Stick with DPT or move to PM&R?

[meregardner]

I am only a month into DPT school and don’t get me wrong, I LOVE it. But I find myself thinking, “should I have gone to medical school?” I think PT is what I want to do. Senior year of high school, when you’re supposed to make a college decision that effects the next 4-6 years of your life, I was NOT ready for medical school. After doing undergrad and getting into my program and developing my problem solving skills more and more, I find myself afraid that I will get into acute care at the end of this and think, “I still love physical medicine, but I want something different.”

This had me thinking about any possible programs that help DPTs transfer from DPT to med school. Does applying as a DPT give me better standing with a med school? Where would I even go? How different would it be? Would I be wasting my time? I’m just afraid I am going down a path in medicine that isn’t for me. I’m afraid of burning out and wanting to go back to school, therefore costing me more money. It’s so hard to know EXACTLY what you want to do when you’re 18. I am still determined as all heck to get this DPT and go into inpatient/acute care, but I wish I knew if there was even an OPTION to transfer from DPT to PM&R or something different. Who knows, what if oncology takes my fancy at 30 years old and I want to turn my career around? It’s just weird. You work so hard in your early 20s just to graduate, then you hit 25 and realize that there’s still so much more life left. Should you use it to work more? Start a family? Go back to school? I’d rather be asking these questions now rather than later, but it’s still a hard thing to conceptualize.

If anyone has any insight on this, knows good differences between DPT & PM&R, or knows about programs that help you transfer from one field to another, I would get a lot of my questions answered. Thanks ❤️

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[honeybadger_PT]

From my understanding, there aren't any programs that help you transfer from a DPT to PM&R. They are very different degrees. DPT's work more in the rehab realm and PM&R are more geared towards the medical management side of things. You would have to go through the process of applying to medical school like any other applicant such as studying and taking the MCAT, ect. The DPT may help a little with applying to med school, but I think they care more about your undergrad gpa than they do about another professional degree. They may also question why you didn't just try for medical school in the first place, so just be prepared if they ask you that question. I have seen some DPT's with an MD/DO so maybe you could try to find someone with a dual degree and ask them about the whole process. I am sure they would provide better insight. Hopefully you figure out what you want to do!

 

[ya1]

I am only a month into DPT school and don’t get me wrong, I LOVE it. But I find myself thinking, “should I have gone to medical school?” I think PT is what I want to do. Senior year of high school, when you’re supposed to make a college decision that effects the next 4-6 years of your life, I was NOT ready for medical school. After doing undergrad and getting into my program and developing my problem solving skills more and more, I find myself afraid that I will get into acute care at the end of this and think, “I still love physical medicine, but I want something different.”

This had me thinking about any possible programs that help DPTs transfer from DPT to med school. Does applying as a DPT give me better standing with a med school? Where would I even go? How different would it be? Would I be wasting my time? I’m just afraid I am going down a path in medicine that isn’t for me. I’m afraid of burning out and wanting to go back to school, therefore costing me more money. It’s so hard to know EXACTLY what you want to do when you’re 18. I am still determined as all heck to get this DPT and go into inpatient/acute care, but I wish I knew if there was even an OPTION to transfer from DPT to PM&R or something different. Who knows, what if oncology takes my fancy at 30 years old and I want to turn my career around? It’s just weird. You work so hard in your early 20s just to graduate, then you hit 25 and realize that there’s still so much more life left. Should you use it to work more? Start a family? Go back to school? I’d rather be asking these questions now rather than later, but it’s still a hard thing to conceptualize.

If anyone has any insight on this, knows good differences between DPT & PM&R, or knows about programs that help you transfer from one field to another, I would get a lot of my questions answered. Thanks ❤️

If you are considering being a physiatrist, it is completely different from being a PT. From what I have seen (and other may see a different side of it), physiatrists usually come to see rehab patients, talk to them, and prescribe them pain meds - that's it. They can also "recommend" patients to do PT/rehab (technically a referral).They do not really rehabilitate patients, but do pain management with meds.

 

[gyngyn]

I know of no US medical schools that give advanced standing for the DPT degree or to students in DPT school.

 

[fridge_raider]

Hi there, it looks like you are in a similar situation as I found myself in throughout my first year of DPT school. I completed the first year of the PT program I was in before withdrawing in early 2020. I applied for medical school admission during the 2020-2021 cycle and am grateful to have an acceptance from a MD program. It IS possible to switch from a DPT to a MD career path. With that said, I would not say it is necessarily easy or straight forward.

The two career paths are very different and, as stated above, there aren't any programs that will transfer a DPT to an MD-PM&R. If you were to go down the PM&R path, you would need to gain acceptance into a medical school which, as you likely know, involves a lot - MCAT, shadowing, clinical hours, and ECs to start. On top of that, you may face an uphill battle with convincing adcoms that medicine is what you really want to do. This is something I came up against while interviewing during this past cycle. Adcoms will question your motivation if you withdraw from a post-professional program and you will have to present a compelling story as to why they should believe you won't do the same for medicine. I was asked some derivative of this question in all my interviews. They can be convinced, (as they were in my case) but it is something you will need to consider and deal with. I don't mean for this to discourage you if you do indeed want to pursue medicine, just trying to inform you so that you are aware of what it will take to get there.

My advise would be to figure this out before accruing a level of student debt that forces your decision. IMO its easier to cut your losses now, take a gap year or two to take the MCAT and build EC, and apply to med school - than to complete three years of DPT school, accrue more student debt, just to start the process all over again in an attempt to gain an MD. But I could be wrong, everyone's situation is widely different. Hopefully some of this was insightful for you - Feel free to PM me if you have any other questions.

 

[kdubz7w7]

I am only a month into DPT school and don’t get me wrong, I LOVE it. But I find myself thinking, “should I have gone to medical school?” I think PT is what I want to do. Senior year of high school, when you’re supposed to make a college decision that effects the next 4-6 years of your life, I was NOT ready for medical school. After doing undergrad and getting into my program and developing my problem solving skills more and more, I find myself afraid that I will get into acute care at the end of this and think, “I still love physical medicine, but I want something different.”

This had me thinking about any possible programs that help DPTs transfer from DPT to med school. Does applying as a DPT give me better standing with a med school? Where would I even go? How different would it be? Would I be wasting my time? I’m just afraid I am going down a path in medicine that isn’t for me. I’m afraid of burning out and wanting to go back to school, therefore costing me more money. It’s so hard to know EXACTLY what you want to do when you’re 18. I am still determined as all heck to get this DPT and go into inpatient/acute care, but I wish I knew if there was even an OPTION to transfer from DPT to PM&R or something different. Who knows, what if oncology takes my fancy at 30 years old and I want to turn my career around? It’s just weird. You work so hard in your early 20s just to graduate, then you hit 25 and realize that there’s still so much more life left. Should you use it to work more? Start a family? Go back to school? I’d rather be asking these questions now rather than later, but it’s still a hard thing to conceptualize.

If anyone has any insight on this, knows good differences between DPT & PM&R, or knows about programs that help you transfer from one field to another, I would get a lot of my questions answered. Thanks ❤️

There is nothing wrong with going back, at any age, aside from the obvious debt considerations. I didn't even start college until I was 21. I finished my master's at 30, and my DPT at 40. I didn't know I would do an MS or a DPT when I was in my early 20s. The only thing I always knew for sure was I had no interest in starting a family, which I suppose does simplify things somewhat.

I was pre-DO while finishing my BS. I made this decision late in my degree and had a few outstanding pre-reqs after I graduated. The first one I took was orgo and the class was 100% pre-MD/DO and PA students, and by midterms I dropped the course and decided against the DO route. My background has always been exercise science and I realized as much as I wanted to be a provider, I had no interest in diagnosing and treating the flu, etc. I was 28 at the time and the realization kind of set me back on my heels, but I regrouped and went into a different professional direction.

Med school you'd be starting from scratch. You can't transfer credits in - in fact, it is incredibly difficult/impossible to attempt to transfer credits from one DPT program to another DPT program, let alone a different clinical degree.

I wonder if you could do some physician shadowing, right now, to get at least a sense of is that where your heart is at. DPT is already a very long three years even if you are passionate about it. It would be an even longer, and expensive, three years if you're already daydreaming about an entirely different career. Being an MD/DO and a DPT are very different.

I'd get clear, or try to anyway, on how exactly you want to be a provider. DPT does have several paths/specialties you can take, it's not all MSK. But are you more interested in pathologies? Do you want to be prescribing meds? Is it disease processes you find fascinating?

I know I've seen PTs turned MDs on here, if you can find one, they'd probably be great to chat with.