High school to med school: Fast track to an MD

Parents Forum
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<p>High</a> school to med school: Fast track to an MD
By Abdullah Nasser
Washington Post
February 22, 2013

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A majority of the world’s countries, including Brazil, China and Denmark, considers an MD to be an undergraduate degree. Five to six years after receiving their high school diplomas (or their national equivalent), students in these countries are seeing real patients while their U.S. counterparts are still struggling with verbal-comprehension passages on the MCAT.

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<p>The American educational system is too slow and expensive. Doctors, lawyers, and other professionals should be able to start their careers earlier.</p>

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<p>Another day, another article, another thread dissing colleges in this country.</p>

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<p>Because Brazil has such a fine reputation as being one of the world’s leaders in medical care an innovation–right behind China :rolleyes:</p>

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<p>With the recent proliferation of PAs and nurse practitioners in this country, the medical system is already in essence starting to employ people who have not had 8 years of post-secondary schooling. More and more students with interest in patient care are taking these routes to employment and are getting decent jobs.</p>

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<p>as a student i think going to graduate school is a good idea. You have more time to learn and grow more. MOst of my friends want to be doctors and to be honest if they became doctors after 4 years in high school i would be quite concerned. Also America has one of the best health care systems in the world!!</p>

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<p>Everyone knows that when a head of state, billionaire oligarch, or otherwise famous/wealthy person gets cancer, they eschew Sloan Kettering and Mayo and head directly to a hospital in Brazil. People with means all over the world would rather get a heart and lung transplant in China than at Duke (or any of the other dozen exceptional transplant centers in the US.)</p>

<p>Beliavsky- do you ever actually read this stuff you post or are you just looking for entertainment value?</p>

<p>There are hundreds (and some might say- billions $) of things wrong with our medical system. The training of our physicians happens not to be one of them. And I have relatives who are physicians in other countries- and they consider the fact that they “chose” medicine at age 18 or 19 to be one of the core drawbacks of practicing medicine in their own country. By the time they are done with their residencies, they are just beginning to realize that they would have much preferred to be something else.</p>

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<p>Beliavsky overstates his case a bit. I think the European system, at least, is generally a 6-year program to MD, following a high school curriculum that is much more focused than anyone would get here. So, effectively, students get their MDs two years earlier, not four or five, and it’s at the not-insignificant cost of permanently excluding anyone who does not know he wants to be a doctor at age 13 or so, and of significantly narrowing the educations of those that do make that choice in 7th or 8th grades.</p>

<p>A few years ago, I had a long talk about this with a friend, who is an academic cardiologist in a European country, and married to an MD in clinical practive. Our children (two of mine, one of his) are all about the same age, and at the time all of them were in college. His daughter was in a faculty of medicine. He was very critical of the education system in his country – basically, his daughter had not had any kind of humanities course since she was 14 or 15, and he thought that seriously affected her critical thinking ability, breadth of focus, and general understanding of people who were not exactly like her. That wasn’t the way he was educated at all. He was a STEM person from the cradle, but when he was in high school he got a ton of literature, history, philosophy, and art history. This all came up because my kids were telling him about the University of Chicago Core Curriculum, and he really liked the whole idea. He wished his country’s system made room for something like that.</p>

<p>I had another relevant discussion recently with a friend who is on the faculty and admissions committee at a not-that-prestigious medical school. He is a non-MD biophysics researcher who has been on faculty at three different medical schools, including a very prestigious one. Anyway, he is appalled by the poor quality of the applicants he sees, mainly their ability to read critically, write coherently, and communicate effectively. Most of them seem to have gotten the message that all that’s required of them is that they memorize biology facts and various formulas – he doesn’t think much of their science education, either. If it were up to him, and he didn’t have to fill a class, he would hardly accept any of their applicants. He says the students at the more prestigious schools where he taught or still teaches are somewhat better, but less than you would think.</p>

<p>He encouraged his own kid to go to a high-quality LAC.</p>

<p>Anyway, there are two, somewhat conflicting points here: Putting high schoolers directly into professional education programs is not such a great idea. But our colleges aren’t necessarily doing a lot to justify their existence and to add value.</p>

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<p>For those who don’t know whether they even want to attend med school as a freshman in college, the current setup is just fine. However, the only accelerated BS/MD program in the US that I know of that would cut two years off the typical med school route is Sophie Davis.</p>

<p>Again, that sort of accelerated program is just not for anybody who wants to practice medicine.</p>

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<p>UMKC (UKMC?) is a program that has been around for a long time and it is 6 years. Northwestern’s HPME was 6 years during the 90s until they changed it to 7 years. I believe there is one in Ohio too (akron/Toledo?).</p>

<p>UK/India/China(?) filter people out after 10th grade to concentrate in majors and so people do not always have all the choices of classes possible in 11th and 12th to keep an open mind although it may still be possible by taking more classes than needed to graduate. When they enter college, they have chosen a major and ignore core curriculum requirements pravalent at most colleges in US. One can go to Oxford and spend exactly 3 years majoring in chemistry and graduate while learning absolutely nothing outside of the science subjects.</p>

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<p>Both places where I trained became wary of younger students (obviously not quite the same situation) who were prodigies and had fast-tracked through college and med school because these kids (one was 18, one was 19) were thrown into residency and couldn’t handle it. The transition to brutal hours, getting humiliated on rounds, etc etc was too much for them. One dropped out and tragically, one threw himself out of a window at the hospital. These were at two different places and two different specialties. </p>

<p>Now obviously, a system that supported younger practitioners would be different-- all of the students/residents would be presumably be younger and in a cohort, which the school would deal with. But transitioning our system to a faster tracked system would have to consider some of these issues-- we wouldn’t just have younger med students, we’d have younger residents in stressful lives.</p>

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<p>D’s friend was accepted into a 6-year program (UMKC), but decided to go to a 4 year university first instead. She wanted a broader education, time to study humanities, languages, etc.<br>
She always wanted to be a doctor, and is starting med school this fall.</p>

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<p>The argument may be stronger for making law degrees into 5 year total degrees, with law schools accepting most law students at the junior transfer level (i.e. after completing freshman and sophomore years), since there are no specific majors or courses required for pre-law students as it is now (those going to patent law are exceptions and could stay in the current system of law school after the needed bachelor’s degree).</p>

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<p>MDs in the States go through a pretty intense weeding-out and development process. The result is that most of the turkeys are excluded from ever laying a hand on a really ill client who could live or die based on a certain refinement of skill in diagnosis and practice. (Sorry, biological turkeys, this monkey was only speaking metaphorically.) </p>

<p>So, I think I’ll stick with the American doctors, and the American system the way it is.</p>

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<p>The author of the article distorts a few things. Someone who took one year off between college and med school would be about 22 or 23 in most cases, not 25. </p>

<p>But…I think JHS overstates his case a bit too.</p>

<p>Many students who pursue medicine in Europe do NOT make that choice at age 13. Some make it for the first time after taking the not uncommon gap year. So, we are talking about students who are 17-19, not 13. Yes, they probably took A levels in math and science, but they may not have decided on medicine rather than a chem or bio degree until quite late. Moreover, it IS possible to go back and earn additional A levels in math and science before applying to university. </p>

<p>Moreover, some students do decide that they want to study medicine after getting another degree first. It’s far from unheard of. Because universities are a lot cheaper than they are in the US–despite the recent increase in fees, especially in the UK–and students don’t have the kind of student debt they have here, this is feasible. Students who have an UG degree in science can sometimes shave a year or more off the medical curriculum. </p>

<p>Of course, there are American students who do post-bac degrees to meet medical requirements, but for a lot of students with heavy UG debt, adding another $50,000 or so to their debt with no guarantee that they will in fact get into medical school is a pretty daunting prospect. </p>

<p>Essentially, I’m just trying to make the point that it’s just not true that someone who didn’t decide to become a physician at age 13 can’t become one in the UK and that it can be quite difficult for an American who doesn’t take pre-med requirements in college to go on to med school. I may be wrong…but I think both Americans and Brits generally make the decision to start studying towards a MD about the same age–17 or so.</p>

<p>After finishing the med degree, Brits spend at least one and usually two years doing a program not unlike rotations in the US before they specialize–if they decide to specialize.</p>

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<p>The market for post-bac pre-med programs only exists because medical schools frown on taking pre-med courses at (low cost) community colleges. This limits the possibility of going into medicine after bachelor’s degree only to those who have lots of money (either their own or family support) or willingness to take a lot of financial risk (spend a lot of money on the post-bac but still have a good chance of being shut out of medical school).</p>

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<p>UBC- it’s not like the med school requirements are so onerous that only a kid who can afford a 5th year can meet the requirements. I don’t think any of the kids I know right now who are in med school were actual “pre med” majors. They studied what they wanted, they took the med school classes spread out over four years so they didn’t have any single semester that felt brutal, and they applied to med school like any pre-med.</p>

<p>I think the market for post-bac exists (based on my observation) because of well-to-do kids who don’t want to “distort” their undergrad GPA with O-chem, or don’t want to try to balance a social life with taking the pre-med requirements.</p>

<p>Nothing wrong with that- but I don’t think the typical kid who may want to be a doctor needs to try to budget one of these programs into an already expensive educational commitment.</p>

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<p>I was specifically referring to students who decide to do pre-med after graduating with their bachelor’s degrees in majors other than biology, whose choices are either the frowned-upon CC courses or the expensive post-bac programs. Those who decide to do pre-med while in undergraduate can fit the pre-med courses in alongside most majors.</p>

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<p>I am from Brazil and I am a dentist that graduated at age 21. So let me explain a little about what is and what is not right about Brazil x US and why I think it is wrong to go in the same path here. When I came here I passed the American National Dental Boards with high scores ( around 90). So you can say I had a good dental education,and was promptly accepted into Tufts and BU for their international graduated program. Emotionally I was still growing and trying to learn about myself. I did not have the opportunity to explore different avenues. I started dental school at 17. Now the system: Brazil system works for who has money. Who has no money makes lines. 6-7 hours of wait to see a doctor In many hospitals people die because they wait too long in the Emergency room. We have some amazing schools and some amazing doctors but we have tons of other schools and doctors that are not good. On top of that the system does not work for everyone, everywhere . If you are sick you better go to a private hospital. Here they want to shorten the years of study and in Brazil they are increasing them. One thing that people do not understand is that every successful doctor in Brazil has at least on American diploma.</p>

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<p>Just to be clear, jonri, I was thinking about France or Spain, not the UK, when I wrote what I wrote. I think there are much sharper choices to make there, essentially at the end of middle school. One may not have to choose finally between being a physician or a chemist, but one absolutely has to choose either of those over, say, law, and there’s no way to study economics or music and also prepare for medical school. There’s some flexibility later down the road, but not so much.</p>

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<p>Some state schools in the US have a program where you are pre-admitted to med school with your UG acceptance (assuming good performance in college.) Three years of UG and then you go on to med school. Our friends’ son did this, but he did change his mind and ended up not going to medical school after all.</p>