Taking a year off before med school - to do very little

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:MD prior poster here- also want to add that it helps to have a few years of real life experience prior to starting med school. Having the maturity of going through real life experiences allows one to better handle the challenges of a rigorous curriculum/residency years. Also fine tunes decision making…all of this isn’t required - as I was an MD by the time I was 21- but I think again it doesn’t hurt and serves one well later in life. There’s pros and cons to everything and I’m grateful to have had an early start which has helped me in other ways but the traditional accelerated model is how it’s done in other countries which may be the OP’s reference point.

How often did you get called Doogie Howser, MD?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:MD here and previously on a medical school admissions committee…most applicants these days have a gap year/years between undergrad and med school in order to strengthen their resumes with research and other experiences. Also having gone through an accelerated track to med school myself, i would have given anything to have some time off for other experiences before giving up my 20’s and 30’s to medicine. It all worked out, but burn out can be real as this is a life long commitment. If your son is dedicated to pursuing this track, a year or more off won’t do any harm.

Not an MD but I’m surprised you are the first to say this and I was chiming in to say it. I have heard that it is quite common, even necessary and expected, to take a year between college and med school these days to apply to med school because the process has become so onerous and the kids need the extra year for shadowing, mcat etc

MD pp is not the first one who said it but OP appears struggling with it.

I didn’t think anyone had said it very clearly although she does seem a bit overwrought. If he is talking to premed advising at his college they may be telling him to do it this way. My understanding (from acquaintances with pre-med kids) is that it’s becoming almost like part of the process. Working as an EMT, in a lab etc doesn’t exactly sound like loafing around to me. I don’t know that I’d pay his rent when he could easily live at home but other than that I think you may need to respect his understanding of the process, assuming he seems to have the grades for med school.

Yes, I am with you 100%. If I were OP, I'd bring him home but support him 100% as long as kid wants to try. Incoming M1 avg age is 24 because most kids go thru the same process. EMT/clinical/lab are all needed requirements but I don't think OP sees it that way.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:NP here - one question that OP has asked a few times here that no one is answering - when would DS apply to medical school? Like what month after graduation? Will he have made enough progress on research, being an EMT etc. to be able to show the med schools anything or is it sufficient to say - this is what I'm doing this year?

This to me is why 2 year gap years for med make more sense than 1 year. In year 1 you make real progress on whatever you're doing and then you apply and show med schools that progress and your 2nd gap year to some extent is waiting time like after you're accepted, waiting for school to start - but of course you can work, travel etc.

https://www.kaptest.com/study/mcat/how-to-plan-your-medical-school-application-timeline/

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:MD here and previously on a medical school admissions committee…most applicants these days have a gap year/years between undergrad and med school in order to strengthen their resumes with research and other experiences. Also having gone through an accelerated track to med school myself, i would have given anything to have some time off for other experiences before giving up my 20’s and 30’s to medicine. It all worked out, but burn out can be real as this is a life long commitment. If your son is dedicated to pursuing this track, a year or more off won’t do any harm.

Not an MD but I’m surprised you are the first to say this and I was chiming in to say it. I have heard that it is quite common, even necessary and expected, to take a year between college and med school these days to apply to med school because the process has become so onerous and the kids need the extra year for shadowing, mcat etc

MD pp is not the first one who said it but OP appears struggling with it.

I didn’t think anyone had said it very clearly although she does seem a bit overwrought. If he is talking to premed advising at his college they may be telling him to do it this way. My understanding (from acquaintances with pre-med kids) is that it’s becoming almost like part of the process. Working as an EMT, in a lab etc doesn’t exactly sound like loafing around to me. I don’t know that I’d pay his rent when he could easily live at home but other than that I think you may need to respect his understanding of the process, assuming he seems to have the grades for med school.

Yes, I am with you 100%. If I were OP, I'd bring him home but support him 100% as long as kid wants to try. Incoming M1 avg age is 24 because most kids go thru the same process. EMT/clinical/lab are all needed requirements but I don't think OP sees it that way.

I read it as - OP thinks the kid doing EMT/shadowing/labs in college was enough, why does he need an extra year of it. But OP think about it - if you're doing research, don't you get into it more when you're full time versus 10 hours a week while trying to handle organic chem?

[Anonymous]

OP I think it's 100% fine to say you won't fund his gap year. He can live at home and commute the 20 min to school if he's with a lab etc. there, or if he wants to stay at school, he makes sure his jobs pay the rent and food and whatever other bills you've decided an adult should cover.

Other than that though I'd leave this gap year thing alone. Trust that he knows how the process works and thinks he needs this year to up his application, so leave him to it. Reality is if you talk him out of this and he applies/gets denied or just moves on from this med dream because he doesn't think he can't get in NOW, then it'll forever be - I wanted to be a doctor but my parents talked me out of it, so now I'm stuck doing whatever my second choice thing is. Why crush his dream? If he isn't good enough, the med schools will crush it but at least he'll know for sure that he tried his best.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Med school applications have skyrocketed. A year of shadowing and EMT work doesn't look great. Sad but true. I could recommend a year of research with a single lab.

This year was a brutal one for med school admissions. This was the first time the intern in our lab (at the NIH) did not get admitted to med school and she is arguably one of the smartest and most clever interns we've had.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Med school applications have skyrocketed. A year of shadowing and EMT work doesn't look great. Sad but true. I could recommend a year of research with a single lab.

Med school admissions have gone woke

Monolingual white American applicants are not welcome.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Med school applications have skyrocketed. A year of shadowing and EMT work doesn't look great. Sad but true. I could recommend a year of research with a single lab.

This year was a brutal one for med school admissions. This was the first time the intern in our lab (at the NIH) did not get admitted to med school and she is arguably one of the smartest and most clever interns we've had.

And usually when one year is brutal the year or two that follow it are brutal too because a good % of people who didn't get in this year will improve their applications and try a 2nd or 3rd time; the pipeline gets backed up.

OP it's a long slog, so honestly him taking a year or two years makes no difference - so he finishes all training at 32 or 33, not 31.

[Anonymous]

Yet another medical resident committed suicide - an anesthesia resident in NYC.

Point being, it's a long and grueling road, so I'd step back if someone wants to change their mind re med school or wants to take a gap year or whatever. Trust that they know what they need/want.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Med school applications have skyrocketed. A year of shadowing and EMT work doesn't look great. Sad but true. I could recommend a year of research with a single lab.

Would be much better to take the 1-year “MS Physiology” degree at Georgetown U. Get a good grade at that and one’s admissions chances for Medical School will be much higher. That program’s coursework is pretty aligned with 1st year of Med School.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Med school applications have skyrocketed. A year of shadowing and EMT work doesn't look great. Sad but true. I could recommend a year of research with a single lab.

Would be much better to take the 1-year “MS Physiology” degree at Georgetown U. Get a good grade at that and one’s admissions chances for Medical School will be much higher. That program’s coursework is pretty aligned with 1st year of Med School.

I highly highly HIGHLY doubt that. Crazy talk.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Med school applications have skyrocketed. A year of shadowing and EMT work doesn't look great. Sad but true. I could recommend a year of research with a single lab.

Would be much better to take the 1-year “MS Physiology” degree at Georgetown U. Get a good grade at that and one’s admissions chances for Medical School will be much higher. That program’s coursework is pretty aligned with 1st year of Med School.

That’s for people who had terrible grades in undergrad, went to undergrad a longggg time ago or are career-changers.

[Anonymous]

I think it is. It is saying it is okay to have a chill year and then go. I know someone who did same and they are doing fine. Relax.

[Anonymous]

OP, a competitive medical school application requires

1) a high GPA (especially science GPA)
2) a high mcat score
3) at least 5 letters of recommendation (3 academic, 1 clinical/research supervisor, 1 doctor etc)
4)hundreds of hours of clinical experience such as medical assistant or EMT
5) hundreds of hours of research experience
6) shadowing 75+hours
7) volunteering experience
8) leadership roles
9) a well-written primary application and essays for secondary applications. A typical applicant applies to over 20 schools so that’s a lot of essays.
The primary application opened yesterday so your child would have needed to have all of the above lined up and would need to be prepared to spend the next couple of months dealing with secondary applications.

You have not mentioned a mcat score or even a gpa. If your child doesn’t have top notch stats they would probably need to strengthen the rest of their application by exceeding the clinical, shadowing, research hours mentioned above.

So, is it that your child doesn’t have a competitive profile yet and needs to spend this year working on extracurriculars and perhaps retaking the mcat before applying next June?

Or are they taking a breather.

Do you know?

Either way, if they don’t apply this month they are definitely taking two years off and you have to come to terms with that.

[Anonymous]

Yeah op told us nothing about DS