Before Applying

Disclaimer: If you are still deciding if medical school is for you, then take a look at my earlier post or other posts of medical school students that dropped out. In summary, make sure you know what you are getting into before beginning on the trail of pre-medicine and then medical school.

And now about what you need to know...

While you are in the pre-application phase, you should know that medical schools virtually require you to have experience with research and exposure to medicine usually through volunteering. Both representatives from Georgetown and UC Irvine told me that they make sure each of their applicants have had some form of research experience either in the lab or clinical. Some applicants are not aware of this. Although you may only want to do patient care in the future, it's essential that you practice research in some form. I recommend that you search for research in Biology or whatever your field of interest is, and then email the principle investigator to see if you can be involved in their research. There are also many summer research programs that could be great opportunities. You may not be paid, but at least several months of research (at the bare minimum. Most applicants do 1-2 years) will pay off in getting into medical school.

In addition to research, try working or volunteering in another medical area of interest to you. I volunteered at the Thornton Emergency Room, UCSD student-run Free Clinic, and led clinical trips to Mexico. I also earned my Emergency Medical Technician certificate at Miramar college. I found these to be more interesting and fulfilling than my research, so I devoted myself more to these activities. Whatever your medical interest is, make sure you are able to show that it is your passion through working or volunteering. If there was one quote that medical students repeatedly said to me throughout, it was "do what you are passionate about." I would add to it by saying do what excites you. If patient care ignites you, go for volunteering in a clinic or hospital. If Diabetes research gets you stoked, invest more in that. You will only be able to talk about a few extracirruculars in your medical school interview so you should have invested significantly in a one or two of them.

The other important tip I can give is to be unique Committees see a TON of applicants every application cycle so if you can look desirable and different than the rest, this will benefit you. This is the reason that 1/2 of non-science majors are admitted to medical school, while just 1/3 science majors get in. Medical school committees like to see that you have taken the time to learn languages, dance, study humanities, business, and statistics, or go abroad, in addition to other activities that make you a more well-rounded person. A medical school committee doesn't want to admit solely science machines and test acers. They want to admit varied, interesting, and engaging people who are also good at science.

Committees also like to see that you can be an effective leader. In essence, a doctor is a leader to nurses, families and hospital staff, so medical schools love to see that you have taken initiative and have lead organizations and groups. Being a leader of an organization means 100 times more to medical schools than being a member of an organization. In fact, anyone can write he was a member of a group on an application after attending just one meeting. But being a leader or better yet, the head leader of an organization requires much more responsibility and work. I was the leader of FISH (Fellowship of International Service and Health) for two years, and a decent amount of my personal statement was devoted to what I had learned from it. About 50-60% of the questions I received from interviewers were about the organization and how I lead it. This made interviews more enjoyable because I like talking about FISH and what I had done with it. If you can work your way to the leadership of an organization or found your own, this will show dedication and initiative. Still, make sure you are passionate about it, and not just in it to throw it on your app, because if you are, you will soon burn out. One of the great things about leading an organization is that you learn so many skills at once. Public speaking, delegation, planning, improvising, and communication are all so necessary that you will soon develop in all of these areas.
In the end, you should be you and if leadership is not your thing, it might still possible to get into medical school, but you better have the smarts of Jonas Salk. Remember to never fake who you are just for the admissions committee. Come interview day, don’t attempt to pretend you were incredibly interested in research when you were not or invent stories of when you were a great leader. Now is the time to find your unique talents and interests, and look for unique experiences and leadership roles.

Letters of Recommendation

Generally, medical schools require two science and one non-science letters of rec and sometimes an additional letter from a coach or boss. How do you get a strong letter of recommendation? Start by getting to know some professors. At UCSD, there are hundreds of students in most science classes, so making contact is not easy. Try going to your professors’s office hours in the first week of class. Better yet, go to as many office hours as you can early on in the quarter. From there, it's hit and miss as to which ones will be worth attending. Some classes will have 20-30 students in office hours. If this is the case, and you are attending mainly for a letter of rec, you'd be wasting your time to stay in on these sessions. Try to find a professor with five or less students attending. Then, you can ask some questions and introduce yourself. Lower division science classes are often great opportunities for this because, let's be honest, most people are procrastinators and won't bother pursuing professors for letters until they are doing all upper division coursework. So if you are still taking lower division classes, beat the rush and go to office hours. I can't tell you how much this helped me in getting mine.

Once you've found a potential professor(s), try to attend office hours as consistently as possible throughout the quarter. You may have to ask fairly knit-picky questions, but it's worth going in so your professor can see you are trying to understand the material and that you are a consistent studier. It's also good to talk about other extracurriculars you are involved with so they can include this into his/her letter of recommendation. Meanwhile, you should obviously be working for a high grade in this class or else the teacher won't be able to say much in regards to your work ethic or mastery of the subject.

After one quarter, you can ask for a letter. Although, it's better if you can take another course with him, work in his lab or be a TA.

If you are a UCSD student, once a year, you can get a dine-with-a-prof card and eat for free in the faculty club. Aside from eating some bomb food for free, this is another great opportunity to get to know your professor. This will give him more things to say than just "Sally was a nice person and got an A in my class one quarter."

If you are not a UCSD student or you have already played the dine-with-a-prof card for that year, do not fear! You can ask him or her to lunch or coffee anyway. This takes COURAGE, but hey, so does being a doctor and these out of the classroom meetings are important for establishing a personal connection.

Once you've developed a relationship with your professor, go ahead and ask the dreaded question: "would you be able to write me a strong letter of recommendation to Medical School?" Ask it this way instead of "could you write me a letter or recommendation to med school?" If your prof will not write you a strong letter, and you are not desperate for one, you should look elsewhere for someone who will positively write about you. A professor rejection might actually do you a favor by allowing you to avoid a mediocre (or poor) letter of rec.

Hopefully, a rejection or apathetic response doesn't happen, and instead your professor says "YES! I would love to!" In this case, give your prof a due date and a packet with the career services information letter. You should waive your right to see the letter because this makes it more convincing to medical schools.

Ask your teacher if she would be comfortable with you providing suggestions as to what she should write. Professors will usually say yes because they are doing a favor for you and would like to include what you want them to say. Then, pick two or three positive characteristics that you believe you posses and have shown to the professor. Provide reasons for each. For instance, if you think you were not only a focused student, but a positive contributor to other student's learning, mention that she should write about this. Then support it. "In certain office hours, I asked others what their questions were and then helped clear up their confusions." Print out a paper with these suggestions, and generally, the professor will incorporate them into his letter. This way, you will better ensure a positive and supported letter. Professors generally love this too since it pleases you and gives them less work.

In summary, look for personal opportunities to connect with professors, consistently meet up with them, display your strengths, ask for a STRONG letter, give them suggestions and you are done!

MCAT course/Advice

Princeton Review/MCAT Advice

My opinion on the course:
The course is a good idea for a few reasons.

1. It allows you to access the practice tests which are by far the SINGLE MOST IMPORTANT THING TO DO in preparing for the MCAT. There is no better way to study than take practice tests. Although at the same time, you want to have reviewed a decent amount of material before you do too many.

2. It allows you to pace your studies. If you are a good self starter with studying, than this might not be an issue for you, but it was nice to see that I would finish reviewing all of the material before I took the test.

3. Class time is helpful, the teachers are selected stringently and they give you good practice passages and guidance in class.

Keep in mind that most of the studying for the MCAT is done to prepare you to think though the passages quickly as opposed to memorize material to regurgitate it later (like on a UCSD bio test). The MCAT is like the SAT in that they want to see how well and fast you can understand complicated science material and non science material (verbal). This is why the practice of taking MCAT diagnostic tests is good because it trains you to pace understand quickly.

There is no section where pacing and understanding is more important than the verbal section. Princeton Review has a verbal strategy that works for some and not for others. When I took the course, they advised students who could not do well on all 7 passages to to only do 5 or 6 well and guess on the other one or two. This could be the best method for you, but I discovered that it was not for me. I did better going through all 7 passages even if I was rushing. If you are like me, this will be your most challenging section and a cause of great frustration. I spent about half the time used studying for the MCAT on this section alone.

You can prepare without the course, but I would not try it unless you are a. A superhero standardized test taker who has already taken a Practice MCAT and done well. b. An excellent self-studier and self-planner who doesn't need extra motivation, or pacing. or c. You just don't have the money (Although you might be able to apply for a scholarship.)

If you don't use a course, you need to find some good books to study, a good MCAT study schedule so you cover everything and take diagnostic tests on time, and plenty of practice tests and practice passages. Some good books include...1. Examcrackers 2. Princeton review's comprehensive book. 3. Kaplan is alright too.

Either way you will want to purchase online tests through the AAMC and get any test you can get your hands on. AAMC tests are $35 a piece. A definite bummer, but worth it.

See what your weaknesses are and work on them because a 10 10 10 is better than a 5 14 13 or something like that. This is why I spent a lot of time on verbal.

You can assess your weaknesses and mistakes by analyzing your practice tests. Each time you plan a practice test, allot at least five hours to doing it and then another two to three sometime later to check over it. It doesn't need to be on the same day, as I would recommend a good fiesta or chilax time after taking an MCAT practice test. But sometime soon after you should see why you got questions wrong and really think about why you picked what you did. Then you can adjust your studies to focus more on these types of questions.

Another tip: If you don't read a whole lot like me, you should start trying to read the New York Times/ Economist.com to try and understand articles quickly. It will help you for the verbal a lot.

Also, don't stress about not doing well on your first several MCAT diagnostics. I think i started out at a 17 maybe 18? You will improve if you stick with it. Don't compare yourself to others either, just work on improving where you can. If you talk to other pre-meds taking diagnostics they will often ask you what scores you are getting on practice tests in order to judge their own. To me comparing practice MCAT scores is equivalent to comparing GPAs and doesn't help anyone achieve a higher score. The MCAT is a test of mental endurance and you don't want others taking you away from your goal of improvement. That said, ask others about strategies and resources that help them. Good luck!

Medical School Interviewing

Important resources: 1. Interviewing practice. This site is helpful for becoming comfortable with answering interview questions. 2. This link will tell you specific questions that were asked at each school. 3. People in general. Talking to friends and strangers will help you become a more natural communicator. You can also ask a doctor or medical student to do a practice interview with you.

The last step of the application process, the interview, is your opportunity to sell yourself to the committee as a solid applicant. It's difficult, because you must balance many negative extremes. For example, you should come across relaxed, but not stoic and complacent, excited, but not jumpy, and positive, but not fake or ignorant. And while you should definitely be prepared for standard non-medicine interview questions (strengths/weaknesses, tell me about yourself), the majority of what I will say relates to the medical interview setting.

Generally, a medical school interview is a full day process. You arrive at 8am and meet other applicants, (I have tips for this part later) then receive a briefing about the school, a tour and an interview schedule. Although there are some exceptions (UC Davis does group interviews), you will have two interviews, one from a student and the other from a faculty. They could be at anytime or place during the day. After the interview, your student and faculty member will present you to an admission committee and essentially be your defense attorney for why you should get a spot in next year's class. In fact, I've even had interviewers ask "I'm going to present you next week. What should I say about you?" Therefore, you should be able to communicate your unique strengths and desire to be a doctor concisely to the interviewer so they will have a good case for your acceptance.

Back to the 8am portion of the day. In almost every interview, you will be be placed in a room with the other applicants dressed in sleek business attire. Many of them will be texting on their blackberries, or quietly sitting in anticipation. Given the nervousness and the unfamiliarity of the situation for the applicants, it's understandable that often the room is silent. These were my favorite settings because it's easy to stand out in a positive way. Try having a casual conversation with the people next to you. You should try to make friends early and often throughout the day as you never know who will be watching you during your time there. Not only will it warm you up for your interview, and acquaint you with others, but every dean and medical student wants to pick applicants who will make their class one of close comradery and friendship so let that be your goal too.

Another tip is to ask a fair amount of questions to medical students and faculty during the briefing and tour. Don't ask an annoying number of questions, but it's good for the staff to see that you are interested in the school and not afraid to speak to them.

You should also have goals to work toward during your interview. My goals were to make sure that the interviewer knows... 1. That I REALLY want to be a doctor. 2. I'm a confident and relaxed, and humble person who can have a conversation about many topics. 3. I have some unique experiences and skills that make me an ideal medical school candidate. 4. I value what you (the interviewer) has to say, and I am interested in your experiences and opinions.

There were many applicants who told me how "easy" their interview was because they barely even talked about medicine and were never asked difficult questions. Instead they talked about a shared hobby like golf. Unfortunately, that disregards goal number one and three and gives the interviewer little to talk about when they present you to the committee. There were other applicants who only talked about medically related things, and that also can be a disservice to the applicant because it neglects an opportunity to show you are a well-rounded person with other interests. Now, let me explain why each of these four goals is important....

I REALLY want to be a doctor.

This is probably the most critical point to get across. You don't want to sound desperate, but you should express that you would be highly disappointed if you could not be a doctor. For instance, if they were to ask you "what would you do if you didn't get into medical school?" and you immediately said "I'd probably become a teacher because bla bla bla" while the next guy said "hmmm....that's tough because I've had my sights on medical school for years and medicine is my passion, but if I had to choose I would probably become a teacher..." The interviewer has reason to believe that the second guy just wants it more. And something inside of us all interviewers would say that the person who wants it more should get the spot.

I'm a confident and relaxed, and humble person who can have a conversation about many topics.

Do whatever you need to do to be relaxed and confident. If listening to motivational music or taking deep breaths helps you get in the interviewing zone, then go for it. Also, listen to other celebrities and people of authority. President Obama is a good example of someone who is relaxed and articulate during interviews. Interviewing doesn't have to be super stressful; it can be a fun experience if you allow yourself to enjoy it.

Being confident, relaxed and genuine at the same time can only come with practice conversing with strangers and other people especially of importance. This is why you should always take advantage of your opportunities to converse with others. Remember to smile when appropriate and find places to insert your humor. Telling jokes is one of the best ways to stand out as an applicant because interviewers rarely hear it, and it shows you are comfortable and having a good time. In one of my interviews, I walked in the door to a doctor's office and saw my interviewer with his dog. "Is he going to be interviewing me too?" I said. My interviewer started laughing and it was a great start to our conversation.

Also, even if the circumstances are not ideal, remain confident, relaxed and sincere. At my UCSD interview, I was misdirected and had to run around Thornton Hospital asking if anyone knew my interviewer. Finally, after 30 minutes, I met up with him. I remember, it was temping to lose my cool, and begin apologizing and blaming the school for their poor directions. I chose not to and and instead expressed excitement in having the chance to interview with him. He definitely appreciated my positivity, and I ended up being accepted and will attend UCSD in 2011.

I have some unique experiences and skills that make me an ideal medical school candidate.

My third goal should be for everyone as well. Always make sure you have experiences to back up your personal thoughts. For instance, if you are a self-driven person you should be able to point to specific experiences that show you are self-motivated. You should also look through typical medical school interview questions online and see if you can support each answer you have with an personal example (some examples should be used more than once because some are stronger and more impressive than others) For instance, if my interviewer was to ask me if I was creative, innovation, or able to apply my knowledge do different settings, I would tell them about how I taught 9th graders at Pruess about nucleotides and transcription with different pairs of shoes because molecular structures and scientific terminology were over their heads. This example worked for many types of questions.

I value what you (the interviewer) has to say, and I am interested in your experiences and opinions.

The idea behind the fourth goal is to show you are a curious and engaging person. I also believe it's important to personally connect with the interviewer. The faculty or student are going to be more inclined to endorse you if they developed a relationship with you through conversation instead of being talked to by you. Although you are the interviewee, you can still ask your own questions. Throughout the interview, it's better if you can ask some questions to them. For example, if they ask you about your opinion of the new health care bill, answer their question, but you could also add "but I don't have the angle that you have as an Anesthesiologist. How would the bill affect your work?" This shows humility, curiosity and a value of the other person's opinion. The more 50/50 your interview is, the more likely your interviewer is to look back on it as an enjoyable conversation as opposed to a standard interview. Lastly, you should have several questions ready at the end about the school and the interviewer's opinion on aspects of it. Again I think it's better to ask something like "I'm interested in global health. What do YOU think are some of the best programs within this area of practice?" As opposed to "Does this school have any global health programs?" Most people would rather give their opinion than tell you about something and again you will connect better this way. Meanwhile, don't make all of your questions personal as this takes away from the variety of your question types.

One question that you should have a solid answer to before your interview is "why do you want to go this school, specifically?" If you do not have a reasonable answer to this, then it will be sure to leave a bad impression in the mind of the interviewer. In fact, I've heard that this is the question that interviewers pay the most attention to because it shows how much you care about going to their school. Your interviewer will not offer a candidate admission to their school if he thinks you will reject it or worse--drop out later on. So make sure you have some reasons lined up. In thinking up reasons, consider anything that stood out to you in researching the school. They could be reasons of locational preference, unique opportunities the school offers, or proximity to loved ones.

Afterward, don't forget to send thank you cards to your interviewers which state your continued interest in the school. And try to mention an inside joke or a unique way in which you connected with your interviewer in your note. For example, if you talked about how you both played on a Rugby team, then mention that it was a pleasure sharing stories of hard tackles and injuries during our interview. I'll look forward to future conversations with you and so on.

Another tip is to try to stay with a student host the night before. In addition to crashing at a person's house for free, you can gain some valuable insight into the school. Your student interviewer will often ask about who you stayed with the night before, and then you can talk about the experiences you had with this person. It's always a good ice-breaker.

Some undergrads have also asked me how much they should be informed on healthcare and ethical questions. I was asked about our healthcare system about 3 times in my 15 interviews and only once on an ethical dilemma. You should know generally how our healthcare system is set up and be able to compare it to a few other industrialized nations. It is a good idea to know some of the weaknesses of our system (cost, lack of insurance) and have some idea of how we might work on those problems. To be safe, you should be able to lay out the reasons for your position on Abortion, Euthanasia, and Stem Cell Research. Your goal should be to support your view, but still remain open minded to other ideas. Be aware that your interviewer may be on either side of each issue and try to test you by citing counter arguments. In that case, consider each objection carefully, but don't back down from your original stance.

A lot of people ask me what kind of questions they asked. Each interview varies greatly in the types of questions. Mainly, because they are 30-45 minute conversations with little guiding framework. The number one most asked question was "why do you want to be a doctor?" Not surprising. In fact, this was asked by every interviewer I talked to. There are two ways to answer this question. One is to list reasons for why you want to be a doctor or why you would be good at it. The other is to essentially tell a story of how you were inspired to pursue medicine and what experiences reaffirmed your desire for medical school. Although, it should sound a lot like your personal statement, I would choose the latter. Stories are simply more interesting than reasons and they allow you to name reaffirming experiences that you want to have a conversation about. This gives you some level of control during your interview.

I hope you found this helpful! Feel free comment on anything I have said. Good luck at your future medical school interview!