<p>Who can tell me the hardest med schools (top 10) to get into in each of the following categories:</p>
<p>1) average MCAT total score
2) average undergrad GPA
3) lowest acceptance rates</p>
<p>Thanks!</p>
<p>US News will have this information for you.</p>
<p>Generally, the top 20 med schools on the US News rankings are about equal in selectivity.</p>
<p>USNews.com:</a> America's Best Graduate Schools 2008: Top Medical Schools - Research
to see all the stats, you will have to pay. But basically, get a 3.8 and 11.5</p>
<p>Here's the List for Topic Medical School - Primary Care</p>
<p>USNews.com:</a> America's Best Graduate Schools 2008: Top Medical Schools - Primary Care</p>
<p>For selectivity on MCAT and GPA, the R schools generally trump the PC schools. As always, using the rankings as rankings is very unreliable.</p>
<p>R rankings are the right ones if you're interested in research. PC rankings are poorly constructed and don't mean anything at all. Specialty rankings, which is what most people are interested in, do not exist because they would be pratically impossible to construct. (US News has some survey data for this, but surveys, of course, are not very reliable, and USN recognizes this.)</p>
<p>I think at least the rankings on cheap schools and having most/least debts have some factual basis.</p>
<p>Actually, in my experience USN does not have very good cost data. Comparing their data to student budgets often gives very different results.</p>
<p>what exactly is the true difference b/t R and PC schools? and also is there a consensus on which kind is better?</p>
<p>Research-oriented schools have more research resources, more NIH funding, and push you into research. Obviously, they're better if you plan to do research in medical school or after.</p>
<p>Any school can lead you into primary care.</p>
<p>One word: Harvard.</p>
<p>And maybe two more: Johns Hopkins.</p>
<p>That do?</p>
<p>By the measures listed (GPA, MCAT Score, Admit %) those are not the two most selective schools in the nation.</p>
<p>By subjective measures -- including quality of research, extracurriculars, etc. -- they probably are.</p>
<p>
[quote]
Any school can lead you into primary care.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>And by the same token, any school can lead you to a research position. </p>
<p>Let's be honest, all academic medical centers have major resources dedicated to research activities. If that's what you really want to do, you'll find a way to get involved. </p>
<p>I think a better examination is to look at "thrust". What will the school put an emphasis on? Certainly it's a spectrum, and no school is 100% (or even 80%) in one direction or the other. </p>
<p>Much like I've said about undergrad schools - with smaller private schools having resources more readily apparent - highly ranked research schools will make the research positions more readily available, will push students to do research, and will make it more enticing for students to pursue research activities.</p>
<p>On the other hand, it's likely that PC schools put a greater emphasis on their faculty to teach clinical medicine and worry less about research. Is the difference that great compared to their Research schools? In some cases, possibly, but every school is going to grant you an MD, and you'll be able to get a residency position somewhere. </p>
<p>In the end, unless you REALLY want to do research and you know this going in, there's probably not enough difference between the two to matter.</p>
<p>All medical schools will have basic science departments, and many will have medical departments (e.g., medicine, pathology, etc.) that will have at least a few faculty who do basic research. Where the difference may lie between R and PC schools, is the opportunities to do more cutting edge research in a wide range of areas. However, most medical students eventually become full-time clinicians so it really does not impact on their clinical training and residency. Schools with stronger research reputations generally can place students into residency programs at places that also have strong research. Some of the students may have been involved in research while in medical school which make them attractive to the particular residency programs. This may be especially important in certain areas e.g interventional radiology where there a high tech infrastructure in place at research schools
.
For a student interested in research who is admitted to a PC school, there will be opportunities to gain some experience. Note that fellowship training in a subspecialty is probably the most critical time anyway to get research training as the next step afterwards will be a faculty appointment somewhere. In that situation, one will have to apply for grants to be able to survive in academia. I would say the research training as a fellow and the transitional period shortly afterwards to become a faculty member is most important for development of research skills. I have known clinical fellows with no previous research experience come into labs and do well enough to pursue it as their major activity. Rare, but not unheard of.</p>
<p>by research after med school u guys mean PhD?</p>
<p>You don't need a phD to do research after med school. An MD is just fine for clinical research or even basic science research.</p>
<p>One other area of difference between R and PC schools is mentoring. Both R and PC schools will usually have good clinician teachers, and you will graduate with enough clinical competency to succeed in internship and residency. On the other hand, at R schools, one will have opportunities to interact with national and international leaders in many different areas of medicine if one takes some initiative. Most of these people made their careers based upon their research. Getting letters from these people for competitive residencies is certainly helpful. However, perhaps even more importantly, they can be powerful mentors just by their positive influence, example, and dynamism. Many students in PC schools do not consider a traditional academic career involving research simply because they have little exposure to it. At R schools, students are exposed to it early on, and some places like Yale and Duke require research theses for graduation. The top R schools want to train the future leaders in medicine, which generally are academicians who do research. In a sense, they are selecting and then cloning the types of students that will perpetuate their institution's influential role in the field of medicine.</p>
<p>Can undergraduate research in medicine field be counted as "clinical experience" for med application? We cannot really have any REAL clinical experience as pre-med now, can we? Do med school admissions officers really value pushing chairs or shelfing books in the hospital that great?</p>
<p>They want patient contact.</p>
<p>Keep in mind that patient contact is a broad, broad, broad definition. When I volunteered, I spent most of my time getting sheets and towels. However I often helped hand out lunch trays and usually got the chance to talk to patients while doing that. I could usually find one patient a shift to sit and talk to for 10-15 minutes. That was enough to give me enough experience to talk about during my interviews.</p>