Should I Go D.O?

[Tozanzibarbymotorcar]

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In the long run you will see DO become closer and closer to MD. The question is how many DOs have to fight that stigma and for how long.

Wishful thinking. I don’t think this will be the case. AT Still has been dead for how long? If anything we will be combined.

 

[Blanky]

Wishful thinking. I don’t think this will be the case. AT Still has been dead for how long? If anything we will be combined.

The trend has been very clearly a progression of increased respect for DOs. In my opinion a merge would be the ideal and final equalizer but I don’t see that happening for over a hundred years

 

[AnatomyGrey12]

The trend has been very clearly a progression of increased respect for DOs. In my opinion a merge would be the ideal and final equalizer but I don’t see that happening for over a hundred years

I give it less than 20 honestly. The residency merger is a big step towards that. The AOA is going to struggle to stay relevant now that they don't accred residencies anymore and now almost all DOs won't be needing the AOA for board certification. They are trying to convince people to elect for AOA certification but LOL.

 

[Blanky]

I give it less than 20 honestly. The residency merger is a big step towards that. The AOA is going to struggle to stay relevant now that they don't accred residencies anymore and now almost all DOs won't be needing the AOA for board certification. They are trying to convince people to elect for AOA certification but LOL.

Wow, its nice that you agree. The question is how many people (DOs) will struggle finding the matches they want before this all gets straihtened out?
Do you think this will progress similiar to DDS and DMD? I dont know everything about the hx of dent but they seem to be held as equals now.

 

[AnatomyGrey12]

Wow, its nice that you agree. The question is how many people (DOs) will struggle finding the matches they want before this all gets straihtened out?
Do you think this will progress similiar to DDS and DMD? I dont know everything about the hx of dent but they seem to be held as equals now.

No because the history of the DDS and DMD is completely different. The only reason there are two degrees for dent is because Harvard wanted to give a degree that matched up with the latin name, so they literally are the same. My opinion is the DO degree will become a historical novelty and current DO schools will simply becoming very PC/community medicine focused MD schools that will provide OMM as an elective.

As for the matching issue I predict we will see a polarizing effect. On one side the average to superstar DOs are matching better than they probably ever have, and as school expansion goes on the students that are at the bottom of the class/low boards and/or with red flags will increasingly struggle to match. Obviously this is just my opinion but we are already starting to see this a bit.

Another one of my opinions is that a merger between the degrees (i.e. MD absorbing DO) won't come from LCME or another medical organization, it will come from politicians. As the pathways increasingly get more and more similar (already DOs are functionally indistinguishable from MDs in practice), and with the residency training now standardized, some politician somewhere is going to decide we don't need two different accrediting bodies that do the same job.

 

[Blanky]

No because the history of the DDS and DMD is completely different. The only reason there are two degrees for dent is because Harvard wanted to give a degree that matched up with the latin name, so they literally are the same. My opinion is the DO degree will become a historical novelty and current DO schools will simply becoming very PC/community medicine focused MD schools that will provide OMM as an elective.

As for the matching issue I predict we will see a polarizing effect. On one side the average to superstar DOs are matching better than they probably ever have, and as school expansion goes on the students that are at the bottom of the class/low boards and/or with red flags will increasingly struggle to match. Obviously this is just my opinion but we are already starting to see this a bit.

Another one of my opinions is that a merger between the degrees (i.e. MD absorbing DO) won't come from LCME or another medical organization, it will come from politicians. As the pathways increasingly get more and more similar (already DOs are functionally indistinguishable from MDs in practice), and with the residency training now standardized, some politician somewhere is going to decide we don't need two different accrediting bodies that do the same job.

Later I’ll go read up on the Dental because now I’m curious and don’t know much about it.
I could def foresee the polarizing you mentioned.

 

[Isoval]

I had a response typed up last night but forgot to post:

The tl;dr of that post is that I believe one of two things will happen in our lifetimes: 1) there is a degree merger or 2) DO and MD become near identical (e.g. no more bias, USMLE for both, etc.)

 

[Goro]

As for the matching issue I predict we will see a polarizing effect. On one side the average to superstar DOs are matching better than they probably ever have, and as school expansion goes on the students that are at the bottom of the class/low boards and/or with red flags will increasingly struggle to match. Obviously this is just my opinion but we are already starting to see this a bit.

To follow up, such students will most likely end up in more rural residency programs at community hospitals. In the worst case, if the number of residency slots is exceeded by the number of grads, then these students will indeed bear the brunt of not matching.

I had a response typed up last night but forgot to post:
The tl;dr of that post is that I believe one of two things will happen in our lifetimes: 1) there is a degree merger or 2) DO and MD become near identical (e.g. no more bias, USMLE for both, etc.)

It's too much for me to hope to see this before I retire, but I sure would like to see it before I die!

 

[deleted610572]

To follow up, such students will most likely end up in more rural residency programs at community hospitals. In the worst case, if the number of residency slots is exceeded by the number of grads, then these students will indeed bear the brunt of not matching.



It's too much for me to hope to see this before I retire, but I sure would like to see it before I die!

Don’t be so old then@Goro 🙂

 

[WedgeDawg]

@eberge3

I was going to type up a point by point response to your many posts here, similar to what @AnatomyGrey12 has done, but I realized shortly after that it would be futile to argue with you.

For everyone else reading this thread, please do not listen to this poster. If you really want to know what the match is like and what matters, talk to 4th years going through the match, residents who recently went through the match, med school deans whose job it is to make sure their students match, and PDs who have to deal with the match every year. Do not listen to people who are not even in medical school yet.

Yes, there is bias against DOs, and this is not exclusive to specialties like ENT, Derm, and Neurosurgery. It is present and pervasive across all fields in medicine. I want to emphasis that this does not mean you cannot match well as a DO, or that you cannot match easily as a DO - it just means that you will have a more difficult time than an MD student in pretty much all aspects of the application. This is something that you should understand going into the process.

There are certainly programs out there in many (all?) specialties that will not rank and/or interview DO students but will take a below average MD student in a heartbeat. I am not saying it is right, rational, or appropriate, but it is reality and again something that you should be aware of.

Letters make an enormous difference, both who they are from and what they say. Do not be deluded into thinking they don't. Your school, boards, and grades will get you in the door, but the "softer" stuff (as it may be called) is what gets you the seat.