Originally posted by oldladypremed
I would love to hear of your route to medical school. What did you do before? How was the application process?
-Oldlady
Oldlady-
First of all, you're not old! I prefer to think of myself as having many valuable life experiences...
I was pre-med when I started as an undergrad, but I was a distracted 18 yr old... long story short, my grades during my first 1.5 yrs were terrible (0.7 GPA second semester....yes, I'm serious). I recovered and started doing well but my advisor told me to give up on med school- I listened. I got a degree in geology (which I still love) and graduated in 1991 with a 2.9 GPA.
Since school I have held several jobs.. most recently customer service manager for a boatbuilding company. I don't know if you can relate to this, but in spite of my successes, I have always felt like I was just killing time (because I was supposed to be in medicine!) When I realized that a lot of employees at my last company didn't understand their benefits/ health insurance and weren't getting treatment they needed, I got involved. During that process I realized that I had to try again to get in to med school.
I needed advice on how to get started. I talked to the pre-med advisor at my undergrad institution (some help) and then to the pre-professional advisor at a smaller local school (lots of help). I was told that my odds for admission were fair to poor, and that I needed to accomplish several things before applying:
1. Finish the prerequisite classes that I still needed.
2. Take enough post-baccalaureate work in higher division sciences to show that I could handle the work.
3. Ace every post-bacc class I took and get my GPA up.
4. Prepare for and do very well on the MCAT (I was told this was most critical. A medical admissions person told me that there is a very high correlation between MCAT success and USMLE step one scores, so they look HARD at your MCAT).
5. Get some experience in a medical setting. (Admissions comittees want to know that you understand what you are getting in to. This is especially important for older students making big career/ life changes)
6. Develop relationships with professors to get good current Letters of Recommendation.
If you already have your degree most colleges will let you take classes as a "post-baccalaureate special student" or something similar. I took organic chem over again (had a so-so grade as an undergrad) and also took genetics, biochemistry, microbiology, cell biology, a statistics class, and did research in a immunology lab. Just a note here: some schools have funky admissions requirements, so make sure you aren't surprised when time comes to apply. Get a copy of the Medical School Admissions Requrements from
AAMC (you will also find info here about the MCAT and AMCAS).
With my GPA, my application was DOA without a great MCAT score, so I preped for this course like my life depended on it (giving up a good job and financial security for the crap-shoot of med-school admissions is very motivating!) There are many prep courses available for the MCAT (I took Kaplan) and I recommend that you look into them. I hadn't had general chemistry or physics in 12 years when I decided to apply, so the structure and materials offered by a formal course were a godsend. You will also have the chance to do lots of practice tests in these classes. (there are tons of MCAT threads on this site- I'm sure you know.)
I quit my FT job to take FT classes and devote my time to MCAT prep. I spent a good part of my savings to do this, but it was worth it. I also got into an EMT class, got certified and volunteered with the rescue squad locally. I did well on the MCAT and got good recommendations. I spent a lot of time refining my personal statement on the AMCAS application. I did a lot of prep for interviews (check out the interview feedback here on the SDN site!) etc., etc........on and on....
This is all just quick overview of what I had to do- don't know how much will apply to your situation. I gotta run for now, but feel free to ask anything as you go through the process.
Cheers!
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