@Roentgen, @UMKCRoosMD, @blugrn6,
Did you guys feel like most of the people in your class was filled with students who were rich or very well-to-do? What about students who are related to someone who went to UMKC’s medical school or have a doctor as a parent? Do you think either or both of those circumstances make it more likely you’ll make it through the program? Do you feel like this gives someone any sizable advantage to those people in terms of getting into residency?
I’ll speak for my class only, but I don’t believe my entire class was filled with rich/well-to-do people. I also don’t believe that UMKC purposefully recruits students who are rich. I think that’s just the way it ends up sometimes. UMKC is “different” in terms of being a program right after high school, that combines undergrad + medical school in 6 years, and I think that appeals to a lot of families or gets their attention. Many I’m sure are turned off by the price tag, but I’m sure there are just as many that are not, and can easily write a check. If you talk to many traditional students, and outside of CC, they never even knew about BS/MD programs, so it really is an alternative pathway overall, if you compare the percentage of BS/MDers to traditional students.
That being said, I do think there is a sizable majority of students in the BA/MD program at UMKC who are very well off financially, many of whom have either direct family members who are physicians (or in healthcare in general), whether they be UMKC Med alumni (brother or sister, but in the past few years very recently, parents) or not. So just playing the odds, you are going to naturally get people who are more entitled and maybe more spoiled. When I started in 2003, it was only in-state or out-of-state available, so in the out-of-state pool, the above scenario in terms of being well off financially/physician parents was much more common, since the tuition was very high at about $51,000. Now with possibility of paying regional tuition all 6 years, where you’re only paying 1.5x in-state instead of 2x, I’m not really sure – probably the same. In-state has always been a variety in terms of financial background - but the financial risk is SO MUCH less for them, so they can effectively feel out the program to see if it is the right path for them, without too much financial risk. I know, as there were in-state students I knew who left, who did well academically, but felt that the program wasn’t right for them – so some went the traditional route, I know one who went for Dentistry, another for Nursing, or changed majors completely, etc. If you’re in-state, I think you have more of a luxury to do that and see how things are for yourself with no regrets, although even if you’re regional/out-of-state, if you leave at the end of Year 2, you’re still in the clear financially in being able to backtrack, without being chained to 6 figure debt (it would be 5 figures).
I don’t think having a UMKC Med Alumni gives that huge of an advantage in terms of getting through the program, but maybe slightly more in knowing how to navigate the program, depending on when that relative graduated. It’s not anything that can’t be made up with other resources though: College Confidential, administrative faculty, or just asking the right people.
I do think that if you’re well off financially you have a lot lower risk going thru this program (a.k.a. parents are footing the bill). So naturally, it would be a lot lower financial stress (which might affect your studying) than someone who is paying for his/her cost-of-attendance mainly through loans and has to think about that while you’re studying. I knew people who were paying tuition & fees AND room & board on loans, and so that can definitely contribute to stress, but they made it through. At least in my class, the ones with parents who were pressuring or forcing to take the doctor path, tended to make it through the program, mainly due to external reasons, although maybe not the happiest. I have seen and know students who felt almost obligated or were encouraged by their parents to do the program, who ended up failing out, leaving, or were dismissed, so it’s really hard sometimes to predict these things, as there are a lot of factors that play here. Just as a personal aside, it was almost never the people you wanted to leave the program, who end up leaving, go figure.
In terms of residencies, I think it depends on the connection. If someone has a brother, sister, mom, or dad, who works in academic medicine (a professor at a medical school) then yes, they do have an advantage at that academic medical center and maybe in that specialty. Medicine is definitely not immune to connections and networking, just like any other profession, that can supercede good grades and great board scores. Even without family, it’s almost always a combination of hard work, determination, networking, personality, and sometimes just plain luck. I know that’s really hard for students to understand, because they’re so used to things being objective (GPA, SAT/ACT scores, etc.), but you’ll see very quickly that a lot of medical school and medicine isn’t objective, but rather subjective. So it’s not always the best person in terms of grades and scores that is chosen. Sometimes those other things can play a role.
All you can do is just play the best with the cards you are dealt with in life, and try not to get too wrapped up in how much easier or harder other people have it even if it is 100% true. It’s a sure fire formula to being very unhappy. I would also make sure you are doing this 100% for yourself, and not at all for your parents – whether you think they’ll be happy and proud, and you can’t see yourself as anything but a physician. As @blugrn6, mentioned before, this is made harder by the fact that you’re 18, and you don’t really have that much overall life experience yet, and haven’t gotten to rule other things out.
I don’t mean to spam the forum with wait list posts, but has anyone on the wait list heard anything yet? 
Nothing yet. Did you hear from them? Are you instate?
Still waiting…
I’m out of state, Indiana. According to the FB page, there’s 15 OOS already.
@prospectivemed, I believe if you look at the Facebook page — it says, “This group is for students accepted to or waitlisted at UMKC’s Six-Year BA/MD Program.” There are currently 96 members, but 13 of them are admins (who are Year 2s) so really only 83 people, out of a Year 1 class of about 120 probably.
@Roentgen is right about the numbers. But @prospectivemed you’re also correct. Out of the incoming students (not the admin), 15 of them are from OOS.
I am not sure how many are wait listed students, out of the 83 who joined the page though
It wouldn’t surprise me if they were just a little late in telling people, although it would have been courteous of them to tell you today - even though they aren’t obligated to. It’s also possible that people gave their decision by May 1st (Friday), then they see this Monday AM and this week how many open spots they have, which then they have to look at the waitlists and fill those spots accordingly, which takes a few days (i.e. going thru administrators, etc.) as I believe the Dean signs off on the final list (don’t quote me on this)
According to the website: http://med.umkc.edu/bamd/timeline/
I hope it doesn’t run till the end of May, as that would be quite ridiculous, IMHO.
Two out-of-state students joined the FB group earlier today. So maybe they got accepted off of the wait list and joined? Honestly my guess is as good as anyone else’s. Best of luck to my other friends who are waiting as well! Maybe they took more than 15 OOS this year? Best to remain optimistic!!
And thank you for the help, Roentgen!!!
You’re correct, all of this is complete guessing and speculation on our part, with respect to the exact numbers of in-state, regional, or out-of-state. I’m sure most people who were waitlisted wouldn’t even think to join the group (I wouldn’t), since it’s relatively difficult to see that part in the group description. Sucks that you all have to wait longer to hear a response, but what more can you can do, right?
They still need about 40 more students to join though, so either they don’t know the group exists, or they don’t have Facebook (it’s possible).
I definitely agree!! Most stats say that they take 10 - 15 kids from out of state. But I saw another stat (I can’t remember from where) that said the out of state pool is 20 - 25 (as big as the regional one?).
I also agree about the FB part. It seems pretty unlikely that students in the FB group are from the wait list since you have to read the description very carefully to know you can join as a wait list candidate. So my best guess would be that they are majority admitted students
Hey @UMKCHopeful, I agree with @Roentgen, the only 2 dates in stone are the April 1st and the May 1st date. Everything else isn’t - there is no official “off the waitlist” date, so it can be very up in the air and they don’t say on the website whether they will email or call with that notification.
@Roentgen, @UMKCRoosMD, @blugrn6,
Do you think becoming a physician or going into medicine is a problem if you have problems with functioning well with sleep deprivation? @blugrn6, you had mentioned previously that you were on a 30 hour call. Obviously we all function well with good sleep, eating well, etc. but is a person not cut out for medicine if not functioning well under sleep deprivation is a problem? Or is it just a matter of choosing the right specialty?
Sleep deprivation is a complex topic in medicine. I think each person is different and reacts very differently to sleep deprivation, especially prolonged sleep deprivation over weeks/months. I don’t think it’s something to be ashamed of, but it’s something you just have to know about yourself. Your sleep patterns can be modified somewhat, but overall on average, how much sleep you need to be coherent is pretty stable. It doesn’t mean you’re weak just because you need a certain amount of sleep, but just be aware that sometimes medicine and attendings, aren’t as sympathetic to sleep deprivation from med students, when your intern/resident is even more sleep deprived than you will be.
There wasn’t even an 80 hour work hour limit in residency until like 2003, so interns/residents were working about 100 hours per week for decades before then. That sounds very scary to people who aren’t in medicine, but the truth of the matter is that people don’t just get sick needing admission or get heart attacks, need surgeries, or need a reading of diagnostic imaging only from the hours of 9 to 5. All across the United States, there are many physicians who are on call for a hospital. That’s something that high schoolers don’t usually have a realistic grasp of unless they’ve taken the time to be around residents as @blugrn6 did. Just remember though once you become an attending physician, there is no such thing as a work hour restriction. Being “on call” can sound like fun in high school, and maybe even a little bit of med school, but after a while it can wear you down or burn you out either as a resident, fellow, or as an attending.
That’s something you need to take into consideration before diving into medicine. There are very few specialties in medicine, in which there isn’t some aspect of sleep deprivation involved. Even in the residency specialties that are more 9 to 5, like ENT (Otolaryngology), it tends to be very rigorous in terms of hours in residency, but once you’re in practice as an attending it is much more 9 to 5.
Even if you match into a residency or fellowship that doesn’t have as much sleep deprivation (which are all competitive for the lifestyle aspect) – Ophtho, Derm, Radiology, Allergy, Pain Medicine, etc. you will still have to do a general clinical internship year, where there might be some sleep deprivation, as well as during your Year 5 rotations. So it’s going to be quite a while before you get to experience and enjoy the 9 to 5 lifestyle that you will want. You’ll have to see patients, work them up and write notes, and study for your rotation exam. It’s just something to take into consideration realistically when it comes to evaluating whether medicine is right for you.
As far as medicine in general, NPs and PAs usually don’t take in-house call in the way that physicians do. So you can definitely still practice medicine without being a physician - and having the sleep deprivation factor that is part of the deal with being a med student and later a physician. As far as not being cut out for medicine, based on the sleep deprivation factor, that’s only something you can answer for yourself. Just be honest with yourself, or do what @blugrn6 did and shadow with a resident team. Since you’ve already committed to the program - you have about a year to figure things out, without losing a lot of time.
Sorry for the delayed response, its been a crazy couple of weeks.
Anyways, I am still working on the advice for med school question, but let me just address the sleep depravation issues and expand on just a little bit more on what was already said.
You know more often the problem that arises is not that you don’t have enough time for sleep and to get everything you NEED to get done (notice, not everything you WANT to do, but everything you NEED to do, special emphasis on the NEED part). We all have a laundry list of ideal things we want to get accomplished during the day/week/month etc, but honestly you’re never going to have time to do everything you want.
Two issues arise here:
Often times the problem is that you haven’t seen your friends in a long time, you have just worked all day and all you want to do is chill/hangout/watchTV.
So you either don’t get stuff done (the most common endpoint) OR you end up spending you sleep time to catch up on work and social life spiraling into a bigger sleep deprived pit.
Its all about time management and setting realistic goals for yourself. There is only so much you can do.
When me and my friends hit our fourth/fifth years and started with rotations, we now no longer just hang out till 4am for the hell of it because we can’t afford to do that. We all have strict bed times, and when the clock strikes 8pm, even if we are all hanging out in a group, my friends on surgery will pull out their computer and start looking up their patients for the next morning and reading about their cases and then at 9:30 they kick us out because its bed time for them.
With that said, no is going to cut you some slack if you sleep 12 hours a night and expect to get sympathy for only getting 6 hours of sleep. Its all about balance, you have to find your ideal balance and stick to it. And if you have any fomo, you gotta get over it quick because otherwise you cannot survive the program, much less the rest of your medical career.
I know this does not directly answer your question but what I wanted to say is that everyone has issues with functioning well on sleep depravation, I have yet to find someone who functions better without sleep. That’s never under your control.
What is under your control a little bit is how much sleep depravation you are in. Yes sometimes, there is nothing that you can do about it, but a lot of times it is under your control. So if you don’t function well with less sleep don’t worry, no one does.
Just make sure you plan your schedule so you do get enough sleep and pick something that you are passionate about so that even if you are sleep deprived you won’t notice it as much.
@Blugrn6, @Roentgen, @UMKCRoosMD
So I was looking at the UMKC Graduation photos on Facebook. Some of the graduates were wearing medals as well as some having cords – one was green and one was blue. Do you know what they mean? Are they graduation Honors or something?
So the medals (or if we’re being technical - medallions, http://www.montereycompany.com/blog/medallions/the-difference-between-medals-and-medallions) and honors cords given at med school graduation are a relatively a new thing, starting when the medical school switched over to the Latin Honors criteria to be in line with the university.
*Gold Medallion = Summa Cum Laude (Top 5% of the class)
*Silver Medallion = Magna Cum Laude (The next 5% of the class, not receiving Summa Cum Laude)
**Bronze Medallion = Cum Laude (The next 10% of the class, not receiving Summa or Magna Cum Laude)
So for above, the top 20% of the class.
-The Green/Gold Cords = This is a relatively new thing given by the national AOA chapter to med schools for those students who are elected to AOA - http://www.alphaomegaalpha.org/honor_cord.html, to wear at graduation
-The Blue/Gold Cords - I have no idea what this is.
-Blue Sash - I have no idea what this is either, but in looking at the Facebook photos, I think this might be someone who participated and met criteria in the Honors College (don’t quote me on this)
Just something you might have noticed – not everyone who got a Latin Honors medallion may have gotten an AOA honor cord. The medallions for Latin Honors criteria are solely based on academic criteria – in this case, cumulative GPA and # of Honors grades on clerkships and courses (CUES and Clinical Skills). AOA is based on academic criteria for the first cut to be nominated for consideration (top 25% of the class), but to actually get inducted into membership, it also can be based on other more “soft” CV criteria - community service, volunteering, research, extracurriculars - like student organizations, etc.
So it’s very possible to be at the top of your class in terms of academics, but not get into AOA.
@bladerz1
Blue gold cords are for gold humanism honor Society
Which interestingly the eras application is going to have a checkbox for starting this match season just like they have a checkbox for AOA.
It doubled the applicant pool for gold humanism this year at our school haha.
Thanks for clearing that up, @blugrn6! I was so confused what that was when looking at the pictures - I thought it may have been an undergraduate honor cord of some kind. This year looks to be the first year that the Gold Humanism Honor Society is giving cords to recipients.