Researching schools

This forum made possible through the generous support of SDN members, donors, and sponsors. Thank you.

CaptYossarian

Full Member
10+ Year Member
Joined
Mar 15, 2010
Messages
13
Reaction score
0
Does anyone know of a good resource for reading reviews on MSTP programs? I checked out mdphds.org earlier in the process and they had a good section on that, but now that I want to actually pick a list of schools for the AMCAS their forum has been hacked. 4480 viagra ads told me nothing about Baylor🙁. Admissions stats and rankings are fairly easy to find (although links are welcome), but I'd really like a site with objective reviews so I can get a sense of the culture and research strengths of the schools.
 
There's no end all resource for MD/PhD programs. This is especially true since the best program for one area of research may not be the best for another. Thus, you can use all of the standard rankings for whatever they're worth to you. In general, recognize that a school's prestige for medicine may or may not match with the best research opportunities.

More importantly, you can talk to your PI and other PI's who know your field of interest about what programs they think are the best. Once you have programs you are really interested in, you have the possibility of looking up students with a shared dept of interest and asking them questions. However, this level of investigation might be saved for after you get an interview. In general, the trends are towards applying to a greater number of schools, and this level of refinement matters more once you know what option(s) you have.

Lastly, try and keep an open mind to graduate research interests. Many applicants go in really focused on a specific topic, but if you think more broadly about where you want your long term career to go, more options may seem appealing.

Good luck!
 
There was a site (intransit.us) that accumulated program reviews from applying students, though it appears to have recently been moved (now mdphds.org) and still under construction somewhat, with most of the links not working. This was a great resource several years ago, and I'm wondering (for current/future applicants) whether this site will be fully resurrected. Something to keep checking back on, though.

More broadly speaking, I think it really depends on what you want. I really don't think the rankings are helpful in this regard, because one person can have a great experience at a top-ranked place that fits them well, whereas another one can be pretty miserable there for a variety of reasons.

If, and especially if, your research interests are quite narrow/somewhat unique (as mine were when I was applying), I would look into the strengths of the corresponding basic science research and, if it's outside the school of medicine, the feasibility of cutting through the requisite red tape to work there as a combined degree student. It's definitely helpful to have a number of potential PIs that you can see yourself working with at a given institution, since they can move, etc.

That aside, a few more things to consider in terms of how much they matter to you personally:

1) Degree of program coordination, and size. The larger, more established combined degree programs tend to know the ups and downs of the process well from extensive experience and may be able to provide better advising.

The especially well-organized of these will typically (though not always) help you smooth the transitions between medicine and grad school and avoid difficult "re-entries." The one caveat here is that at certain programs, the individual med and grad programs are more independent in their rule-setting and don't submit to the whims of the MD-PhD office, which may result in spending extra time meeting requirements that some may feel are unnecessary for a combined degree student.

I think a combination of the above phenomena, as well as random luck, are manifest in how long students take to graduate.

The better programs may also have structured ways to mix science and medicine throughout the curriculum (e.g. grad seminars during med school, structured opportunities for clinical work during grad school) that can be helpful in keeping the combined perspective, though this is a more minor point.

2) The med curriculum. Is it paternalistic (lots of requirements, especially in basic science years) or hands off (very few, and lots of pass-fail grading during this time). This depends on your learning style, and how structured you like it to be. I have a sense that the latter leads to a more relaxed med school class, though this can be up for debate.

3) Location/stipend amount for location/intangibles. Where do you see yourself happily spending a pretty long portion of your life?
 
Last edited:
My advice (which is quite possibly worth nothing) is to focus on the research. Medical school are relatively generic. Yes some places may have some unique aspects to their curriculum, but practically any decent medical school is going to prepare you to be an excellent physician. The research is what is going to really differentiate places for you.


1. Research opportunities

If you have absolutely NO clue about what you want to do with your research then US News' Top whatever guide is probably a good place to start. Otherwise, ignore it.

Odds are that you have a general idea of what field you want to do your PhD in (chem, biochem, phys, etc.). Is the institution one of the leaders in this field? The MDphds.org site you referred to actually has a nice list of NIH funding rankings by specialty (from several years ago) that can help you identify places that may be good.

If you're fortunate enough to already know what disease(s) that you want to study, there are definitely some places that will be better for you than others and you should do whatever it takes to find them.

It may take a ton of time, but if you can spare it I would try
 
Last edited:
Thanks for all the advice! Did you look for potential PIs when picking schools for primaries, or did you base the initial list on intangibles, etc. and then narrow things down when you start secondaries and interviews?
 
It's a tough call. Hindsight, doing that would have saved me a substantial amount of money and time and secondaries. However, the process of potential mentor selection is time consuming and is sort of getting ahead of yourself.

There are two things you really wants to avoid: 1. the situation where you're interviewing at a school and realizing that you have no interest in going there because their top people are all in fields you don't care for (This happened to me on multiple occasions). 2. Realizing in January that you didn't even apply to a specific school that is likely an excellent match for your research interests (happened to me as well...)

I'd suggest before submitting your AMCAS application to a school, and definitely before completing your secondary for any school, make sure that the field(s) you are interested in are well represented there. Otherwise, you're wasting valuable application time and probably lots of money. If you're invited for an interview I would definitely begin to identify several mentors you would be interested in working with- half of the reason for this is for your own benefit, the other half is because there is a high probability that one of your interviewers will ask you if you have identified potential mentors at that school. Additionally, some schools will force you to submit a list of people you are interested in meeting with during your interview day (I believe that all schools should do this).
 
I just finished my application cycle, and while it worked out all right for me in the end, I feel like I applied to the completely wrong set of schools. (I ended up going on interviews to schools that I knew almost right away weren't for me, and I never applied to some places that could have been a great fit.) If you can, compile a list of the schools you're applying to--don't exclude any school you have some interest in, and don't let stereotypes and rumors get too in the way--and then go over this list with a couple different people, like your PI/mentor/anyone who's involved in science and can give you an idea of the research at the institution, your pre-health advisor who can give you an idea of the medical school, and then an MD/PhD student who can give you an idea about the MSTPs themselves. Probably ideal would be to talk to someone who just finished the application cycle and can let you know how they felt about the MST programs at the schools they visited--not just what opportunities are available to you but how well it is run, how organized it is, how good are they at career development, how much fun do they have, how much do they support you, how easy are bumps in the road to overcome.
 
I would just add to this that it's important to try to talk to people who are not only just starting the program, but are on the finishing end as well. These may be hard to find since it's mostly first years and/or junior grad students giving school tours and generally involved in admissions.

I feel that the senior students can reflect on how much the whole process went according to their expectations, how often their scientific/clinical interests changed, and how much support they are getting/have gotten in applying for residency programs - i.e., how well the program has succeeded for them as a whole.

My two cents.
 
I just finished my application cycle, and while it worked out all right for me in the end, I feel like I applied to the completely wrong set of schools. (I ended up going on interviews to schools that I knew almost right away weren't for me, and I never applied to some places that could have been a great fit.)

Exactly my experience as well. further, I didn't apply to the top top programs because I didn't think my MCAT would cut it. Don't make this mistake either. Apply to any and all places that will be a good match for you.
 
Top