<p>southparkmd is a college kid who is arguing with doctors, residents and medschool students. soutparkmd may or may not be able to make into a medical school. with the kind of attitude it shows, many interviewer will just reject the individual no matter how good the stats, etc. for me, i am not very knowlegeable about the differences of md and do but am willing to listen and learn what the practicing physicians and medstudents have to say.</p>
<p>“Legally, there are no differences. Both are considered to have an unrestricted license to practice medicine.”</p>
<p>That does not sound like a back door option. Different door but not a back door.</p>
<p>Even with DO’s, we are still not fulfilling our need for physicians. Hence, we resort to taking foreign and international medical graduates. So, I don’t think many people can look at osteopathic med school as a “back door” or as superfluous. There’s no physician who would make the argument that DO’s are not needed. Their pass rates on the USMLE are better than IMG’s/FMG’s and most residency programs will take DO students over FMG’s/IMG’s.</p>
<p>Some doctors told me that a DO wasn’t a negative thing. Claiming that a DO won’t be qualified as a MD is basically saying “If you don’t go to Harvard Med School, you will be a terrible doctor.”</p>
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The bigger question is whether they are less capable as doctors after all is said and done. I suspect the answer will be similar to whether people who had 1800 SATs end up as worse managers/accountants/whatever than those who had 2000 SAT scores. You may be hard pressed getting great MCATs if physics is a stumbling block, but does that correlate to becoming a poorer physician? H of MD.</p>
<p>SouthParkMD,
We would like you to provide real life examples that support your statements. GMC and Ferrari both sounds awesome to me. Why one is better than another? They serve different pupose. They definitely are priced differently. Is orange better than apple because it has more vitamin C? Maybe and maybe not. Ask person who likes one and hates another. What is better for one, might not be better for another. Some people would not apply Ivy’s despite their high stats and people advising them to do so. Why? They have their own reasons. What I am trying to say that your reply does not answer OP’s question about DO programs. Would be nice to see valid comparisons based on valuable life experiences.</p>
<p>I don’t understand this bias either. I’d readily go DO before I go the Carribean route. In practice, you do the same damn thing (and make comparable salaries - this being said in that I know a DO who lives three doors down from an MD across the street).
In terms of SouthParkMD’s response…
If I were at the level (as a DO) in practice and I overheard somebody talking about the status levels between DO and MD I’d laugh it off as I drove home to my gated community… Also, “Don’t interview any DO’s” ? Do you have stats on the employment rate of DO’s to MD’s? I’m hesitant to believe this because my father works with DO’s and MD’s in about the same ratio at the hospital. It comes down to how much you’ve committed to learning your skill.<br>
However, I can say that I was getting help in the Chemistry Learning Center (CLC) at my school and heard a (presumably pre-med sophomore or junior) saying, “I’d rather kill myself than go DO…it’s like…all the work for nothing.” So there is an overwhelming bias…I really believe it’s more of a status thing and less of a qualifications one though.</p>
<p>Actually, I have 2 neighbors, next door is MD with 2 kids and right across from me DO with 5 kids. All kids went to college as far as I know, to state schools, neither wife has been working, I do not see any life style differences, DO family drives more expensive cars because, I suppose, of their personal preferences.<br>
I have life changing personal experience with non-MD chiropractor. He has helped with very fast relief and extremely valuable lessons for the future. The problem lasted over several weeks. Many MD’s of various specialties did NOT provide any help. Their usage of very strong drugs was not just useless, it was dangerous according to other providers that were consulted later. </p>
<p>Stating that MD is better than DO simply because Ferrari is better than GMC has no logic in addition to the fact that some of us will prefer GMC for a car.</p>
<p>One could be a very good DO with very posh life style and the same is true for MD. I am sure there are examples of opposite.</p>
<p><a href=“and%20make%20comparable%20salaries%20-%20this%20being%20said%20in%20that%20I%20know%20a%20DO%20who%20lives%20three%20doors%20down%20from%20an%20MD%20across%20the%20street”>I</a>.
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<p>Very true… I have both DO’s and MD’s on my street and they don’t have different standards of living. Once in practice, unless you look at their initials, many people don’t know if their doc is a MD or a DO.</p>
<p>One of our family doctors is a MD, the other is a DO. My kids’ dermotologist is a DO. I think he calls his specialty something like Dermotological Surgeon.</p>
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<p>Maybe there is a bias among people who don’t know anything, but there’s no bias in how you get to bill insurance companies :)</p>
<p>You can let “pre-med sophomore or junior kill himself”, you cannot change his opinion. His statement “I’d rather kill myself than go DO” does not make his opinion valid. It does not make it invalid either. It is just his opinion based on assumptions, not facts. Making life changing decisions based on opinions of other people is not a very good idea. Maybe the whole purpose of this pre-med saying that was putting somebody down? Frankly, I have never met starving doctor in the USA, MD or DO. For that matter, while all of other professionals always discuss job/no job situation, you will never hear MD/DO discussing job availability related concerns.</p>
<p>I know, when I heard that I was floored. The phrase is pretty dramatic in and of itself, but it’s typically used to express total and utter disappointment or bewilderment. I’d be down for going DO (and I have the grades thus far to go MD, but who knows…I’m only a sophomore and things happen) in a heartbeat. I guess I’m more of a “bigger picture” kind of person anyhow.
And I’ve actually never heard of anybody in the healthcare profession discussing job availability-related concerns and I doubt anybody will for 15-20 years because of the baby boomers.</p>
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<p>This is an inaccurate analogy for lots of reasons already discussed, but let’s PRETEND that it was a useful one.</p>
<p>If I was locked out of my home, I’d be pretty thrilled to walk in the backdoor rather than sit by the front door rather demanding that it open.</p>
<p>Nicely stated, Mike.</p>
<p>If anything, a DO should be regarded as an MD+ because you get to learn another new subject (manipulative therapies) in addition to what you learn in a regular MD program. </p>
<p>So a DO≥MD in terms of the amount of content you learn. at least that’s what my advisor said .</p>
<p>I just want to clarify for all that the user “SouthParkMD” was a known ■■■■■ on SDN. He was a user who made a “What are my chances” thread and argued against the DO degree when users far kinder than I offered him the suggestion. He was banned on SDN for the same kind of inflammatory remarks he has made on this thread (which I assume he was banned for as well).</p>
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<p>It is really a matter of specialty for whether or not one would consider OMM to be an “addition” to their training. In specialties that include primary care, OMM is a wonderful addition. However, in specialties like surgery and its subspecialties where the standards for modern surgical procedure have been set for decades, OMM really doesn’t seem to have that much relevance.</p>
<p>…and don’t even get me started on cranial.</p>
<p>My D. has mentioned that one of her friends has been accepted to both MD and DO. However, DO came first, while she was eventually accepted to MD off the waiting list. Well, while she was waiting to be accepted to MD, she fell in love with school for DO. So, she has chosen DO at the end. Apparently this person has made her decision based on extansive research, visiting, meeting current students and interviewing at both places, which definitely beats of the wall remarks of any pre-med sophomore. Just another example…IMO, everybody needs to choose what fits him/her the best out of AVAILABLE options. As BDM menitoned, open door is your entry, forget the locked one.</p>
<p>To clarify the erroneous minority remarks about DO schools. The osteopathic medical schools accepted routinely women and African americans long before allopathic schools. Look at the Philadelphia College of Osteopathic Medicine history and they are proud of this fact.</p>
<p>The physician widely regarded as the “best doctor in town” in our city of 35,000 is a DO. He has been in practice many years, does not incorporate OMM into his practice, and is universally loved. He lives in what many think is the most beautiful home in town, a painstakingly restored 1920’s Tudor. He drives a luxury car (that is not sold in town) because he “always wanted one”. His two children were incredibly successful in both h.s. and college. He is the physician to many of the towns doctors and interesting enough, when the “big city” visiting doctors are in town to see patients (cardiologists, urologists), they have often scheduled appointments with him for their own personal medical problems rather than see a doctor back home. I was recently in the ER and heard the physician working there call him a “physician’s physician”, going on to extoll his virtues. All of this isn’t so because he is a DO or isn’t an MD, it is because he is an AMAZING DOCTOR and human being, no matter where he was trained. Interesting enough, when he applied to medical school (back in the mid-70s), he said he was accepted at both an MD and DO school. At that time, the MD program was 3 years and the DO program was 4. He had just finished a grueling Master’s program and said he just didn’t want to cram all that learning into 3 years. As MiamiDAP mentioned about the student in his post, this doctor researched both options and decided he just preferred the DO program. It has worked out pretty well for him!</p>
<p>I would not say DO schools are avoided “like the plague”. While there are few premed students I know who wish to go to DO schools (most dream of getting into top medical schools), I know very few who would reject a DO school if it was the best choice they were offered. Sure, as a college student I might prefer getting an MD from Johns Hopkins, but I would be happy going to my local DO school as well. In the end, it doesn’t make any difference, unless you want to enter a very competitive medical specialty. </p>
<p>I doubt you can call any school a “back door” if they admit people with the same application style as MD schools and select people based on merit. To me, “back door” implies shady dealing or some scheme to admit under-qualified applicants. A real back door would be a program that lets you go to medical school without taking the MCAT, or who admits only legacy candidates.</p>