkat2sj]

what i keep hearing/ reading is that if you're going to take time off, do something interesting and hopefully relevant during it. although, i'd assume most of us nontrads didn't originally think we were going to apply to med school later on, so we didn't necessarily do that. i think the big thing is what law said, gain valuable experience. work as a chemist, volunteer in clinics, join the peace corps. don't do what i did and spend a year doing nothing, working at a bank or a bar!! although i do intend to explain that my reasoning behind that was to begin chipping away at my large undergrad debt, which i think is a reasonable excuse. plus i only did that for a year because it didnt take me long to feel like i was wasting my life away.

i am a masters student now. personally, i really needed it. if your grades are really good, you dont necessarily need to take one unless you decide that's what you wanna do for a living INSTEAD of med. but i think taking a year off is a good idea, and once you are out of school you'll begin to realize what you really enjoy and want to do. before i graduated undergrad i thought i wanted med school but wasnt sure. seriously, the week following my graduation . . . i felt like a fog had been lifted and i finally had clarity and when i asked myself the same question i'd been asking all along (should i ditch my current path for med?) the answer was "duh." i guess up until that point i didnt know if i really felt that way- whether i just thought the grass was greener on the other side. i dunno. but just taking a break from the path you're on can really help you see whether you really want to stay on it. i guess what i'm really trying to say with this long-a$$ answer is, time off is good. grad degree, i wouldnt do unless you decide after time off and reflection that you actually want to pursue it for a career. anyway, you dont have to take off too much time. it only took me a year to get my crap figured out. well, really, more like a week, but i was already in a one year lease and had to finish it out 🙂

oh- and if your grades are pretty good, you could always try the MD/PhD route and do research in medical biochem/pharm??

 

[Rotinaj]

I took 5 years off after highschool before going back to college. In those 5 years I worked in contruction which taught me a work ethic and increased my mechanical thinking skills, I've waited tables which helped me learn how to deal with people and make them feel confident while working in a high stress environment and I spent the rest of my free time enjoying life which keeps me from being a robot. Now that I've got some perspective other than the narrow point of view of a career student, I feel that I'm ready to succeed where I wouldn't have been only a few years ago.

Bottom line: take the time, enjoy college and do well. The schools won't care as long as you have good stats and they like your character.

 

[Renkat2sj]

<<I've waited tables which helped me learn how to deal with people and make them feel confident while working in a high stress environment >>

don't get me wrong- i actually feel the same way. waiting tables is definitely a lesson in juggling your time between a million tasks and demands, prioritizing, and getting everything done while still making everyone feel like THEY are your priority while keeping a smile on your face.

but, i dont know if an adcom would really take that seriously. so although i personally feel it did help me, i probably wouldnt bring it up unless asked. and for someone taking time off who knows that the eventual goal is applying to med school, they have the advantage of choosing to spend their free time doing things they like that also help their app . . . like volunteering in something really interesting now because they have the time, rather than cramming some time in later doing a volunteer gig they dont like because its the only thing they can fit in their schedule.

 

[Rotinaj]

Yeah, I'm not going to make a big deal out of it, but if they ask about it, that's what I'll say. I agree with you that it's applicable, even if adcoms wouldn't think much of it.

Some perspective:

My mother was a medical malpractice attorney who worked defending doctors for a living. She said that she had seen but a few lawsuits that could have been avoided by communicating more clearly with the patients and through more compassion when something did go wrong. My counselor also showed me some interesting statistics on your typical doctor. As it is, the roughly 60-70% of new doctors still come from high income families (top 20%), so that's a lot of people that probably never had to work for a living. I do honestly think that if more doctors had waited tables and worked customer service jobs, they'd be better for it than someone who comes from money and has a more limited perspective.

(Before anyone jumps to conlusions, even though I'm the son of a successful attorney, I'm not wealthy by any means. She had to quit her practice due to a chronic illness which subsequently drained any money we had before it killed her. I've been working full time since I was 18)

 

[Pemberley]

I would recommend working rather than getting your masters. Get out in the real world (most pre-meds have never done anything at all outside academia) and do something interesting to you and DIFFERENT. You'll never have the chance again.

I've never considered med school as an option but recently after hearing all my classmates talk about med school after graduation, I've decided it might be something I want to do.

I'm a chemistry major and I love chemistry. I always thought I would continue along this field. I'm already a junior so I have to start applying for grad school next year and it's too late for med school.

So i was thinking I would perhaps either work after graduating or get my Masters. My question is, is it bad to take a few years off after getting a BS then applying to med school? because everyone i know is going to med school right after they get their BS.

 

[vtucci]

If you love chemistry, then by all means use it to your advantage. Do something that combines your love of chemistry and is applicable to medicine. Maybe something on the pharmaceutical end?

If you are going to get a masters, I would recommend considering going to Oxford or Cambridge. It is nice to have an international experience.

 

[njbmd]

I've never considered med school as an option but recently after hearing all my classmates talk about med school after graduation, I've decided it might be something I want to do.

I'm a chemistry major and I love chemistry. I always thought I would continue along this field. I'm already a junior so I have to start applying for grad school next year and it's too late for med school.

So i was thinking I would perhaps either work after graduating or get my Masters. My question is, is it bad to take a few years off after getting a BS then applying to med school? because everyone i know is going to med school right after they get their BS.

I was an undergraduate Chemistry major (Analytical Chemistry) who obtained a Ph.D in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology before applying to medical school. It was my experiences in working on my post-doc work that honed my interest in clinical medicine. Needless to say, since I applied to medical school at age 45, I took more than a "couple" of years between bachelor's and medical school.

In short, if your interests lie in obtaining an advanced degree in chemistry, you can accomplish this. If your interests lie in the practice of medicine, you can accomplish this goal too. There is no specific time limit on application to medical school but you need to know if you have the stamina (and passion) for going through a challenging and demanding medical curriculum. Many folks find that they don't after a few years out of college. What you ultimately do with your life, largely depends on what you want and when you want to do it. Good luck!

 

[QofQuimica]

I've never considered med school as an option but recently after hearing all my classmates talk about med school after graduation, I've decided it might be something I want to do.

I'm a chemistry major and I love chemistry. I always thought I would continue along this field. I'm already a junior so I have to start applying for grad school next year and it's too late for med school.

So i was thinking I would perhaps either work after graduating or get my Masters. My question is, is it bad to take a few years off after getting a BS then applying to med school? because everyone i know is going to med school right after they get their BS.

I got my PhD in chemistry and am now in my second year of med school; I went to med school a decade after college. If you're qualified and competitive for admissions, taking off a year or two to go to grad school, work, etc. won't be a problem. to you. 🙂

 

[gman33]

Spend some more time thinking about why you want to pursue medicine. A year or two of working, mixed in with some health related volunteer activities should give you a better perspective.

If you have a strong UG GPA, then there is probably no reason to get a Master's degree if your ultimate goal is med school.