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I forgot to mention that when I talked to Ann this morning, I asked her if all the seats were full. She said that a few spots were still available. (Although I didn't ask, I assume these spots were made vacant from those that recently dropped Tucson acceptances.)

So unless those few open spots have already become acceptances today, that means that a few people at the top of the waitlist should get acceptances soon. :luck:
 
Has it been confirmed that ALL rejections will also be coming out tomorrow (or is Phx still uncertain on rejection releases as well)?
 
Does anyone else feel like their life has pretty much been put on HOLD because of this school??

I didn't even join the FB class of the school I will probably be attending in hopes of hearing ANY sort of positive response from this school (well, I actually did just join the AZCOM 2013 group this afternoon) but my point is still the same... anyone else feel this way??? For those of us who don't make the waitlist, wouldn't a rejection back in Oct-Dec have been really nice?? I'm sure many of the rejections were already determined by then... argh!
 
rennykim said:
Does anyone else feel like their life has pretty much been put on HOLD because of this school??

I didn't even join the FB class of the school I will probably be attending in hopes of hearing ANY sort of positive response from this school (well, I actually did just join the AZCOM 2013 group this afternoon) but my point is still the same... anyone else feel this way??? For those of us who don't make the waitlist, wouldn't a rejection back in Oct-Dec have been really nice?? I'm sure many of the rejections were already determined by then... argh!
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I agree 100% with everything you just said. Either way, I will once again become a functional human being in the next two days.
 
I wonder if everyone will get their emails (WL or rejection) from Tucson at the same time, or if they will be rolling out throughout the morning or day.

Also, to those of you who are thinking of re-taking the MCAT: I advise against it. I got a 25 and had already signed-up to retake it. I then had talked with my old pediatrician (who interviewed for UA back in the day) and he said NO do not retake it. He said too many people focus on the MCAT when most likely you will not get in because of your interview or EC's. He said as long as it is fairly balanced (8 or above in each section) then focus all of that time studying on doing much more important things with your time like volunteering, research, traveling, etc.

So-I traveled abroad this summer and got more clinical experience when I got back-rather than spend hours studying and making my MCAT "average". I just wanted to share what someone had told me to do and how it ended up being the best, and most relieving, thing to do.

He also said that those people whose MCAT is lower, the same, or just a point or 2 higher risk looking less appealing than having taken it once and then have other strengthened areas post-MCAT and being confident you did the best with your time.
 
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I agree completely about what you are saying about the MCAT. Looking back, I wish I would have taken this advice. While I understand that there is no clear cut cookie cutter method for getting into medical school, I just really feel that what you just said should have been posted on the school's website so that people won't freak out as badly over the MCAT and won't waste precious time (and money) retaking it. Perhaps I am starting to sound bitter, and I am, but I do look at this application cycle as a learning process. Heck, if I didn't go through it, I wouldn't have the mindset as clearly defined for the next go round. EC's, EC's, EC's, being well-rounded. Being real.
 
:scared:<----------- me at 9am tomorrow.😱


:zip:By the way, what is this icon for?
 
InvitroDerm said:
I agree completely about what you are saying about the MCAT. Looking back, I wish I would have taken this advice. While I understand that there is no clear cut cookie cutter method for getting into medical school, I just really feel that what you just said should have been posted on the school's website so that people won't freak out as badly over the MCAT and won't waste precious time (and money) retaking it. Perhaps I am starting to sound bitter, and I am, but I do look at this application cycle as a learning process. Heck, if I didn't go through it, I wouldn't have the mindset as clearly defined for the next go round. EC's, EC's, EC's, being well-rounded. Being real.
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I'd trade your 31 MCAT any day for my master's degree and research publication (the two main EC's I worked on this year instead of retaking). Who knows what UA really wanted...

*edit* I'd add 500+ useless volunteer hours in there too but I'm sure you had plenty of those as well.
 
For those of you who got into AZCOM but really want to go to UA, like Renny and Protein and Cuddy, etc. may I ask why? Is it the name? Is it the price? I'm just wondering what it is about UA if the content is pretty much the same and the residencies are pretty much the same as well. As a DO, I would feel comfortable applying for IM, FM, Peds, OB, Path, Psych, etc.
 
InvitroDerm said:
For those of you who got into AZCOM but really want to go to UA, like Renny and Protein and Cuddy, etc. may I ask why? Is it the name? Is it the price? I'm just wondering what it is about UA if the content is pretty much the same and the residencies are pretty much the same as well. As a DO, I would feel comfortable applying for IM, FM, Peds, OB, Path, Psych, etc.
Click to expand...

The real reason that I applied D.O. as well is because I want to be a doctor (ASAP) and was going to take whatever route I could to getting closer to my goals. I am a Business major and from the beginning was comfortable with a school that was oriented toward PCP's because I liked the idea of practicing and managing within my own practice. I also really like the holistic approach that osteopathic schools emphasize.

BUT I also really want to do Peds and really was excited about UA's new children's hospital opening up. Also, I have become very involved with my work in the ER and now am starting to get excited about being a Pediatric EP. So..I think I could get a more competitive residency and oppotunities with Emergency at UA than AZCOM. I also like UA's curriculum (especially Phoenix's) and low tuition better.

Regardless I wanted to stay in AZ to work with our population and wanted to get there as fast as possible b/c im inpatient and driven. So I would have taken AZCOM, but so much more excited about UA and their teaching hospital (Tucson), tuition, culture ( I am a Wildcat already), etc. I feel like I would fit in with UA's whole "diverse" student body. But I realized that medical school is what you make of it and I was determined to reach my goals at AZCOM as well if I had to. Plus I like AZCOM better than SOMA in Mesa...
 
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Yeah, that's how I feel too. For any of you who do get that ugly rejection letter, UMC is having a job fair thing in the dining room of the main hospital for PCT's, CNA's, and sitters on the 12th at (not sure). Maybe I'll see you there. It's either room D or C. Just ask the front desk.
 
InvitroDerm said:
For those of you who got into AZCOM but really want to go to UA, like Renny and Protein and Cuddy, etc. may I ask why? Is it the name? Is it the price? I'm just wondering what it is about UA if the content is pretty much the same and the residencies are pretty much the same as well. As a DO, I would feel comfortable applying for IM, FM, Peds, OB, Path, Psych, etc.
Click to expand...

A small part of it is the name (since I didn't learn what a DO was until this past September but I doubt I'll still care after graduating 4 years from now) but the main thing for me is the tuition. You're right about the residency opportunities being virtually the same regarding the less uber-competitive specialties, but as a DO that means I will also have to take extra board exams and perform well every time on top of learning OMM, which basically translates to more work while paying more money for a similar degree. But yeah, my original goal was either internal med, emergency med, or ob/gyn which DO's match very well but what if I decided later I wanted to do surgery, derm, radiology, etc. of course DO's have matched into those fields as well (and in fact have their own residencies that MD's can't apply to) but in general not coming from an MD school just makes it that much harder. I would also argue that in general MD schools have better research opportunities than DO schools, although in my specific case, I know AZCOM's research opportunities are superior to most other DO programs and not very competitive to get.

*edit* I will also add that if I do make it off the WL at the other MD school I interviewed at, it will be a really tough decision for me since I am really happy with being in AZ and out-of-state tuition at any private school is comparable to AZCOM's. But maybe I am just freaking out for no reason and putting the cart in front of the horse... what if I do get a decent WL position at UA? What if...

Also, it was very nice of you to share that info with us, Invitro. I will not be reapplying but in general most pre-meds I know aren't that cooperative with each other 😀
 
Congratulations, Cuddy! And good luck to everyone tomorrow - keep us updated! Think happy thoughts...
 
rennykim said:
Also, it was very nice of you to share that info with us, Invitro. I will not be reapplying but in general most pre-meds I know aren't that cooperative with each other 😀
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Lol, thanks! I actually learned my lesson in undergrad. I was competitive and quite honestly, it just got me nowhere fast, except high grades. In medical school, I have vowed to help everyone out as much as possible (while still getting good grades hopefully). Also, I don't want to be that person who tries to show off in front of the professor. This is a time in my life where I just want to be happy. Hopefully my good vibes will be contagious.
 
InvitroDerm said:
Lol, thanks! I actually learned my lesson in undergrad. I was competitive and quite honestly, it just got me nowhere fast, except high grades. In medical school, I have vowed to help everyone out as much as possible (while still getting good grades hopefully). Also, I don't want to be that person who tries to show off in front of the professor. This is a time in my life where I just want to be happy. Hopefully my good vibes will be contagious.
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I agree completely. I feel like I have been competing my entire undergrad and trying to out-do everyone. I disliked being around other Pre-meds for this reason and liked being non-science..although Business majors are just as competitive, cocky, and cut-throat sometimes lol. When I interviewed at Phx the students there said it was so anti-competitive and they all helped each other out. Tucson also showed the same vibes to me..I am also ready to just be content and motivated to do well for myself...not to beat everyone else.
 
Hi Everyone, tomorrow should be an exciting day 🙂

This is my first time using this, I am looking for some doctors in AZ to shadow that truly care and understand the art and not just the science of medicine.

Any recommendations?
 
InvitroDerm said:
For those of you who got into AZCOM but really want to go to UA, like Renny and Protein and Cuddy, etc. may I ask why? Is it the name? Is it the price? I'm just wondering what it is about UA if the content is pretty much the same and the residencies are pretty much the same as well. As a DO, I would feel comfortable applying for IM, FM, Peds, OB, Path, Psych, etc.
Click to expand...


Well I just back from the gym to find out this thread has exploded with posts! But I'm about to head out to a movie with a date 😍

Ok that smily face looks horrible so lets roll with 😀

And my reply to that would be very long and extensive so it's going to have wait just a little....but I'll give you guys something to read later for sure.
 
Proteinpowda said:
Well I just back from the gym to find out this thread has exploded with posts! But I'm about to head out to a movie with a date 😍

Ok that smily face looks horrible so lets roll with 😀

And my reply to that would be very long and extensive so it's going to have wait just a little....but I'll give you guys something to read later for sure.
Click to expand...

What movie are you watching?
 
Cuddy420 said:
I agree completely. I feel like I have been competing my entire undergrad and trying to out-do everyone. I disliked being around other Pre-meds for this reason and liked being non-science..although Business majors are just as competitive, cocky, and cut-throat sometimes lol. When I interviewed at Phx the students there said it was so anti-competitive and they all helped each other out. Tucson also showed the same vibes to me..I am also ready to just be content and motivated to do well for myself...not to beat everyone else.
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I stayed away from all the biochem and molecular biology majors during undergrad - as they seriously freaked me out (no offense to people in theses majors though). I stayed away from the pre-med honors clubs as well for the same reason. I didn't like being with cutthroat people who were hoping everyone else would fail.

My group was the other public health students. A few of them were pre-med, but even the pre-med public health students were all-around awesome people... at least in my graduating class. Those girls and guys were fabulous, laid-back and friendly. 😍

I tend to ask a lot of questions in class.... not to show off at all... but simply to get clarifications or to understand concepts better.
 
rkaz said:
I stayed away from all the biochem and molecular biology majors during undergrad - as they seriously freaked me out (no offense to people in theses majors though). I stayed away from the pre-med honors clubs as well for the same reason. I didn't like being with cutthroat people who were hoping everyone else would fail.

My group was the other public health students. A few of them were pre-med, but even the pre-med public health students were all-around awesome people... at least in my graduating class. Those girls and guys were fabulous, laid-back and friendly. 😍

I tend to ask a lot of questions in class.... not to show off at all... but simply to get clarifications or to understand concepts better.
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I actually liked that you asked lots of questions during interview day, too (at azcom).
 
I just can't take it anymore!! I really don't know how I'm going to sleep tonight. I feel like crying already...which I suppose is ironic given my screenname.
 
I can't take it either. Maybe the best thing to do would be to stay up all night...that way, if I get bad news I can crash right afterward so I won't have to think about it.


edit - Oh wait, I have to work. Darn.
 
I don't think, as a whole, the niceness of people who get accepted into medical school is any different from those who don't get accepted. They are not more altruistic nor more giving and caring.

There are environmental factors that remove incentive to be outwardly "competitive", in the negative sense: the pass/fail grading, a small intimate class size that makes any rock-the-boat ploys turn a student into a pariah, and common individual but independent goals (the Board exams) that may be furthered by cooperation and not cutthroating (for lack of a better word).

The students themselves aren't less "competitive"; it's just that the environment make it so that they achieve no benefit from say, kissing up to a prof., because there's no curve and everyone's going to get the same passing grade.

Of course the first and second year students at UofA and just about every P/F grading med school is going to say, "there's no competition and everyone tries to help each other". It's not intrinsically because of their pure nature; it's the nature of their environment. They are still human beings.

Has anyone really gotten to talk with 3rd or 4th years during interviews? Not me. Perhaps when it comes down to applying to residencies, if there is face-to-face competition for a slot, and it wouldn't surprise me that med students who mostly possess great, great desire for their careers and future could... it wouldn't surprise me that they would begin to appear all too human when they get the chance to step above (on!) someone else to get ahead, if they think they can get away with it.
 
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I think you are right. Competition is sort of genetic. It does not help when a dean's letter has your med school rank. So much depends on stats/etc. like the location of your residency, what specialty you can apply for, etc. I just hope that I can stick with my not very competitive residency aspirations so that I don't have to get tangled up in the all the competition. But look at my name, do I sometimes dream of a 255 step 1 with Honors with AOA. Okay, I admit it. But is it healthy? No way. It is much healthier to aim for a specialty that is not very competitive. Hopefully my desire for the noncompetitive specialty will stay strong throughout med school.
 
I hate this! Yeah right, like I'm gonna sleep at all tonight...
:annoyed:
 
I figure I'll probably be having a few drinks either way tomorrow night... unless my waitlist numbers over forty... then I'll just continue to continue to stress and worry.
 
Everyone needs to go to sleep.😴 Lets hope for the best and good luck to everyone.
 
Hey: So I've decided to wait until after the letters come out to post my long reply....

But here's the funny thing. I was thinking about it....a year ago...a month ago I could give you a clear cut to the point answer about why MD over DO....now I'm really scrambling for things to say that I'm more aware.

But there are many many reasons to prefer MD over DO; but primarily only for professional status reasons (and if you want to work outside the country). What I've come to realize is that we all tend to forget that medicine is a job...a career. And for some reason unlike everyone else we're forget that and think of it as a calling of sorts...or based on some reimbursement rates that we do it as a hobby?

At the end of the day as an MD or DO you're going to do the SAME thing. Help people and be a doctor. The whole holistic full-body approach...well look at the MSAR. I think half the med schools mentioned something about that last year. Personally I don't take too much stock in that. Osteopathy started off with the belief that everything was caused by "spinal lesions," and that correcting those could fix everything. Even when Koch and Pasteur came out with the germ theory they stuck to their claims saying that because of the lesions they body was not able to fight off the infection. DO's originally rejected almost all drugs (which was probably a good thing back then...better to take nothing vs ingesting mercury or undergoing some blood-letting) and later adopted them for a licensure standpoint. It probably wasn't until about the 60's that there really wasn't much of a difference in the scope of practice (and ways of practicing) between allopathic and osteopathic. So what is the better career option for how you want to practice medicine? What's a better fit? You can do the same things.

So now the two are the same... full practice rights, same reimbursement etc. Will you get as competitive of a residency as a DO vs MD. No. The playing field is not even from what I know. Yeah you have the extra residencies as a DO but I would imagine there is a reason many if not most DO students apply to allopathic ones (they pay better too don't they and have more research oppurtunities?). For a lot of us going DO is the route we take b/c we're allo rejects....so having MD board certification soothes our conscience. And I hate to say it but are most DO students going to do as well on the boards as their MD counterparts. In general the MD students had higher entering stats which would conceivably lead some to conclude they have an advantage on the boards. When I was originally going to the Caribbean I was told I would pretty much be the big fish there amongst the other students based on my stats and sometimes that's a good thing. A kid that goes to Harvard and gets a 36 MCAT will hear "Well you did go to Harvard." An ASU student that gets that 36 MCAT will stand out (their average MCAT score is a 19 I was told as of two years ago).

Another thing to consider is the OMM? Is it something you want to incorporate into your practice? And it takes up a lot of time in MS1 and MS2. But it probably helps reinforce anatomy greatly and cuts down the study time there.

Why I like UA over DO better I'll get into later after the letters come out.

And either which way...some pre-meds might not look as fondly upon those DO initials now but at the end of 4 years when they realize what we had to undertake to earn them they'll look on them with pride.
 
9 am- see you all tomorrow morning! Good luck to everyone!
 
Plan for the day: Pick up car, pick up cats from animal hospital, sit down at computer, hold breath for a good 40 seconds, then open my email.

And if things don't go the way I hope them to - stay positive.
 
Well folks I must say today should bring at least some closure for us. Too bad PHX isn't on the same timeline so we could get it all over in one fell swoop.

I must say it's been a pleasure and like others have said this has been the a huge source of entertainment/peace of mind.

Good luck everyone! I truly hope the best for all of us 👍
 
TeamZissou, I really wish you'd chosen AZCOM and we could be classmates. I'm sorry to hear about UA. I'm sure my rejection email will be coming very shortly. No matter where we end up, I know we will all be great physicians someday.
 
Nevermind. Got my email from Tucson. Pretty low on the waitlist. Oh well, here's to AZCOM.
 
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Waitlist Tucson #60......................so far away and yet almost close enough. But not. Hmm....
 
Here's my attempt at humor to soften the blow...
 

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rennykim said:
TeamZissou, I really wish you'd chosen AZCOM and we could be classmates. I'm sorry to hear about UA. I'm sure my rejection email will be coming very shortly. No matter where we end up, I know we will all be great physicians someday.
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Thanks Renny! After getting to know some of you on this thread I may have made a different decision. But bygones be bygones. I do plan to return to AZ either for residency or for practice so it's likely we will encounter each other again!

Congrats on #72, you never quite know how deep it may go this year!
 
waitlisted Tucson #23... I wonder how far they will go into the WL this year.
 
Rejected! For future reference I have amazing EC’s, great letters, graduated summa cum laude (3.92 gpa), but had a 24 MCAT (that darn verbal). Oh well off to DMU which actually focus more on surgery anyway! I am just so happy to actually know and not have to agonize if they will get to my number. Good luck everyone!
 
Waitlisted at Tucson #39...I have no idea what to think about that. It is right in the middle of maybe, maybe not. Atleast I got the Phx acceptance, but if I do get that Tucson spot eventually then there will for sure be an opening at Phx for someone. Wishing for lots of WL movement!
 
So, I'm thinking. I need to get some better EC's, and I may need to look for new LORs. I might just take a couple classes for no other reason than to get the letters. My MCAT should be good to go (9/11/10/P). My GPA is in the 3.6 range. Anybody else got some suggestions?

Does anybody have it in them to bug Phoenix again today? I'd do it but I'm worried I'd just sound like a panicked Tucson reject. I guess I still have a slim hope of Phoenix since that was where my interviewer told me she thought I'd get in...
 
rejected, meh. i got a 31, 3.75. didnt submit sec to other schools until nov-dec, and only got interviews from mayo and georgtown. gotta retake i guess
 
I'm waitlisted at #76 at Tucson. Doesn't look too good for me... ah well, it's good to know where I stand.
 
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