What is this fascination/obsession with being a "doctor". It's just a 9-5 job and some (specialties) are more tolerable than others. Yes, any specialty is accessible to DOs if they "work hard enough" but it would be a lie to say that the odds are equal to MD.
I personally could not tolerate FM, IM, Path, or Psych. If I was limited to these specialties I would rather drop out and pursue something else. For example, if I barely struggled to pass MS1 I might have just cut my losses there. They all make >200k+ but I simply would rather be a chef than do those specialties.
Yes, even MDs aren't guaranteed to "walk into" rads/gas but when you consider that *on average* they have a much easier time doing so (home programs ranking them high, more connections, perceived prestige, etc) it greatly improves the odds.
I would recommend to anyone who's had the great misfortune of enduring our back and forth to
sift the data and look for themselves at the differential NRMP match rates between DO's and MD's. It might be a good idea to begin at 2020, the year GME was fully centralized and to normalize for something known to be heavily influential, such as number of publications--before interpreting the data.
There is truth in what you're saying, however it's important to understand that the intrinsic value you're placing on the letters MD may not rise to more than a few percentage points in match rate for a competitive applicant in a competitive specialty. Likewise, those letters may convey twice the odds under the same circumstances in another competitive residency.
As to how this translates to OP's predicament, nothing has changed. OP has a route to every competitive specialty in hand right now. Your personal experiences lead you to be so certain of a positive outcome that you're willing to bet your career on the fact that they will be able to get an A to another DO school if the MD path doesn't pan out. I think that level of confidence is both remarkable and misplaced because we don't know anything relevant about OP's application, save their one semester of a 4.0 in their SMP.
However, your latest post does, I think, reveal the root cause of this confidence: you couldn't fathom being a doctor if not for specializing, and further, you believe pursuing a DO confers such disadvantageous matching odds that you weigh that heavily in your risk equation when assessing whether or not OP should run towards or away from their current A.
As aforementioned, I would suggest deferring to available data.
If, like you, OP places high risk on becoming a DO = intolerably practicing FM or IM fellowship doc, then perhaps they too should aim at the bush and hope the birds don't all fly away.
