@WayOutWestMom One clarification on the immunization requirement. My D went to her PCP/Clinic during Thanksgiving break.
AMCAS doc says ‘1 dose of adult Tdap’. But clinic says they can not give until 10 years is complete from last one. Obviously the last one is Dec 2009 when she was a child. Hope MD school accepts. Not sure if there is anything like adult Tdap versus child Tdap?
At least given the blood for the Hep B since that takes long time to complete.
There is a difference between adult and children’s versions of TDap.
If your D knows which med school she’s likely to attend, she should check on their admissions website for that school’s specific immunization requirements and school specific form. If she has questions, she needs to contact the Office of Medical Student Affairs at the school.
Thanks to both of you for your responses. Will ask her to check with UTSW office. Even UTSW doc says same thing of AMCAS.
Tetanus-diphtheria-pertussis – One (1) dose of adult Tdap is required. If last Tdap is more than 10 years old, you must receive another tetanus booster (Tdap or Td vaccine).
Sticky point is, her Tdap is < 10 years old but I presume it is not Adult Tdap. Her HMO clinic clearly told they can not give until Dec 2019 after 10 years is over.
I am reading the requirement is when you start meeting patients and not necessarily when you start med school. They seem to need meningitis when you start.
I don’t think so @texaspg The form says “All immunization requirements must be met prior to start of orientation.”
@GoldenRock, you D needs to call or email Student Health and ask.
University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center Student Health Services
5323 Harry Hines Blvd.
Dallas, Texas 75390-8861
Telephone (214) 645-8690
Fax (214) 645-8676
studenthealth@utsouthwestern.edu
At my lad’s med school students start meeting patients practically right away.
I can’t recall exactly what he needed, but he went there the summer before he started when he was lining up a place to stay and they took care of it - all titers and shots, etc.
New changes on AMCAS w/r/t the new traffic rules–
Those holding acceptances need to read this document. It contain important information about how applicants and schools communicate with each other about enrollment plans.
Thanks for sharing. Just curious how these new rules may improve how things are done and if it benefits all or more applicants vs school? From reading, it seems to be a win for both sides as schools have a good idea how close they are getting the class size they want and if they need to reach out to the those on the waitlist, it can be helpful to those students giving them a chance. It seems to make the applicants with lots of offers need to narrow down their options so I guess it’s a little harder for them. But I am pretty new at this so encourage other thoughts .
D did not receive all her financial offers until sometime late April. I dont see how people can choose a school without that kind of information unless they have only one offer.
Agree with @texaspg. Unless schools give acceptances along with aid package details, it is not realistic for students to make a decision and withdraw. Only a handful of students on unique situations will be in a position to make a final decision.
Reviewing the posts at SDN, noticed UTSW gave the aid details along with acceptance. All OOS students get IS fees and also whatever merit aid is informed. A post stated got $10k and IS fees. So s/he knows the net fee is only $10k/year. So can withdraw from any accepted schools if decided not to join even if they may give 100% aid if UTSW is the choice for whatever reason. At the same time, if has acceptance at Harvard or Hopkins and would like to attend, may withdraw from UTSW if financially independent. If not, going to hang on until aid situation is known from Harvard or Hopkins. It is catch 22 and draws the whole process.
BTW, my D withdrew acceptance from 2 schools and pretty much concluded nothing going to change. Could sense she is so relieved and happy the process is over and ready to enjoy the final semester.
Just to note—
med schools cannot see the names of the other schools where an applicant holds an acceptance, they can only see that an applicant has one or more acceptances.
This is different than in the past where schools could see where an applicant held acceptances.
This change was made for 2 reasons–
to avoid the appearance of collusion (which had been an issue the DOE/DOJ had raised about the multiple acceptance report)
to reduce the “bidding” among school for high stats students.
A number of top programs (including Hopkins, Stanford, CA publics) have pledged to focus their scholarships on meeting need for low income applicants instead of directing merit toward attracting high stats middle and upper class applicants.
I heard UTH does this but didnt know about UTSW. Did your D get the IS fees?
@WayOutWestMom - Reducing bidding seems like an interesting concept. I was wondering how schools decided about giving or not giving scholarships. I think more and more schools are trying to make it free tuition by getting big donors to name scholarships. Both NYU and Columbia announced something about it. I am wondering if JHU will do this at some point since they got a big chunk of money from Bloomberg for undergrad. Penn has 35 scholarships but I have heard their need based aid is very good also.
@texaspg During interview students were told if selected will be given IS fees. Apparently if an award is given then fees is IS. So depending on the strength of the applicant award amount is given. For example my D got the token $1k award but that enabled to waive the difference of OOS and IS fees. Another SDN post informed s/he got $10k award.
My point is more on the way it handled. The simple 1/2 page pre-match mail sent at 12.01 am on 11/15 informed you are accepted, given $1k award and waived the difference in fees. End of story and it appeared UTSW is not keen on wasting their time in the long process.
Personally I agree any award should be given to needy students than the high stat students, especially when the cost of MD education is so high and interest gets accumulated.
But I am not able to fully understand how the new process can reduce the bidding and the drawn out process.
I admit I have not spent enough time to understand and know about old or new processes. But I feel unless schools make the offer right at the outset, it is going to force students to wait and see. Also I feel schools with large endowments should give more aid especially for needy students.
re: reducing bidding. Partly this has come about because the LCME decide to get serious about enforcing diversity standards w/r/t SES. (It’s one the of things SLU got placed on probation for last year.) And partly it came about because schools like Stanford, Harvard, JHU, etc often ended up bidding against each other for the same small pool of students in order to maintain their USNews ranking and it had gotten seriously out of hand. The DOJ also viewed the practice as possibly anti-competitive. So the decision wasn’t entirely as altruistic as the NEJM article linked below suggests
[Is There Merit in Merit Aid?](https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMp1713146?query=featured_home)
Additional commentary by JHU here: https://hub.jhu.edu/2017/10/25/nejm-med-school-scholarships-commentary-ziegelstein/
And most economists doubt that free med school will solve the US’s doctor distribution problem–
[Free Med School Won’t Solve The Doctor Shortage](Free Med School Won't Solve The Doctor Shortage)
Many people believe that NYU’s free tuition is more a rankings stunt than a genuine attempt to persuade more people to go into primary care, esp since NYU just established a second campus on Long Island that only hosts an accelerated 3 year primary care track program and the free tuition offer does not apply to students matriculating there.
It’s my understanding Bloomsburg’s money went to the undergrad, not the med school so that pool of money can’t be used to fund medical students at JHU.
@goldenrock - that is really good deal for OOS students since Texas has probably the lowest instate tuitions in the nation and it sounds like there is no OOS tuition at all although it is listed at 10k (?) higher.
On a side note, lot of international students attend graduate school at Lamar since they have something similar - give a small award and allow everyone to pay instate.
D received her 2nd acceptance yesterday! She has been on 7 interviews, some of which don’t make decisions until spring. DH and I are very excited for her!
With regards to the free tuition discussion, Mayo recently received a $200 million donation — the largest donation ever for the school. The donor’s last name has now been added to the school’s name. Rumor has it that tuition will be free or greatly reduced.
https://newsnetwork.mayoclinic.org/discussion/mayo-clinic-school-of-medicine-receives-200-million-gift/
Per SDN posts, UCLA sent acceptance and Geffen scholarship today. Many students must be super happy since Geffen is free ride and it gives to 20% of entering students on merit.
@GoldenRock I saw you many posts, and was hoping you would have some insight on the following programs.
SLU med scholars, Usciences/LECOM (BS/DO) and Nova BS/DO.
Right now my son is admitted to Nova and FAMU/FAU and waiting for replies from others
Any insight on the residence match, matriculation rates, success, etc on these? Appreciate your inisght
Not @GoldenRock
But I can answer some of your questions—
You can’t judge a medical school by its Match List. You might as well try to read tea leaves. A school’s match list is reflective of the interests of a particular set of students, not the quality of education a school receives.
Choice of speciality is also highly personal and may vary wildly from one year to the next at the same program.
Osteopathic med grads have a significantly more difficult time matching into highly competitive specialties (derm, ortho, ENT, neurosurgery, rad onc, ophthalmology) though DOs matching into those specialties is not entirely unheard of.
DOs typically match into primary care and less competitiveness specialties (FM, IM, peds, neurology, pathology, psych, gerontology). Procedure-oriented mid-competitive specialties (OB/GYN, EM, anesthesia, general surgery) are possible for top, highly motivated DO students.
The reasons that DOs tend to fill mostly less competitive fields is due to a variety of reasons:
– DO students tend to have lower standardized scores than MD students
– some osteopathic programs have comparatively weaker clinical rotations that prepare student less robustly for Step 2 CS/Level 2PE and ultimately for intern year
– osteopathic programs prepare their students for the COMLEX, but competitive specialties and academic residency program require USMLE scores from applicants
– despite the residency unification next year, there are still residency programs that simply will not interview DO applicants for positions
What I think you should look for in a BA/MD or BA/DO program:
1) is med school admission guaranteed if the student meets program minimums? If not, how are admission decisions made?
2) Is a MCAT required?
3) what non-academic factors go into an admission decision for program participants? Is there an interview? Expectations for EC participation?
4) how many students participating in the program actually matriculate into med school? What is the program drop-out/fail out rate?
5) is a student in the program allowed to apply out without losing their guaranteed admission at their home program?