Premeds I want to hear your story.

For what it's worth, I got into DO school with a 3.4 GPA and a 3.3 science GPA. And my charming personality, of course.

If that is Vene, that's unfortunate. I didn't realize the stigma against some European schools was so strong.
 
DEmedic said:
Is that written by who I think it is?
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I would guess that it's MSmertka. If you click that name in the comments, it directs you to the homepage of the blog. I recognize that name as a respected physician who posts often in the EMS Mentoring facebook group. A quick google search shows that he has done a bunch of research with people from Poland.
 
Gurby said:
I would guess that it's MSmertka. If you click that name in the comments, it directs you to the homepage of the blog. I recognize that name as a respected physician who posts often in the EMS Mentoring facebook group. A quick google search shows that he has done a bunch of research with people from Poland.
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Exactly.
 
Wow, this thread brings back memories. I started med school in 1999 so things have changed a bit. I never had to take the clinical skills assessment, MCATs were scored on a scale up to 45 and had a written section with a letter grade that made no sense. I will be honest, I have no idea how competitive it is anymore to get into med school. I can't imagine AdComs have changed much over the years. Grades and MCAT scores are important but so is showing an interest and knowledge in medicine. Having an EMS background can help or have no weight, it depends on your experience. A large number of premeds do it to have something to put on their applications. My background was a little different. I got into EMS in high school because of a friend with no desire to go into medicine but as I did it more, I liked it more and decided to change career directions. I had about 8 years under my belt when it came time to apply. Every interviewer asked me about my EMS experience and I think in some cases it helped.

I definitely think it helped during my clinical years. I was the only one in a class of about 100 to get a perfect score on my ACLS exam before 3rd year (yeah, I had trouble fitting my head through the doors for a few days). I was also very comfortable talking with and touching patients, which a lot of people weren't comfortable with. I was also comfortable with dealing with moderately sick people so my first instinct wasn't to run and find a resident (although that may not have been the best choice at times). On the flip side, I didn't know how much I didn't know. It was eye opening to see how lacking my EMS education was. Things that were dogma and sacred cows in EMS were turned upside down. I no longer said things like, "I can't believe that dumb nurse took the 15LPM NRB off the chest pain pt."
 
Gurby said:
I would guess that it's MSmertka. If you click that name in the comments, it directs you to the homepage of the blog. I recognize that name as a respected physician who posts often in the EMS Mentoring facebook group. A quick google search shows that he has done a bunch of research with people from Poland.
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Is Mike Smertka Vene though? I enjoy reading whatever they have left online over the years. They share the same style and breadth, so I'm convinced they're the same.
 
Flying said:
Is Mike Smertka Vene though? I enjoy reading whatever they have left online over the years. They share the same style and breadth, so I'm convinced they're the same.
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It's him.
 
I can't offer any advice since I've never been a pre-med. Thought about it seriously a couple times, but decided on a different path.

Maybe some words of encouragement, though: A flight-nurse co-worker of mine spent much of our down time at work studying for his post-bac science courses and later for the MCAT. He was a few years older than me; I think 41 or 42 when he started med school (he started med school the same year I started CRNA school). His grades and MCAT scores weren't stellar, though they were decent. I think in his case, his years of healthcare experience as a paramedic and RN helped him a lot.

Anyway, he got through med school and is now a 2nd year anesthesia resident. Pushing 50 and doing great. He's glad he did it, and I don't think he wishes he'd done it earlier either, since his pre-medicine career is such as big part of who he is.
 
LanceCorpsman said:
Ive noticed some of you on the forum are trying to become doctors. What is your story? Why do you want to become a doctor? Has being in EMS influenced your choice of becoming a doctor?
Also, if you still work and go to school (undergrad), how do you balance the two?
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Currently PGY3 EM. EMS influenced my decision to go to medical school - I wanted to know more, do more, and call the shots for the most part, but stay involved in EMS. In undergrad I was able to work part time so that I didn't need loans for cost of living (did 12hrs/week during class and then picked up full time hours during breaks). In Med school I continued to teach for a paramedic training program and work very PRN for a IFT service.
MCAT sucked, but I did decent enough and was accepted. My GPA was high but I switched out of bio for what was certainly an easier major.

There's a lot of ex-EMS folks in medicine. For many it was just something they did for a period of time and is now just another line on their CV. For some it is something they take a lot of pride in.

As for applying to medical school, an EMS background can help but it won't overcome bad scores or GPA, but may help if you have average and above scores. It depends what you did in EMS and how you sell it in you personal statement and in interviews. And when going into EM, it can certainly be a selling point. As I apply for attending jobs, it still is a selling point since I still like EMS and physician EM practices need docs to be medical directors and to teach, etc. Having an EMS background moves you to the front of the line for those positions. It may be helping me with getting an academic position even though I am not doing an EMS fellowship.
 
@medicsb Hopefully I can be as successful as you are in the coming years. EMS and just working in multiple fields of medicine has made me want to pursue medical school. You said, "I wanted to know more, do more, and call the shots for the most part". That perfectly describes my hunger for more knowledge and more control over patient care.

Although EMS is my passion, I am not sure if I want to pursue EM. Since most of the doctors in the ED here hate their lives and advised me not to try to become an ED doc.
I heard the burnout rate is pretty high as well. As a senior resident, do you see yourself not burning out in the coming years working in the ED? Doctors have been telling me that residency was harder than being in medical school, is this true for you?

Goodluck on your job search!
 
Hello! New to this site and new to this thread! In fact, new to EMS itself.

I was an EMR (Emergency Medical Responder) during high school. I initially took that class because I wanted to work in the medical field, but I wasn't sure exactly what I wanted to do. The skills taught in EMR attracted me to the EMS field immensely. Little did I know that EMR was a pre-req for high school students to take EMT. (I didn't even know that people who worked on ambulances were called EMTs). The EMT course introduced me to the more realistic aspect of medicine that EMR didn't. There is a greater obligation an EMT has--and to be an EMT requires a more realistic and strong mentality which I admire greatly.

But why pre-med? I actually wanted to do P.A. School ( still do) but I figured why not give med school a shot. Med school is still not a concrete plan for me yet. I;m currently a freshman majoring in molecular cell biology. There's not much I can say compared to anyone else who've seem to already got most of their college work completed, but its a work in progress all the same. Maybe down the line I will discover something as an EMT that will turn me away from the medical track in total. Maybe I will be successful in getting into med school. I don't know, but its an opportunity and its open.
 
LanceCorpsman said:
@medicsb Hopefully I can be as successful as you are in the coming years. EMS and just working in multiple fields of medicine has made me want to pursue medical school. You said, "I wanted to know more, do more, and call the shots for the most part". That perfectly describes my hunger for more knowledge and more control over patient care.

Although EMS is my passion, I am not sure if I want to pursue EM. Since most of the doctors in the ED here hate their lives and advised me not to try to become an ED doc.
I heard the burnout rate is pretty high as well. As a senior resident, do you see yourself not burning out in the coming years working in the ED? Doctors have been telling me that residency was harder than being in medical school, is this true for you?

Goodluck on your job search!
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EM is "high" on burnout, but that's not to say you can't have a long fulfilling career, and truth be told, most do. We all ***** and complain, but it has its upsides, and few actually leave the specialty as far as I know. Ultimately, most would not want to be doing anything else. The thing is, sort of like EMS, is that where you work can make all the difference in the world. Contract management groups (CMGs), which are large corporate groups that own and manage many EM practices for hospitals, are kind of like the private ambulance companies. AMR is EmCare (actually, they're both owned by the same corporation) in emergency medicine; Rural metro is TeamHealth. EM docs like EmCare and TeamHealth about as much as EMTs and medics like AMR and rural-metro. Not a whole lot like them, but when they're the only game in town, you do what you gotta do. Overall, there many many more options in EM than EMS, so it is hard to compare overall.

For me, residency has been easier (but in no way "easy") because I have been doing what I have wanted to do. (Now, if I was a surgery resident or a medicine resident, I may not think that.) But, there have been many times where I've questioned what I was doing and why (usually on an ICU rotation at 4AM when I've been up for 24 hours straight and will not get to leave for home for another 8 hours). And for sure the responsibility of being a resident is orders of magnitude greater than a student, but that actually makes it more rewarding. However, one thing to realize is that residency hours have changed a lot over the past decade and a half, so I do have it relatively easy as I am not expected to routinely clock 100-120 hours/week while on inpatient services like older generations of EM physicians.

As far as burnout... I don't see myself burning out, per se. I may become crispy at times, and certainly I have felt the burn during residency, but good work-life balance can go a long way. I guess we'll see how that goes.
 
medicsb said:
EM is "high" on burnout, but that's not to say you can't have a long fulfilling career, and truth be told, most do. We all ***** and complain, but it has its upsides, and few actually leave the specialty as far as I know. Ultimately, most would not want to be doing anything else. The thing is, sort of like EMS, is that where you work can make all the difference in the world. Contract management groups (CMGs), which are large corporate groups that own and manage many EM practices for hospitals, are kind of like the private ambulance companies. AMR is EmCare (actually, they're both owned by the same corporation) in emergency medicine; Rural metro is TeamHealth. EM docs like EmCare and TeamHealth about as much as EMTs and medics like AMR and rural-metro. Not a whole lot like them, but when they're the only game in town, you do what you gotta do. Overall, there many many more options in EM than EMS, so it is hard to compare overall.
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Makes me wonder. Are you all in search of the oft-mentioned unicorns as well?
 
I would advise not being a doctor just to be a doctor, and not just to call the shots. It's a lot of work to get to that point, yet realize it just isn't for you.
 
I got my BS in health sciences (basically pre-med) with being a PA always my career goal. As I started applying to PA schools I soon figured out that patient contact hours are pretty much a MUST. There are schools around the country that don't have "requirements" for patient hours, but it's extremely tough to be competitive without. I figured GPA, GRE score, and volunteer work would get me in somewhere without patient contact hours, but that isn't the case. It's not hard nor expensive to get your EMT during the summer in between semesters of full-time classes. Even if you work part-time as an EMT after that while you are a full-time student the hours will slowly add up . If I could go back I would have gotten my EMT in the summer of my freshman year and worked throughout the rest of my undergrad doing that instead of other part-time jobs not in the field.
 
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