How to Get into Medical School [8 Effective Tips] | White coat investor

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This may seem like an unusual post for a website primarily aimed at physicians and those already in the pipeline to become physicians. But I have a surprising number of pre-med students who read the blog, and I hope this post will help them long before they get a $400,000 student loan to become a doctor. Here are the “secrets” to getting into medical school.

#1 Get better at standardized tests

If you didn’t do well on the SAT or ACT when you entered college, you have a lot of work ahead of you. Administering standardized tests is an essential skill for pre-meds, medical students, residents, and even practicing physicians. The tests never end. You might as well learn how to deal with it now. It helps to be smart, but there are real test-taking skills that anyone can use to improve their scores from failing to satisfactory, adequate to good, and good to great. Taking every MCAT practice test you can get is a good start. But read the answer explanations, even for the answers you got right. You learn a lot about taking and taking a good test. These skills will help you perform well on the MCAT, the USMLE Steps I-III, the shelf exams, the in-service exams, the board certification exams, and the recertification exams.

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#2 Work harder AND smarter

You’re going to study more in medical school than you did as a pre-med. As a resident you will work even more hours. If you don’t like going to school, studying hard, and working hard now, you might as well leave while you still can. There are many great careers where you can make decent money without killing yourself. But at the same time, start practicing high-return reading and learning strategies. If you’re still reading the entire textbook twice in front of the class, you’re doing it all wrong. Ultimately, there will be so much material that you won’t be able to read it all once, let alone twice.

The thickness of “required” medical school textbooks is measured in feet, not inches. You simply can’t read them all word for word. Read the summaries. Read the section titles. Look at the graphs, charts and figures. If you don’t understand something, read that section. You spend less time studying and ultimately gain a better understanding of the material and how it works.

#3 Work on your social skills

Although many doctors are introverts, there is little room in medicine for people who cannot communicate effectively with others. Most doctors spend all day communicating. When you are not listening and talking to patients and their families, you are communicating with staff and other physicians or taking long written notes. This is not a career for people who prefer to work alone. You might think you can study radiology or pathology or some other specialty that isn’t patient care, but I have news for you. There are few jobs that don’t involve interacting with other people on a routine basis. People who cannot communicate effectively are weeded out quite easily using letters of recommendation, essays and especially interviews.

#4 Check the boxes, but use them to your advantage

There are sections on each medical school application where you describe your extracurricular activities, including leadership opportunities, healthcare orientation activities, and service activities. You must check these boxes to get into medical school. Many pre-meds check them out ONLY to get into medical school. I suggest you use these activities to see if you really want to become a doctor. If you don’t enjoy being a leader, if most aspects of healthcare don’t fascinate you, or if you don’t really enjoy helping other people without thinking about reward, you may want to reconsider your desire to go to medical school. It might not be for you, and that’s okay.

Also keep in mind that you don’t have to spend a billion hours on every activity. So you shadowed a doctor every day for two months. Have you really gotten that much out of the past 59 days? It would be much better to shadow four different doctors for four hours each. You don’t have to work as an ER attendant for three years or be president of six different clubs on campus.

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#5 Be interesting

As a fourth-year medical student, I served on a selection committee for admission to a medical school. Everyone who reached our committee had passing MCAT scores and grades. They all checked all the required boxes. We still had several hundred registrations for 100 slots. At that point it came down to who was really interesting. As a biology student and president of the pre-med club, you didn’t get far in those discussions. But if you were a Russian émigré who had started an orphanage across the Mexican border for children whose parents had been killed in a drug war, while playing as a linebacker on the college football team AND STILL getting solid MCAT scores, getting good grades and checking all the pre-med boxes, then you were a shoo-in.

Don’t try to conform to the “pre-med model.” Be yourself and be excellent at it. Capitalize on what makes you unique, whether it’s your heritage, extracurricular activities, age, previous career or interests. You have to sell yourself in the application and during the job interview. It’s not enough to be Hawaiian or a famous jazz musician. You should explain how your experiences will make you a better doctor and contribute to the education of your classmates and the care of your future patients.

#6 Apply to medical school early and perfectly

Applying late to medical school is like walking into the batter’s box with two strikes already against you. Not only have you missed many job interview opportunities (and acceptances), but you have also demonstrated a lack of ability to plan ahead and a lack of attention to detail – two essential qualities of good doctors. Likewise, your applications must be perfect. If several people (preferably those who can spell) haven’t read your entire application, and not just the essay, you’re doing yourself a disservice. It really matters.

#7 Play the numbers game when applying to medical school

I’m always shocked when I see people who only applied to one medical school. That’s a losing strategy. Granted, the better an applicant you are, the fewer schools you have to apply to. But I would set the minimum to 10. Sure, it will cost you more money to sign up, but if you don’t join until next year, it could cost you hundreds of thousands in lost income. Don’t be penny-wise and pound-foolish. If you’re not a good candidate, 20 or even 30 schools aren’t a bad idea. You can always turn down job interviews if you get too many. Save money by turning down job interviews (if you’re so lucky) and not skipping job applications.

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#8 Apply to the right medical schools

Your biggest advantage is probably in your state school. Often they have to bring in a certain number of people from their own state. But there aren’t many states with ten medical schools. So, how do you decide which out-of-state schools to apply to? Look who they’ve taken in the past. If a school traditionally draws 95% of its students from its own state, don’t apply there. If two-thirds of the class is made up of out-of-state students, it’s probably worth the money to apply. Apply somewhere where you will be somewhat unique. If you’re from Louisiana, someone in Colorado might think that’s cool, but in Alabama you won’t stand out much when you apply for a job.

Also applies to a number of schools. No matter how good you think you are, apply to some “back-up” schools. It can be humbling to see how many of these people don’t invite you for a job interview. If you are not an above-average applicant, you may also consider applying to Caribbean medical schools. If that is your only acceptance of medical school, I am confident you will choose this over the alternative.

If you are lucky enough to get into a lot of schools, do yourself a favor and seriously consider the cheapest medical school. What you learn in medical school depends much more on you than on the school, and escaping with just $100,000 in debt instead of $400,000 will make a huge difference in professional and personal opportunities in the future.

What other tips do you have for pre-medication? What do you wish you had known when you applied to medical school?

[This updated post was originally published in 2012.]