Medical Should I apply to MD/PhD this year or wait?

[Lucca]

3.6/>520, tons of research, a few publications. Likely decent recommendation letters. I have ~50 shadowing hours and 20 clinical volunteering hours at the moment. I will be able to get them up to ~100 and ~120 hours before June. Is this still too little to be competitive? Should I wait a year to apply?

The short answer is that yes, you will be competitive for MD/PhD programs with that profile provided your letters are positive and "tons" of research means you've had at least one productive, independent, longitudinal research experience.

For the long answer, skim through this helpful post: What are my chances? Read before asking. [Updated 2019]

With a 3.6 / >520 and the research I described above, you'll be excellent in 2/3 of the most important categories for MD/PhD admissions. The extraordinary MCAT score in particular will erase any doubt that your GPA might have raised at even the most competitive MSTPs. At the end of the day, research is king in this cycle and strong experience, evidence of productivity, and good mentor LORs will take you very far. It's still a good idea to round out your clinical experience by continuing to shadow and volunteer, with volunteering being more important than shadowing past 50 shadowing hours.

I'd recommend applying to 15 or so programs, 16-20 if you want to be super-safe but more than that would be overkill, mostly concentrating on the mid and top tier MSTPs.

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[Mr.Smile12]

I'm also going to add that yes I think that depending on your definition of "tons of research" and "a few" publications, you should be in a good position for any research-focused medical school, not just MD/Ph.D. (Lots of programs require a research thesis to get an MD only, and I can urge you to look at the five-year CCLCM program at CWRU.) I would encourage you to speak with individuals who do translational medical research so you have a good idea of answering what your career goals or aspirations would be, and why a MD/PhD gets you to where you want to be. (You can do research and get grants with either an MD as an academic physician or a Ph.D. as a researcher, so you need to know for yourself why you are willing to do both and take 8 years to do it.)

I tell people all the time, doing an MD/PhD to have a low student debt when you are done is NOT a good reason to pursue it.