Good afternoon. I am fairly new to the site and it has really given me the confidence I needed to pursue my dream of going to med school. I am truly an OLDER PRE-MED and need some help, direction and just some success stories from the over 40 crew. I am 43 years old, have a BS in Psychology, MBA, and currently owner and operator of my own real-estate appraisal company. I have dabbled in pretty much everything from teaching, emergency psychiatry, social work, and now owning my own business. It is very satisfying to have my own business, but my dream has always been to go to medical school. I took all the pre-requisites in undergrad but did terrible on the MCAT each time I took it. Frustration kicked in as well as time began to pass, so here I am 20 years later. I just need some help in terms of what my first step should be. Do I need to re-take all the pre-requisites? I want to expedite this process and get on track asap. Any advice and direction would help. Thanks
- Test Prep NY Said:
Thank you for the obnoxiously glaring SPAM.
There are definitely people on here with much more knowledge than me about these things but I feel badly that your first response was spam so I thought I’d try to help.
First, do you have any medical schools in mind? It might be worth contacting them and finding out if your prerequisites are too old. I think it might be beneficial to retake some of the core pre-med classes (I did and it had only been ten years ago for me). The biology material has changed and I think you’ll find that the bio on the MCAT is much more focused on molecular biology than it was even ten years ago. Re-taking some classes would be a good refresher for you for MCAT material and will likely boost your confidence. Doing well on a few upper level science classes will help you out a lot too when it comes to applying.
Do you know why you didn’t do well on the MCAT the first time around? Lack of familiarity with the material or test anxiety? You can overcome these problems with practice.
Good luck!
- Dazed Said:
- Test Prep NY Said:
Thank you for the obnoxiously glaring SPAM.
Postings were deleted and user banned for a week. If this user had wanted to introduce themselves as a representative of their particular company and wanted to announce their service and event, that would have been professional and acceptable.
You probably don’t HAVE to retake all of your pre-reqs, but you definitely need some recent coursework. As mentioned above, you should refresh your biology, as it has changed significantly. I would strongly recommend some genetics or additional upper level biology as well. As for the other pre-reqs, you may not need to retake them if you did well in them the first time. However, you may want to retake them if you think you need to refresh your knowledge in those subject areas prior to taking the MCAT again.
You won’t get a concrete answer from most schools about whether or not your pre-reqs are too old - most will say “it depends”. Still, it doesn’t hurt to call a couple of schools that you know you are interested in and get their opinion.
- csimpso1 Said:
I know you're excited, enthused, exhilirated, feeling all of those emotions as you think about becoming a doctor (believe me, so am I -- and it's a ways off for me, too). But be careful about wanting to "expedite" things. Becoming an MD is a long road, no matter how you look at it. Sure, maybe you could do it a semester sooner or later, depending on how you structure classes, the MCAT, med school applications, etc. But take things slowly. Don't overwhelm yourself. That's my 2 cents, for what they're worth. Good luck to you!
Thanks, I appreciate the comments. Good luck to your too.