Give me money.

For anyone who is curious about the way med school applications go, the very first question anyone should ask is this: how much does it all cost?  The answer is, of course, mostly dependent on how many applications one chooses to send; however, the geographical location of the schools also makes a big difference.

To give you a general idea, the first round of applications, if one chooses only to apply to AMCAS schools (and there are plenty that aren't on AMCAS, such as every public school in Texas), one must pay an application fee to each school that tends to vary a great deal.  Let's assume that the average primary application fee is $75.  That's already $750 if one were to apply to 10 schools, which is a rather paltry number of schools in the grand scheme of things.  The next step, if one has a strong enough primary application, is invitations to submit secondary applications, along with a further application fee.  Let's say that the second fee is also around $75.  If one were to get secondary invitations from most schools to which one applied, that could easily be an additional $600, bringing us to $1350 so far.

If one is then lucky enough to be invited to interview at several schools, the cost only continues to climb.  While one could significantly reduce the cost of interviewing by only applying to schools in one's immediate vicinity, this usually doesn't provide for enough strength in numbers, and one must look farther afield.  Even if one were to apply only to schools within a several-hour drive, interview days tend to start around 8am, making a hotel stay practically necessary for anything more than an hour or so away.  So, imagining that travel costs will average to $100 per school (which is a very low estimate, to be sure), and that a typical hotel stay will run around $75 for room and food (also entirely too low), a five-interview run would cost $875, bringing us to $2225.  One could also start to add in opportunity costs of missed work, and then the total begins to soar.

So what is the alternative?  Well... there isn't one.  Perhaps if one were applying with a 4.0 GPA, and a 45T on the MCAT, and if one came from a community under-represented in medicine and with an economically and educationally disadvantaged background, and had spent several years working in a medical clinic in the middle of a war zone, one could apply to just one school and reduce costs dramatically.  But most medical school applicants will not have this option.  Many will have to max out their credit cards or take out loans just to complete the application cycle.  Schools could certainly offer interviews from alumni in various cities around the country, but because the interview day is as much an opportunity for schools to sell themselves to students as it is for students to sell themselves to schools, this would diminish the utility served by the day.

That said, if you're reading this because you're thinking about applying to med school, my advice is this: go for it.  Spend the money, take out the loans, and then work as hard as you possibly can to have made the investment absolutely worth it.  If you are driven by passion, you have nothing to lose, and the payments will seem a worthwhile sacrifice.

Now I ain't sayin' she a gold digger --
Primary applications: 17
Instant rejections: 1
Secondary applications: 16
Post-secondary rejections (i.e. without an interview) to date: 5
Interview invitations to date: 6
Interviews completed to date: 4
Post-interview rejections to date: 0
Waitlisted to date: 2
Acceptances to date: 0

What kills you...

This post was meant to be about something completely different, but I've had a rough day, and read a funny e-mail, and now you're just going to have to enjoy my favorite part of the e-mail instead of some gripe or other about the medical school application process (of which, I promise, I still have many...).

For those of you who watch what you eat, here's the final word on nutrition and health. It's a relief to know the truth after all those conflicting nutritional studies.

1. The Japanese eat very little fat
    and suffer fewer heart attacks than us.

2. The Mexicans eat a lot of fat
    and suffer fewer heart attacks than us.

3. The Chinese drink very little red wine
    and suffer fewer heart attacks than us.

4. The Italians drink a lot of red wine
    and suffer fewer heart attacks than us.

5. The Germans drink a lot of beer and eat lots of sausages and fats
    and suffer fewer heart attacks than us.

CONCLUSION:

Eat and drink what you like.
Speaking English is apparently what kills you.

That's funny right?  Fine, I thought it was funny.  Maybe a little over-generalized and stereotypical in its execution, but whatever.

Here are some number-y updates for you.  Note the addition of a new category!

Just a city boy --
Primary applications: 17
Instant rejections: 1
Secondary applications: 16
Post-secondary rejections (i.e. without an interview) to date: 5
Interview invitations to date: 6
Interviews completed to date: 4
Post-interview rejections to date: 0
Waitlisted to date: 2
Acceptances to date: 0

A wee update

I had been waiting to post something new until I had something more to report.  Up until this morning, that only included two more rejections, which just didn't feel like a great reason to write an update.  As of this morning, though, I've received another interview invite, bringing my total to 6.  Just to clarify, the "interviews completed" down there is also included in the interview invitations.  The only reason for keeping them separate would be so that if I were to decide not to interview somewhere, i.e. if I were to get into a school that made interviewing at some other school seem less necessary, you would be able to tell.  I don't actually know how I'll indicate that, except maybe that by mid-April, those two numbers won't match up.

The biggest thing I have to say is this: waiting is awful.  Looking back on the application process so far, I've changed my mind about what is the worst part over and over again.  At first, it was studying for the MCATs, because how could that possibly be fun?  I then thought that taking the MCATs would be the worst, but I had a really good experience with smiling test center staff, and the day felt much better.  But then applications seemed like they were for sure the worst part!  Only once I had gotten through them, they felt like an accomplishment, and no longer like something dreadful.  Leading up to my first interview, I was convinced that interviewing would be awful!  But not the case at all.  Waiting, however, is definitely awful.  And knowing that the suspense could be drawn out for a couple more months only makes it seem worse.  That said, it's a necessary part of the process.  I'd like to say that I've found a way to make waiting more entertaining, but it is what it is: the slow passing of time.  What I can say is this: it will have been worth it.  Whatever the outcome, wherever I get in or don't, wherever I end up when all is said and done, it will have been worth all of the schooling, the test studying, the test taking, the applications, the interviews, and the waiting.  I would advise people that if they consider this process and it doesn't seem worth the trouble, it probably isn't.  I very much felt that way when I was considering law school; sitting for the LSAT didn't seem worth any of the trouble.  If passion isn't driving you to stick to it and already rejoice in the end outcome, even though it is yet unknown, you might be doing yourself a favor to reconsider before you end up doing something you don't enjoy.


Maybe that's bad advice.  But it's advice that once I learned to follow has seemed to produce good results!


Now, back to waiting.


Uh oh... now that I'm looking at these numbers and actually doing some counting on my fingers, there's definitely a problem... they're wrong!  Oops... ignore the other ones and use these instead.  Note the bold for changes from my erroneous calculations.

Stop.  Hammer time --
Primary applications: 17
Instant rejections: 1
Secondary applications: 16
Post-secondary rejections (i.e. without an interview) to date: 4
Interview invitations to date: 6
Interviews completed to date: 3
Post-interview rejections to date: 0
Acceptances to date: 0