PA to MD/DO

[binibeans]

Hi all!

I'm a 23yo physician assistant with ~1.5 years of experience and am interested in becoming an MD. I went to a BS PA program (2 years prereqs + 2 years PA school for my undergrad degree). My overall cGPA (including 2 years of PA school) is 3.54 and pre-PA sGPA is 3.68. I had a really rough time during didactic year of PA school (junior year of my undergrad) which explains the cGPA. I have B-/C+'s in my clinical medicine and pathology classes, but got all A's on my senior year/clinical year. I'm worried that this will reflect badly on my application given that PA clinical med/pathology classes are somewhat similar to med school classes. I have yet to take the MCAT but wanted to know what you guys think! Other maybe useful info: I'm asian, residing in CA (would love to stay in the state for med school), no research experience.

Additionally, because of the accelerated program my prerequisites for med school are incomplete. I took 2 semesters of general bio without lab, 1 sem microbio with lab, 3 sem combined gen chem/org chem, 1 sem biopharmaceutical chem. I plan to take physics this fall, but I also wonder if doing SMP would be a better idea?

Any thoughts are appreciated! Thank you!!

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[Angus Avagadro]

Some schools have PA to DO programs. LECOM is one, but I don't know their requirements. You could check their website. I believe they cut off 9 mos of training and tuition is lower.

 

[PA_2_MD]

Some schools have PA to DO programs. LECOM is one, but I don't know their requirements. You could check their website. I believe they cut off 9 mos of training and tuition is lower.

LECOM is the only bridge program in the country. The program bypasses year one and you pay one less year in tuition.

They take 12 students and 6 must go onto primary care. This is now mandated in a contract that the students sign and if you don't go into PC you pay back the year of tuition and are barred from matching.

 

[Angus Avagadro]

LECOM is the only bridge program in the country. The program bypasses year one and you pay one less year in tuition.

They take 12 students and 6 must go onto primary care. This is now mandated in a contract that the students sign and if you don't go into PC you pay back the year of tuition and are barred from matching.

Youch! I knew they had one, but didn't realize they were the only one. Maybe it might be worth another years tuition to take 4 yrs.

 

[PA_2_MD]

Youch! I knew they had one, but didn't realize they were the only one. Maybe it might be worth another years tuition to take 4 yrs.

100% which is why I didn't even consider doing it when I applied.

 

[deleted941485]

Hi all!

I'm a 23yo physician assistant with ~1.5 years of experience and am interested in becoming an MD. I went to a BS PA program (2 years prereqs + 2 years PA school for my undergrad degree). My overall cGPA (including 2 years of PA school) is 3.54 and pre-PA sGPA is 3.68. I had a really rough time during didactic year of PA school (junior year of my undergrad) which explains the cGPA. I have B-/C+'s in my clinical medicine and pathology classes, but got all A's on my senior year/clinical year. I'm worried that this will reflect badly on my application given that PA clinical med/pathology classes are somewhat similar to med school classes. I have yet to take the MCAT but wanted to know what you guys think! Other maybe useful info: I'm asian, residing in CA (would love to stay in the state for med school), no research experience.

Additionally, because of the accelerated program my prerequisites for med school are incomplete. I took 2 semesters of general bio without lab, 1 sem microbio with lab, 3 sem combined gen chem/org chem, 1 sem biopharmaceutical chem. I plan to take physics this fall, but I also wonder if doing SMP would be a better idea?

Any thoughts are appreciated! Thank you!!

As far as grades, they are opening up med schools like McDonalds now there are plenty they are willing to just take your tuition.

But the better question is why make the change? As far as anyone is concerned PA (physician associate) = MD making the additional training expensive and redundant.

Sitting here sweating over your physics grade is beyond pointless.

 

[Alexxxxx]

As far as grades, they are opening up med schools like McDonalds now there are plenty they are willing to just take your tuition.

But the better question is why make the change? As far as anyone is concerned PA (physician associate) = MD making the additional training expensive and redundant.

Sitting here sweating over your physics grade is beyond pointless.

Opening up med schools like McDonald's?? Even though a lot of MD and DO schools have been opened up in recent years, they are still becoming more and more competitive, consistently, every year. It is not becoming easier.

 

[Princeton Medical Student]

As far as grades, they are opening up med schools like McDonalds now there are plenty they are willing to just take your tuition.

But the better question is why make the change? As far as anyone is concerned PA (physician associate) = MD making the additional training expensive and redundant.

Sitting here sweating over your physics grade is beyond pointless.

Average accepted MCAT and GPA increase every year regardless of school opening.

 

[deleted941485]

Opening up med schools like McDonald's?? Even though a lot of MD and DO schools have been opened up in recent years, they are still becoming more and more competitive, consistently, every year. It is not becoming easier.

Ok so why go? It’s harder than it was and the effort/return isn’t there. This is peak Med school interest. Stay a PA, you’ll be happier in the long run.

Also it’s physician associate not assistant.

 

[Proudfather94]

Ok so why go? It’s harder than it was and the effort/return isn’t there. This is peak Med school interest. Stay a PA, you’ll be happier in the long run.

Also it’s physician associate not assistant.

If this is what they really want to do they should do it. I have a feeling when enough mid levels make mistakes that a physician would have caught and the public opinion turns on them they will lose independent practicing rights.

They may seem like they are doctors now because they are using public opinion to accomplish their goals. Public opinion polarizes quickly and when it does and nobody trusts mid-levels, laws will be passed to restrict them and they will no longer be "just like doctors". Unfortunately that will probably come from hurt and killed patients but that's what some of the mid-levels asked for.

 

[deleted941485]

If this is what they really want to do they should do it. I have a feeling when enough mid levels make mistakes that a physician would have caught and the public opinion turns on them they will lose independent practicing rights.

Any cursory internet search will demonstrate the contrary. Independent practice rights are here to stay. The public does not have a problem with it and more importantly neither do the payers.

If someone is deadset on something, then I don’t see why anyone would bother announcing it on a forum where someone may have a contrary opinion.

Arguably being a PA is more versatile has a better ROI than most of Medicine does and that trend isn’t going to change. Sitting here agonizing over grades and coursework and LORs just to get into an average Med school stateside while taking on copious amounts of debt you certainly will not payoff unless one of your relatives dies is not worth it especially when PAs are essentially being granted the right to do everything a physician does without anything more than token supervision (even that is going away).

 

[Gambino.]

Also it’s physician associate not assistant.

Nope. Even your national org says assistant until legislation catches up with the term associate. Time to waste tens of millions of more dollars to stroke the PA ego for that.

 

[Alexxxxx]

Ok so why go? It’s harder than it was and the effort/return isn’t there. This is peak Med school interest. Stay a PA, you’ll be happier in the long run.

Also it’s physician associate not assistant.

I am not the one that even said it is physician assistant... But why go? Because you want to be a doctor who can fully heal your patients, not assist in healing them. If you have the will and the urge to go all the way as well as the right reasons, it is worth doing. You might as well say don't even be a PA, just be a medical assistant lmao. The return is there by the way - the average physician salary is well over 2x the PA salary.

 

[Proudfather94]

Any cursory internet search will demonstrate the contrary. Independent practice rights are here to stay. The public does not have a problem with it and more importantly neither do the payers.

If someone is deadset on something, then I don’t see why anyone would bother announcing it on a forum where someone may have a contrary opinion.

Arguably being a PA is more versatile has a better ROI than most of Medicine does and that trend isn’t going to change. Sitting here agonizing over grades and coursework and LORs just to get into an average Med school stateside while taking on copious amounts of debt you certainly will not payoff unless one of your relatives dies is not worth it especially when PAs are essentially being granted the right to do everything a physician does without anything more than token supervision (even that is going away).

Mid levels make more mistakes than physicians. Mistakes in medicine cause injuries and deaths. Mid levels will probably be allowed to practice on their own because of their method of changing public opinion to support them. When patients die at the hands of mid-levels and physicians point out how they would have prevented it the public opinion will turn on mid-levels.

Op if you are fine working under a doctor then stay a PA. If you want to practice independently I would become a physician. Once PAs and NPs become independent and make their mistakes and they and the hospital they work for get sued into the ground things will go back to the way they were.

 

[Angus Avagadro]

Any cursory internet search will demonstrate the contrary. Independent practice rights are here to stay. The public does not have a problem with it and more importantly neither do the payers.

If someone is deadset on something, then I don’t see why anyone would bother announcing it on a forum where someone may have a contrary opinion.

Arguably being a PA is more versatile has a better ROI than most of Medicine does and that trend isn’t going to change. Sitting here agonizing over grades and coursework and LORs just to get into an average Med school stateside while taking on copious amounts of debt you certainly will not payoff unless one of your relatives dies is not worth it especially when PAs are essentially being granted the right to do everything a physician does without anything more than token supervision (even that is going away).

I won't dispute that mid levels will be granted more privileges through legislation, rather than education. People are,, and will get fed up with this lower tier care. Without supervision, will they have the same med mal insurance coverage? A couple points.
Getting into PA school is no cake walk.
NPs education is not equivalent to PAs, not that you claimed that, just pointing it out.
Midlevel salaries will drop as more graduate and some Docs will apply for those jobs, especially those who don't match. This will be similiar to recent law grads applying for paralegal spots when they can't land a job. We saw this briefly in the 90s when anesthesiologist grads were taking crna jobs when new jobs were so tight.
Everyone I talk to doesn't care for seeing the PA instead of the Doc.
Bottom line, all salaries will drop or remain stagnant for everyone.

 

[Destalchemy]

Ok so why go? It’s harder than it was and the effort/return isn’t there. This is peak Med school interest. Stay a PA, you’ll be happier in the long run.

Also it’s physician associate not assistant.

No its not. The AAPA's lawyers have said the change is merely internal as of now, and you can get into legal trouble if you misrepresent yourself to others by using this title.

It is NOT physician associate to anyone outside of the organization itself or one of the few ivory tower programs who have used the term for the last few years.

 

[deleted941485]

No its not. The AAPA's lawyers have said the change is merely internal as of now, and you can get into legal trouble if you misrepresent yourself to others by using this title.

It is NOT physician associate to anyone outside of the organization itself or one of the few ivory tower programs who have used the term for the last few years.

The AAPA and "Ivory Tower" would not use it internally if they didn't at least have some hope of broadening its usage.