<p>I was wondering which majors would be best for me if I plan to become a radiologist by attending medical school? I have a select list of colleges I plan to apply to in the next coming months and I really need to know which major to apply for. I also was wondering if Biomedical Engineering was an option. If not, please help me by giving me a few majors that would be perfect for pre-med, and even radiology if possible. There aren't a lot of discussions on becoming a radiologist that I have seen as eye-opening, so I decided to start a thread of my own in hopes of getting some thoughtful replies. Thanks everyone!</p>
<p>It doesn’t matter. Just get through UG with whatever major floats your boat.</p>
<p>Med schools look for two different things: your overall gpa and your science gpa. Science gpa will consist of courses in biology, chemistry, organic chemistry, physics, and math, which are generally calc and statistics. You can major in anything, so long as you also take pre-med required courses. The required courses can vary slightly according to the particular med school, but not by much.</p>
<p>You really won’t be doing anything related to radiology during college, unless it’s some kind of research. That’s okay. You’ll enjoy it much more by the time you get to med school, but probably by then, you may have already changed your particular focus.</p>
<p>Your undergrad major will zero influence on whether or not you end up in radiology.</p>
<p>Radiology is a very competitive residency program and your ability to match into radiology will be largely dependent on how well you score on your Step exams (medical licensing exams), your grades during your clinical rotation in radiology as a med student, whether you can get strong letters of recommendation from your radiology praeceptors and if you’ve done research in radiology during medical school.</p>
<p>A GAMom said–major in whatever you want. It really doesn’t matter.</p>
<p>And what limabeans said about changing focus is true too. D1 (currently a MS2) was physics major with 2+ years of experience doing particle irradiation/high energy physics research. She thought she wanted to go into either radiology or radiation oncology when she started med school. However, after spending time with the rad groups she discovered she hated it. Moral: don’t plan your future around something you know nothing about yet.</p>
<p>Thank you all! I guess my UG major will ultimately affect my decision in the future. It all makes sense now! </p>
<p>One other thing, what are the steps to becoming a radiologist? I know the basic ones like going to med school for radiology, but what comes after 4 years of med school and residency?</p>
<p>Radiology board exams. State licensing exams. A subspecialty fellowship in radiology if you have a specific area of interest. More exams.</p>