***Official Thread for BSMD Applicants 2018***

@PPofEngrDr All are his patients living in the same city. But went to different colleges all over US during their time. At least that is what I saw 2 years from my D’s school in Bay area. All over from Dartmouth to Miami to San Diego to Seattle to Houston to Chicago, all over the US.

@PPofEngrDr

I am not sure what is confusing about my previous posts. I did mention that the list is comprised MOSTLY from our patients. UIC GPPA student is in fact my niece from Illnois. With this fact, I guess you can deduce that we are located in NY State. Hope this helps.

@grtd2010

These consultations are done after office hours.
I enjoy doing this…to motivate others to achieve their dreams. Some of my reading list includes: Becoming Dr. Q, A Hope in Unseen, Of Blood and Hope, Living Loving and Learning, A Road Less Travelled.
As an immigrant, who has received so much from the generosity of others, I want to contribute a little bit to my community-paying forward.

@PPofEngrDr

Oh, I forgot to mention that most of my patients are not sick. Preventative medicine is big in our office. Perhaps, you have not yet come across doctors who measured your waistline as a part of discussion on metabolic syndrome.

@upstream On a different subject, Are you familiar with Dr. Fung’s work regarding metabolic syndrome and Intermittent Fasting? You can PM directly please.

Rarely I read any book. But I read 2 years back “when breath becomes air” given by my D. It was a moving one. It is good my D read and still wanted to go for medicine only.

@GoldenRock and other experienced members ,
What do you suggest between penn state / Jeff and union/AMC.
No scholarship for penn , and half tution covered for union

@TTV2018 Sienna and Uniion are two different schools - Sienna is a very small school whereas Union is bigger with better facilities and is more expensive. I would pick one where you feel your D will be more at home Thats Important… If money was not a factor my vote will be for Union - no confusion here.

@upstream I like your post #3428 a lot.

As a parent of 3 kids who got into multiple programs (MD & DO) and Ivies (the 3 kids are of course not at the same level and have their own place) - I can tell you college is very different from high school and smartness is RELATIVE…

As you rightly said the main trick is to pick the right school - traditional or program for the Kid. If there is a misfit, then there will be problems regardless of which route one takes… Its interesting everyone posts stats on how many kids got into programs but I have not seen meaningful numbers on how many make it out successfully… YOU will be surprised…

The story does not end on being accepted into a program - it just begins and there are no guarantees in Life…

@TTV2018 , as @rk2017 rightly pointed out , our son got accepted into UNION/ ALBANY MED program. He is talking to current and past students to get more info about the prog. So far no red flags.

Northwestern HPME program interviewed high school students with leading research work, for ex. regeneron finalist. Interviewers were openly hostile to research candidates.


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Wow... same case here with Princeton student.... afraid to ask

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@upstream, also forgot about some smart girl who went to WashU BME and gave up on medicine, she never tried.

@bsmddoodad

Can you please elaborate what happened at HPME?

@upstream
Thank you for your post.
Summarizing your data points—-

Out of 30 examples listed for traditional route-
16 had to take 1-2 years gap

7 dropped out
8 had to do DO
3 got into top 25 school
9 got into mid-tier school
1 low tier school
2 Caribbean med schools

So, 75% did become MD/DO but over half had to take 1-2 gap years.
25% dropping out - one reason people cite for traditional route is that kids change their minds.
Your data confirms that.
The gap year story is what I have heard a lot - that itself makes a strong case for BSMD Route.

@NoviceDad

Nice summary.
Most students dropped out due to poor grades.
One student at Emory (forgot to mention this case in my previous post) did so poorly in his 1st year Bio, he wanted to change his BME major…in his case I believe his downfall was due to poor planning while he was in high school, taking a sole Bio class while he was a Freshman. One unfortunate case at WashU was that his intellectual ability did not fit as a pre-med at that university. His stats indicated that he barely got in due to his fluffed up extracurricular activities as coached by a paid consultant. Once again, A’s in introductory pre-med science courses are not freely given out in any colleges. He had too many C’s. Of course he could have pursued his passion to become a physician by going to a Carribean medical school, but his confidence was so low that he did recover from his Freshman year.

To summarize my points here:

Pick a college, where you will be a top dog. If you are planning to go to Cornell or UChicago, you will be competing with many students from a feeder high school, where they annually produce 125 NMSFs.

Need to plan well…having passion is not enough. For an example, if you are going to take Orgo, you might want to take Orgo class at a local college as a non-credit class during the summer as a preview.

Good luck everyone!

@upstream
Thank you.

Do you have any views on following BSMD programs?

Northwestern HPME
PennState/ Jefferson
Stonybrook

@chasingdreams21 , do you think MBA from LIM program will give added advantage for residency ? Can you please let me know your opinion of LIM compared to penn/Jeff PMM?

@upstream do you have any advise on TCNJ/NJMS BSMD program?

@upstream and others this is becoming quickly quicksand and tbh it shakes my confidence too and that makes me keep rethinking about choices we have over and over.
Would like to share our experience on Northwestern admitted student day, aka Wildcat day, and we have an opportunity to talk to student panels, students, faculties and even pre-med health advisors (that is only available once college starts).
One point they emphasize is that acceptance rate to medical school national average is 42%, while NU average is 70~80% range in last few years, so believe the success ratio is higher for NU students.
2nd, to my question about UG grade deflation, initial facial reaction was like I pressed wrong nerve, but then pre-med health advisor portrait it that med schools are aware of grade system from different colleges so its not like they are all treated with same weight (further elaborate 3.75 from NU wouldn’t be same as other school 3.75). there was an acknowledgement of grade deflation term. They also said average science GPA is 3.55 for NU UG admitted students to med school.
3rd, they did confirmed that UG students have opportunity to research with Feinberg medical school graduates and faculties as part of UG and that is obviously a huge booster considering Chicago metro size. They have entire office dedicated for UG research program.
4th, in first year they are advising about 1100 students for pre-med track and by end of year that number drops to 400-500. I am more focusing on 400-500 number then 1100 as at beginning of UG year lots of kids explore lots of things thus higher number of 1100.
From a current senior student we learned that he got admitted to NUPSP among 50 kids who were eligible, 16 interviewed and 7-8 admitted to NUPSP. Eligible GPA for NUPSP is 3.7 and he achieved 3.8 and made it to NUPSP.

Will add more later if i recall something.

Many thanks for your kind advice @GoldenRock @GreenPoison @rk2017 @srk2017 @NoviceDad @BS_MD2017

Very helpful! I showed them to my DD. Will contact others here who are admitted to these programs.

She will visit both places again and then we will let her make the decision. She has merit scholarships from both places and fortunately cost is not a factor.

Good luck to all those who are making tough decisions right now. May you all find the best college for your brilliant future!