While it’s true that there are a fkton of premeds on campus, the fact that UCSD is such a hub for medical innovation means that there are loads of opportunities around here. I’d argue that the sheer volume of paths to pursue makes the number of premeds a non-issue. EDIT: This is a longer post than I planned it to be; brace yourself.
Volunteering and shadowing opportunities: Open up Google Maps or your preferred mapping application, and search “hospitals near uc san diego”. A lot of little red dots pop up, and a lot of those are extraneous. We’re going to focus on the important ones:
- VA Medical Center San Diego - the 304-bed hospital that I volunteer at weekly right now (my roommate and I are both in the MRI department). I know at least six UCSD students who currently volunteer here (actual stat probably closer to ∞), and it’s a really easy way to gain clinical experience and rack up volunteer hours. This is walkable from just about any dorm, as it’s immediately adjacent to Sixth College and connected to the School of Medicine by a cute bridge.
- Thornton Hospital - the 119-bed UCSD Health System hospital on the east side of campus. You could walk or jog there for a little exercise, or just hop on a campus loop or SuperLoop shuttle to get to your volunteering or research position in two minutes.
- Scripps Memorial Hospital - I’m sure one day a really talented Triton baseball player is going to break a window here, because it’s that close to the campus baseball field. This is a 382-bed facility across from Thornton Hospital, you know, just in case you can’t find a volunteering or research opportunity with the other two facilities.
- Scripps Green Hospital - If you’re in ERC and all of this is sounding a little far—you know, 1.5 whole miles—Scripps Green Hospital is a 173-bed hospital just north of campus. (It’s not affiliated with the adjacent Scripps Research Institute nor the UCSD Scripps Institution of Oceanography, but we’ll get to those.)
- Moores Cancer Center - my suitemate’s girlfriend is a first year and a researcher here, and he just got a volunteering position there too. This is on campus and run by UCSD.
- Sulpizio Cardiovascular Center - also on campus and run by UCSD
- Shiley Eye Center - also on campus and run by UCSD
- Student Health Center - next to the library and run by UCSD, probably the closest thing to what your Davis friends have roles at
- Hillcrest Medical Center - If all of these Level II and III trauma centers don’t sound intense enough for you, you can take the 20 minute shuttle to UCSD’s flagship hospital, a massive 390-bed hospital that I’ve only seen once (but let me tell you it looked pretty intense, like I don’t think it’ll get much more intense than this).
- https://meded.ucsd.edu/freeclinic/ THIS (which is a pretty friggin cool program)
- https://health.ucsd.edu/about/who-we-are/Documents/FS-Facilities-HSC.pdf the rest of the health sciences research laboratories and centers, in case hospital experience isn’t really your thing (keep in mind that this is just the Health Sciences list, excluding the biology labs and the research institutes near campus)
- Jacobs Medical Center - a 245-bed skyscraper opening in 2016 right next to Thornton Hospital (in that big empty space between the Mesa Apartments and the existing facility). In case we run out of volunteer opportunities.
If you didn’t already check, the entire area surrounding Davis has one 48-bed hospital.
OK! That’s hospitals. Let’s take a look at research opportunities:
- Salk Institute for Biological Studies - adjacent to North Campus, one of the premier biological research institutions and graduate schools in the world (and Roger Revelle was pretty mad that they nabbed that beautiful piece of land from UCSD). If you’ve heard of the polio vaccine, that was Jonas Salk. (Try visiting on the equinox or at least look at a picture of that day)
- The Scripps Research Institute - slightly north of campus, another awesome biological research institution. Have you seen a Humira ad on TV with a happy-looking retiree? That was these guys. (I have an uncle who does cool biological stuff here)
- J. Craig Venter Institute - I can see this building from Revelle. Dr. J. Craig Venter was the first guy to sequence the human genome
- Novartis Institute - I haven’t heard of them actually, but they’re there on the map
- Sanford Consortium for Regenerative Medicine - run by both UCSD and the Salk Institute. There’s a shuttle that runs here every 30 minutes so you can get your stem cell research fix.
- Sanford-Burnham Medical Research Institute - a lot of local wealthy people, such as the Sanfords, put their names on a lot of stuff. All the things named after the Scripps family and the Rady family can get confusing.
…and these are the ones that AREN’T academic departments. Once you throw in the fact that UCSD has among the
- Top 3 cognitive science programs,
- Top 3 bioengineering programs,
- Top 3 marine biology programs,
- Top 5 neuroscience programs,
- Top 10 biology programs,
- Top 20 biochemistry programs,
- Top 5 programs by overall university research funding,
- Top programs by overall positive impact,
- Top 10 programs by research impact, and
- Top 15 programs by world academic influence,
it seems like the problem won’t be having too few opportunities to choose from, but too many. (Damn, I should write brochures. But seriously. The only thing stopping you from beefing up that resume and application around here would be you, I haven’t even mentioned that biology and biotechnology startups would kill for a North Torrey Pines Rd or Genesee Ave address.)
tl;dr ucsd doesn’t have hella good bio programs for no reason, it’s the place to be
In answer to your initial questions, though, medical school isn’t easy. Even with all of these opportunities, somewhere close to 50% of all first-time medical school applicants from UCSD don’t get a single acceptance, which is pretty close to the national average. Keep that in mind…but even if it doesn’t work out, I highly doubt you’ll have wasted four years. That said, the USF nursing program sounds dope too. Good luck, and I’d be interested to know what you eventually decide!