WAMC: 3.8/3.7 | 520 | Clinical + Data Science + Service-Oriented | 48 MDs

[CrimsonTurtle57]

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cGPA/sGPA: 3.8 / 3.72 (AMCAS verified)
MCAT: 520 (single attempt)
State of Residence: California
Ethnicity/Race: Asian (South Asian)
Undergraduate Institution: large UC
Graduate: master’s in business/data analytics from a major public university - 3.87 gpa


Clinical Experience (~1100 hrs):

• Medical Assistant at rotating clinics primarily serving undocumented immigrants and refugees (~270 hrs)
• Clinic Intake Volunteer at a safety-net clinic (~80 hours)
• Victims Advocate with local law enforcement departments, trained in psychological first aid and provided trauma-informed support (~550 hrs)

Research Experience (~1000 hrs):

• Wet lab research on glioblastoma through NIH-funded program (600 hrs)
• Capstone project developing AI tools for Healthcare venture capital firm to evaluate health startups (220 hrs)
• Independent projects using clinical and online data to model stroke risk, psychiatric illness, and crisis language detection in suicide-watch forums (120 hrs)
• 2 peer-reviewed publications, 1 preprint, regional poster presentations
• Note: no PI rec letter which I understand is a concern. Commentary on this would be helpful. it was a full-time summer research experience 3 years ago and I ultimately quit the lab for several personal reasons.

Shadowing (130 hrs):

• Psychiatry, cardiology, neurosurgery, neonatology - including Cleveland clinic

Non-clinical Volunteering (~1150 hrs):

• Private tutoring over six years (~1750 hrs total; roughly half paid, half volunteer for underserved students)
• Consulting through a university consulting group (~450 hrs); not sure if this counts as traditional non-clinical, but was consulting for local health clinics and small local businesses. For example, we collaborated with a local dental clinic to explore ways to accept Medicaid patients without compromising their business model.
• Addiction recovery shelter volunteer (70 hrs before program shut down due to COVID; pivotal to my path and discussed in PS)
• Digital health literacy project for rural hemophilia patients abroad in a south asian country (~140 completed, 500 projected) - the main focus of upcoming gap year is scaling an app for patients to report bleeds and building algorithms that trigger care alerts for local clinics

Leadership & Other ECs:

• Leadership in wellness and mentorship roles through student orgs
• Former esports team captain and youth coach
• Internship in data analytics (private sector)

Posters & Publications:

• 2 peer-reviewed, 1 preprint, 2 regional poster presentations

Other Notes:

• Strong emphasis on integrating clinical medicine with data science
• No institutional actions or red flags
• No awards - only formal recognition is Dean’s Honor List
• 7 letters of rec - 5 from faculty (3 science, 1 writing, 1 graduate prof), 1 from Healthcare VC firm, 1 from parent of student I've tutored almost daily for over 6 years, 1 from MD at volunteer clinic

Total Schools Applied: 48 (all MD)
Umich

Albert Einstein

Kaiser

Pritzker

Yale

Cornell

Zucker

Thomas Jefferson

Upenn

VCU

Dartmouth

Northwestern

Icahn

UNLV

UofAirzona - Phoenix

Rosalind Franklin

Georgetown

UCLA

Rush

UMass

Drexel

Columbia

WashU

Stanford

Tufts

Harvard

Eastern Virginia

UCSD

Vanderbilt

Carle

Reno

Loma Linda

Boston University

CA Northstate

CUSM

Case Western

Duke

George Washington

Johns Hopkins

USC - Keck

Loyola

Brown

UofArizona - Tucson

UC Irvine

UC Davis

UCR

UCSF

Colorado

 

[Faha]

48 schools is far too many to apply to. If you have already applied to 48 schools, I suggest these for secondaries:
Umich

Albert Einstein

Kaiser

Pritzker

Yale

Cornell

Zucker

Thomas Jefferson

Upenn

VCU

Dartmouth

Northwestern

Icahn

UofAirzona - Phoenix

Georgetown

UCLA

UMass

Drexel

Columbia

WashU

Stanford

Tufts

UCSD

Vanderbilt

Loma Linda (if you fit their mission)

Boston University

CA Northstate

CUSM

Case Western

Duke

George Washington

Johns Hopkins

USC - Keck

Brown

UC Irvine

UC Davis

UCR (only if you are from that region)

UCSF

Colorado

 

[Mr.Smile12]

I'm not sure I understand your activities classifications (totally don't quite get all your "non-clinical volunteering" and some of your "clinical experience"), but overall it's impressive... but hard to decipher. Hopefully your actual AMCAS is clearer than this WAMC analysis.

My usual question still applies about why you are making this pivot and how are you leveraging your past experience towards a career goal.

 

[CrimsonTurtle57]

I'm not sure I understand your activities classifications (totally don't quite get all your "non-clinical volunteering" and some of your "clinical experience"), but overall it's impressive... but hard to decipher. Hopefully your actual AMCAS is clearer than this WAMC analysis.

My usual question still applies about why you are making this pivot and how are you leveraging your past experience towards a career goal.

Yes, I should clarify - the only "traditional" non-clinical volunteering I have is at an addiction shelter pre-COVID, 70 hours. the other one is working as a volunteer data analyst with a hemophilia welfare society in an Asian country. As for the university consulting group, I labeled it as an extracurricular activity on AMCAS, but the description has leadership/service elements, as it was all done pro bono, and the nature of consulting was usually community-focused.

As for the clinical experiences, the only non-trad one is victims' advocacy, which I classified as clinical because it is very much patient-facing. I was trained in psychological first aid and served as an on-call responder with law enforcement, offering trauma-informed support in high-stress, often chaotic situations. I was supporting patients in moments of trauma ranging from domestic violence to mental health emergencies.

As for the data science angle, I pursued it and later the MSBA because I wanted to build a toolkit that complements clinical care. I see patient care as both individual and systemic. I believe the future of medicine lives at the intersection of innovation and human connection. By training in both, I hope to stay grounded in individual care while helping shape solutions that serve entire populations. That's the angle I took when explaining it on AMCAS. My goal, more broadly speaking, is to improve care from the systems-level through my data analytics, machine-learning skillset.

Thanks for taking the time. Do you think my school list is well balanced for my profile? I know 48 schools is a lot, and so as another commenter pointed out, should I trim the list significantly?

Also, what's your take on the lack of a PI rec letter? The lab was 3 years ago, and during the summer, 3 of the 4 aspects of my research production were from there. However, I ultimately did not pursue that letter for several reasons, including the fact that I felt that the letters I received better reflect my character/abilities/proficiencies.

 

[Mr.Smile12]

I think more than 30 schools is too many. Spending money needlessly is not smart when you have much more debt coming over the horizon. Unless you have done significant pre-writing and have a very focused list of schools where you align with mission, you could tire out and not present yourself well.

This list just popped up regarding addiction medicine opportunities for ERAS/residency. Pay attention to the schools that host the programs.

ERAS 2026 Participating Specialties & Programs

I don't know of specific residencies that could leverage your data analytics/machine learning skills, so I throw it to other experts to figure if your vision is feasible or appropriate for medical school. That will also be a big question adcoms will have: how much do you really want to learn about medicine itself as opposed to the machine-learning aspects? Not that many schools really welcome this, nor is it part of a typical curriculum. Thus, you could get looked over because a medical school you list may not figure you are a good fit. From what I can tell, integration of MLL/AI is still highly experimental for medical schools, and I'm not sure how willing schools are with having students teaching them. That's worth the networking.

By trying to show you have two separate visions for yourself as a medical student, you risk screening yourself out because you don't show a high preference for schools to train you properly in both aspects. Of course, my opinion is that the addiction medicine path is clearer because there are defined residencies that you can be prepared for. MLL/AI is not clearly included in the ERAS options, and I think it would be better pursued through different (research) fellowships.

To me, it sounds like a place like Carle, Texas A&M EnMed, and Arizona State (when open) would be an interesting pitch.
Q&A with Carle Illinois College of Medicine: Developing Innovation and Entrepreneurship as Health Professionals | SDN
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