Why such a controversy going nurse to md route?

[Dreamofmd23]

Out of curiosity, why is it such an issue for someone to get their BSN then apply MD or DO in a year or two after working as an RN for awhile? Hypothetically one could ask a biology major why they didn't become a biologist or professor etc. As long as it is an accredited Bachelor's degree and the applicant completes all the prerequisites, why should it be a problem? I understand that nursing and medicine are completely different aspects of care, but why should we question a nursing degree over chemistry, economics, literature, or communications? Is there some stigma attached that nurses are only training for a vocational career? If they continue on with their education why is it seen that way? What about the people who plan to apply someday but need to work to save up money? What's your opinion on this subject? Have any of you known people who are applying, accepted or are currently in medical school; who have had previous careers?

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[md-2020]

Because nursing is far more vocational than any of the other degrees you mentioned.

 

[JustAPhD]

Slightly unrelated, but I've seen there is a stigma against nursing degrees when compared to biology or chemistry BSs. Simply put the emphasis on the actual science is not quite as strong.

 

[Mad Jack]

Because nursing degrees aren't very rigorous and you're wasting a spot in nursing school that could go to someone else that would actually make a career of it. There isn't much of a bias- nurses just tend to have poorer applicant profiles overall so have lower admission rates- but there is a bit of a "why did you go nursing to MD" that you'll definitely get if you went straight from nursing school to med school. If you're a nontrad nurse though, you're good.

 

[USvWindsor]

I got my BSN, have worked as a nurse the past 2 years, and am matriculating at an MD school this summer. I wouldn't recommend it as a path or plan to medicine; it's really hard to fit in prereqs, if you change your mind to a regular BA/BS it might take you an extra year, and nursing school can be stressful since you have like 5 opportunities to fail out each semester. I would only advise someone to pursue a BSN if they are seriously interested in nursing and are equally considering nursing and medicine as future careers. It worked for me and I would probably make the same choices if I had to do it again. I really enjoy my work and am thankful for the life experience, but everyone's situation is different and this would not work or be enjoyable for 95% of people. Nursing and medicine are very different.
Also, I did not experience any negative reactions on the application trail.

You can PM me if you have more questions, but I'm not planning on revisiting this thread.

 

[Almighty Saguaro]

I think it depends on how you present your story.

The points about "science background" is moot considering that non-science majors are accepted every year.

I know someone who applied while in the final year of his/her undergraduate training in an allied health field. At almost all his/her interviews, his/her clinical background/perspective and how well it gave him/her better insight into healthcare than most other applicants were major talking points. This is despite him/her explicitly stating that med school was always the goal and the undergrad training was a backup in case medical school admissions didn't work out.

Rejecting a qualified applicant (and essentially preventing him/her from becoming a doctor) because he/she 'wasted a spot in another professional program' seems a little absurd.


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[tantacles]

Out of curiosity, why is it such an issue for someone to get their BSN then apply MD or DO in a year or two after working as an RN for awhile? Hypothetically one could ask a biology major why they didn't become a biologist or professor etc. As long as it is an accredited Bachelor's degree and the applicant completes all the prerequisites, why should it be a problem? I understand that nursing and medicine are completely different aspects of care, but why should we question a nursing degree over chemistry, economics, literature, or communications? Is there some stigma attached that nurses are only training for a vocational career? If they continue on with their education why is it seen that way? What about the people who plan to apply someday but need to work to save up money? What's your opinion on this subject? Have any of you known people who are applying, accepted or are currently in medical school; who have had previous careers?

In real life, no controversy. In fact, my MD school currently has 2 RN's in the third year alone. The controversy has been largely manufactured by SDN. No one really cares what you did before medical school as long as it is legitimate; all we want is for medical students to succeed.

 

[piii]

There is no controversy... The only person making a big deal out of it is the OP. If a nurse wants to become a doctor for a good reason, who cares?

 

[IlyaR]

There is no controversy... The only person making a big deal out of it is the OP. If a nurse wants to become a doctor for a good reason, who cares?

Agreed. I was under the impression that you can major in basket weaving and matriculate as long as you do your prereqs.

 

[LizzyM]

Here's the deal with pre-reqs. Most pre-meds will take rigorous Chem I and II, o-chem I and II, Biology I and II. The nursing majors take a semester of chem, a semester of o-chem and an intro bio course, maybe a microbiology course for non-majors. None of the chem courses are with chem majors, none of the bio courses with bio majors. So then they are looking at taking chem II, o-chem II and maybe bio II without having had a deep dive in the subject matter in the previous courses.

Nurses aren't the only ones who are considered not having had rigorous preparation. I have seen the same with nutrition majors and clinical laboratory majors. The MCAT scores of the health sciences majors are the lowest of any group of applicants and the lowest among groups of matriculants.
https://www.aamc.org/download/321496/data/factstablea17.pdf

 

[AnatomyGrey12]

I feel that our nurses should have a more rigorous undergraduate education. At the very least, they should understand General Chemistry, take some college level math, and study some sort of Physics.

Why? It has absolutely nothing to do with what they are in school for. They are in school to become nurses, that is their program. Their undergraduate program is their professional program. It would be like a medical school teaching astrophysics or Pchem as part of their curriculum.

 

[LizzyM]

Why? It has absolutely nothing to do with what they are in school for. They are in school to become nurses, that is their program. Their undergraduate program is their professional program. It would be like a medical school teaching astrophysics or Pchem as part of their curriculum.

Going back to the late 1800s, nursing was a vocational training program operated by hospitals. The BSN programs came along in the mid-20th century. Without college degrees nurses couldn't climb the academic ladder and be "a profession". by the 1970s, the call was to eliminate nursing schools and send everyone through associate degree programs at a minimum, BSN and upward through doctorates in nursing. Going along with the BSN was the expectation that one be broadly educated in the social sciences and humanities as well as the natural sciences and clinical instruction. So, it could be argued that nurses need rigorous coursework in some areas of study, perhaps including physiology and biochemistry but less so in o-chem and physics (these are even under discussion for med school pre-reqs).

 

[anbuitachi]

There's not much bias as far as I know. As long as you are qualified it's fine. Question is more like why would you go from nursing to MD.... self torture? hahaa

 

[AnatomyGrey12]

Anyone going into healthcare should have the privilege of a rigorous science education before heading off to secondary school.

That's one of my points, nursing school isn't a secondary school. It is an undergrad degree. Doing the pre-reqs for the nursing program isn't like doing pre-reqs for medical school. It's more like taking accounting 101 to get into the accounting program. I get what you are saying and agree to a point but my experience after working with nurses for a number of years and watching my wife go through a fairly rigorous BSN program I disagree with the notion that harder classes will benefit these students very much.

I think a much larger problem is the plethora of garbage RN programs and how different some BSN programs can be. I can tell you that the nursing students from my undergrad are as smart as a lot of my pre-med friends. But also I have met other RN or BSN students from other schools and sometimes they can't tell a wrist IV from a PCC line.. And it isn't just the individual student, different programs consistently are garbage. IMO if there was a more standardized accreditation then the nurses would learn those critical thinking skills that you are talking about. Some programs develop them in students, and others don't.

 

[wholeheartedly]

Here's the deal with pre-reqs. Most pre-meds will take rigorous Chem I and II, o-chem I and II, Biology I and II. The nursing majors take a semester of chem, a semester of o-chem and an intro bio course, maybe a microbiology course for non-majors. None of the chem courses are with chem majors, none of the bio courses with bio majors. So then they are looking at taking chem II, o-chem II and maybe bio II without having had a deep dive in the subject matter in the previous courses.

Nurses aren't the only ones who are considered not having had rigorous preparation. I have seen the same with nutrition majors and clinical laboratory majors. The MCAT scores of the health sciences majors are the lowest of any group of applicants and the lowest among groups of matriculants.
https://www.aamc.org/download/321496/data/factstablea17.pdf

That's a bit confusing with respect to the clinical laboratory science majors though. The programs I'm familiar with all required the actual science major biology series, chemistry series, and organic and/or biochemistry. Physics was the only thing missing I think. No science light fluff classes. My best friend and I both earned hard science degrees first then went back for health professional programs later so we'd have some job security. She went the nursing route and I went the clinical lab science route. She complained a lot about how easy her "science" classes were compared to our undergrad science classes and how concerned she was with some of the things her classmates found hard.

Most of my CLS classes were interesting, fastpaced, and a high volume of info in a short amount of time. The caliber of students in my classes was as high or higher than undergrad. We did screen people out though. You didn't do well in your prereqs you didn't make it to the next phase. We also had things called critical objectives, things you had to score perfectly on to make it through the course. If you didn't get it 100% the first time, you remediated, if you came up short again you were done. Those objectives were tested over and over again throughout the program. So the people who finished were pretty solid students.

A lot of my classmates were doing dual majors in CLS plus another science degree or psych. Most of those applied to medical school and all were succesful getting in and felt that their background helped them (they did get a year or more work experience before applying in all but one case). This might be a function of the strength of the CLS program at that school and the med school's familiarity with the program and success of its graduates in med school. The assoc. dean of admissions for the med school told me my performance in the CLS program was outstanding and would really help me. I also heard that from other med school faculty. Interestingly, the med school were I attend graduate school also looks favorably on CLS grads., especially those with a year or two of work experience. according to the assoc. dean there.

I don't disagree that the stigma is definitely there. I wonder if that perception is a function of program quality variability, or the misperception of people bunching it in with other health professions. Most physicians don't really have any clue who are, what we do, or what sort of educational background we have either.

I'm fortunate because the first school I mentioned is in the state I was born and raised in and they favor former long term residents and the other is the state where I've lived the past 8 years. But then I've got a really screwy background, so who knows how this will all play out in the end...

 

[LizzyM]

That's a bit confusing with respect to the clinical laboratory science majors though. The programs I'm familiar with all required the actual science major biology series, chemistry series, and organic and/or biochemistry. Physics was the only thing missing I think. No science light fluff classes. My best friend and I both earned hard science degrees first then went back for health professional programs later so we'd have some job security. She went the nursing route and I went the clinical lab science route. She complained a lot about how easy her "science" classes were compared to our undergrad science classes and how concerned she was with some of the things her classmates found hard.

Most of my CLS classes were interesting, fastpaced, and a high volume of info in a short amount of time. The caliber of students in my classes was as high or higher than undergrad. We did screen people out though. You didn't do well in your prereqs you didn't make it to the next phase. We also had things called critical objectives, things you had to score perfectly on to make it through the course. If you didn't get it 100% the first time, you remediated, if you came up short again you were done. Those objectives were tested over and over again throughout the program. So the people who finished were pretty solid students.

A lot of my classmates were doing dual majors in CLS plus another science degree or psych. Most of those applied to medical school and all were succesful getting in and felt that their background helped them (they did get a year or more work experience before applying in all but one case). This might be a function of the strength of the CLS program at that school and the med school's familiarity with the program and success of its graduates in med school. The assoc. dean of admissions for the med school told me my performance in the CLS program was outstanding and would really help me. I also heard that from other med school faculty. Interestingly, the med school were I attend graduate school also looks favorably on CLS grads., especially those with a year or two of work experience. according to the assoc. dean there.

I don't disagree that the stigma is definitely there. I wonder if that perception is a function of program quality variability, or the misperception of people bunching it in with other health professions. Most physicians don't really have any clue who are, what we do, or what sort of educational background we have either.

I'm fortunate because the first school I mentioned is in the state I was born and raised in and they favor former long term residents and the other is the state where I've lived the past 8 years. But then I've got a really screwy background, so who knows how this will all play out in the end...

You've got a lot more going on there than just a CLS major. What I've seen have been senior undergrad students with that major and nothing more.

 

[wholeheartedly]

You've got a lot more going on there than just a CLS major. What I've seen have been senior undergrad students with that major and nothing more.

True, I've got a weird background and there were a bunch of overachievers in my program, but even the CLS major only students in my class had to perform well in all same bio 1 &2, chem 1 & 2, organic chem, and biochem that that the hard science majors took. So that should reflect a bit better on the group as a whole than say "micrbio for nutrition" that my nursing friend took to meet their microbio requirement.

I guess I'm sort of also responding to another post you made awhile back that rubbed me the wrong way, saying the CLS ( and nursing too I think) were people who "skated into college after graduating at the bottom half of their class in high school"

http://forums.studentdoctor.net/threads/clinical-laboratory-science.1159143/#post-16874802

What I was trying to say was based on both my experience , hard science degree and CLS degree, the caliber of my classmates was NOT at all consistent with that characterization. Most of them were top students and were performing well against all the other students in the science major courses.They were just also smart enough to plan a course that guaranteed a job at the end.

I'm hoping these students at least get a holistic app. review before someone decides their academic prep. wasn't rigorous compared to other science degrees?

 

[floatingrib]

yall realize a nursing student going to med school would take pre med along with nursing reqs? So it wouldn't be easier just a lot more sciences. Like yall making it like it's easy, I know history, english, etc majors doing pre med as well a nursing major maybe not entirely for science courses, but the lack of flexibility is what makes the two together super tough. Also Organic biochem is definitely harder than chem I &II and bio I & II. It's way easier than Organic chem tho, but I don't understand why it's being compared that they're easier sciences when non science majors aren't even taking the extra science classes. Nursing will not prepare one for the MCATS, like history won't for a history major. The pre med classes that both will take will prepare them.

 

[tantacles]

Here's the deal with pre-reqs. Most pre-meds will take rigorous Chem I and II, o-chem I and II, Biology I and II. The nursing majors take a semester of chem, a semester of o-chem and an intro bio course, maybe a microbiology course for non-majors. None of the chem courses are with chem majors, none of the bio courses with bio majors. So then they are looking at taking chem II, o-chem II and maybe bio II without having had a deep dive in the subject matter in the previous courses.

Nurses aren't the only ones who are considered not having had rigorous preparation. I have seen the same with nutrition majors and clinical laboratory majors. The MCAT scores of the health sciences majors are the lowest of any group of applicants and the lowest among groups of matriculants.
https://www.aamc.org/download/321496/data/factstablea17.pdf

It's certainly interesting, but I intuit that a health science major with a high MCAT score wouldn't be at any disadvantage. It's the great equalizer, and as long as you can perform on the MCAT, your pre-reqs, so long as they are completed with great grades, shouldn't impede you.