<p>I can't seem to find a lot of this topic so here it goes:</p>
<p>I am currently a senior in high school and have committed to a very competitive nursing program (about 3000 applicants for 150 spots) and I know that I am very fortunate to have gotten in. At this point in my life, however, I'm not sure that I want to become a nurse and I am actually leaning towards going to med school and becoming a dermatologist. Although you can major in whatever you want and still go to med school, I have heard that majoring in nursing is frowned upon by med schools for several reasons: (1) There is currently a huge deficit of nurses and they don't want to take a nurse who has completed all the schooling away from the field (2) Nursing programs are extremely competitive and I took the spot of a student who really wanted to be there (3) The nursing curriculum is extremely strict and in order to complete my pre med prerequistites I will have to stay in school for an extra semester (4) Nursing is a GPA killer which will make it more difficult to get into med school.</p>
<p>I'm not sure if I should switch my major to something else, as I plan on becoming a doctor anyway. However, with more and more people getting rejected from med school each year, majoring in nursing is appealing to me as I will always have something to fall back on. However, if majoring in nursing is really going to make it difficult to get into med school, I'm not sure if I should change my major to something else.</p>
<p>If anyone has any knowledge/advide on this topic it would be greatly appreciated. Thank you</p>
<p>Nursing is not a career “to fall back on.” The approaches to healthcare are very different between and MD and an RN (even a DNP). If you want to diagnose and treat disease, if you want to determine the plan that others will follow, go premed.</p>
<p>You are correct that you would need extra time to complete the MD prereqs. You do know that beginning in 2015, those prereqs become more stringent? The additional behavioral sciences won’t be a problem because nurses will take those anyway. But, the new premeds at my uni are now being advised to take 2.5 years of chem (gen, o, bio). I’m just saying look a little closer at the requirements, you may jot be able to cover them in one extra semester. </p>
<p>It’s something entirely to get into a program, get into clinicals and think, I would rather be the doctor, but I’m too far in to quit. Then you finish nursing and do your premed classes. To go in hedging your bets, saying I want to be a doctor, but just in case . . . I think that would hurt your chances come med school interview time. </p>
<p>The first year of nursing school is mainly required general ed classes and sciences. You could delay your decision for a year, by trying to get some classes out of the way that would work well as a biochem pre-med or a nursing student. Pre-med students typically take more chem than nursing students and take calculus. </p>
<p>Meet with a pre-med advisor at your college to understand what med schools require and are looking for. </p>
<p>It is hard to get into a nursing program, but easy to change over to a biochem or similar major. Start as a nursing student and then keep an open mind about alternatives. A premed needs a very very high GPA, so the decision may be made for you if you don’t get As . </p>
<p>There are many pre-meds who don’t get into med school who wish that had become a nurse. . </p>
<p>This topic has been discussed in depth within the last couple years on this part of CC. Check out the search function for nursing and pre-med. </p>