Recently I have been looking increasingly at going to medical school. Here is my background.
I have a BA in psychology and MA in neuropsychology and have been working in the field for the last three years. I am published, work with neurologists, neuropsychologists, and psychiatrists and have lots of experience working directly with patients.
Research oriented PhDs. in clinical psychology are looking less and less attractive to me and I was hoping to apply to med schools for the next cycle.
My question is how reasonable is this desire to get everything together for the next cycle and actually be competitive?
I can devote the next year to almost exclusively taking prerecs and MCAT prep but I will not have all my chem and ochem done by the time I would need to take the MCAT.
So I know I am pushing it on multiple fronts but at the same time I am not shooting for a top 10 school. I was looking at LECOM particularly since it is local and not as difficult as some schools. With my experience is it worth pushing through for this cycle? I spoke with LECOM and they said I could put my secondary in but only take the MCAT as late as Jan.
Anyone have experience with similar situations or have any thoughts about how realistic this might be.
Assuming that you have some hard science background and can be a great student, it is possible to take general chem during the summer and Ochem in fall/spring. Of course there are the biology requirements, both general and advanced, and physics, so it really depends what you have done previously. Also, many medical schools will now accept a semester of biochem in lieu of 2nd term of Organic Chem. So you could take the MCAT in the spring 2011. To prepare for the MCAT you should take a prep course, which many of the companies offer online. Some offer a 24 week, once a week meeting class so it starts in fall and finishes in spring in time for April/May MCAT. I find that schedule can be useful if you work as well as going to school. It gives you time to study and absorb the material.
Now, having said all that, you really need to look at the time and effort it would take to finish all the classes and the MCAT in about one year time. Unless you are planning to go to a postbacc full-time, it is a difficult hill to climb.
The question I always posed to people who have similar issues is: do you want to get into medical school or do you want to get into medical school quickly? The risk of taking on too much too quickly is getting poor grades and mediocre MCAT. If you apply under those conditions, and get rejected, you then have to work another year to get better grades, better MCAT, reapply AND explain about your previous rejection.
My purpose here is not to dissuade but to make sure you look hard at what you have, what you need, the time, effort and resources to get there while you work, have family, etc, and what would be the best path to be a SUCCESSFULapplicant