As a DO student, I'd love to discuss this. Genuine discussion, concern, and education on my end. Not trying to argue.
Firstly, what are your credentials? So I can understand your point of view and perspective and take the into consideration.
I think the real concern some residency programs have with DO students is they don't know what type of training they got in med school.
Is there no way for residency programs to tell? Do they only see grades from your school and nothing else? If students are passing the shelf exams, shouldn't that show that their rotations were sufficient enough to pass the same exam that any T5 student rotating at a top hospital is passing?
The fact that your IM rotation can be 100% outpatient at some schools (from what I have been told) is wild.
Agreed. That should not be happening. Same question idea though: if they're passing the shelf exam, it would show sufficient IM knowledge to pass the rotation, no? Of course, residencies want you to know more than just the minimum, but even at the best hospital in the country, you might not learn "everything" in one short rotation.
Some places are still not DO friendly, but I feel like that is going away in a lot of specilties.
I still notice very few resident DOs in competitive specialties at academic centers. Honestly, it's closer to none. Personally, I don't care about academic medicine; I'll go anywhere, but many do care. But I do think DO stigma is slowly fading.
I would argue that there are places that are not anti DO, they are anti not the best (ie MGH, Hopkins, etc).
Do MGH & Hopkins actually take DOs? Which specialties? If they don't take DOs, how do you know (see below)
So it's not that you're a DO and thus they don't like you.
This^ to be true, and not the fact that they're truly just anti DO?
It's that you're a DO so your school did not help you to put together an actually amazing application.
Let's just assume that your school doesn't help you put together an application. At the end of the day, isn't that on the individual? Why would "you're a DO and your school doesn't like you" mean the difference between getting selected or not? If the student scored well on Comlex and STEP, got good grades, did research (even if it's outside their school), passed (or scored high, depending on school setup) their shelf exams, were smart with where they applied, and interviewed well, how would they be any different than any MD student? And why should they be? Everything I just mentioned falls onto the individual. Just like it does at an MD school. Maybe the school has more of an effect on letters of recommendation, but those don't HAVE to be from your school. Time and time again it's been proven, by statistics and opinion, that a DO physician is equally competent to an MD physician. So why should any individual at a DO school, equal to their MD counterparts when the residency apps hit the desk, be thrown out simply because they went to an accredited US medical school that awards 2 different letters to the end of their name?
Do I agree there is a bias? 100%. But I don't know if I agree with your logic of why DOs aren't being taken by residencies. I'm not saying I know what the reason is, but I'd love some more explanation on yours.
This is not just old DO schools. This is new DO schools too. I reached out to a new one opening in my area to try and give the some tips on how to help their students and they were like no thanks we know what we're doing.
Shocker -_-
news.feinberg.northwestern.edu
