Expert Advice on BS/MD programs - Part 1

Part 1 - What are BS/MD programs and how I came to know about them

Hi, my name is Yesh and I am a student in the Boston University seven-year accelerated medical program (SMED). You can catch me on the CollegeVine site a lot, usually doing live streams or creating content on our YouTube channel. For those of you who may not know me, it’s great to meet you! I have been working at CollegeVine for four years now and have had a blast helping families and students navigate the admissions process, as well as specifically navigating pre-med and BS/MD admissions. Outside of school and working with CollegeVine, I enjoy ultimate frisbee, have been getting into Formula 1 racing and like to explore the intersection between medicine and technology.

Today, I’ll be discussing the widely popular topic of BS/MD programs! BS/MD programs are those that combine the college and medical school experience in one by allowing you to obtain a bachelor of science (BS) degree AND a doctor of medicine (MD) degree in a set amount of years. However, it is important to note that there is variation in these guaranteed accelerated programs. Some offer a bachelor of arts degree (BA/MD), a doctor of osteopathy degree (BS/DO) and these programs can last anywhere from 6-8 years in length.

When it comes to admissions, any guaranteed medical program is likely to be more competitive than the average school. Some of the top-tier BS/MD programs have an admissions rate of less than 4% which is even lower than the 6-8% acceptance rate of ivy league schools! It goes without saying then that competitive applicants to these programs have really high science GPAs and standardized test scores along with a strong medicine and science focused application profile. For more information on this I would highly recommend you check out our “Ultimate Guide to BS/MD admissions video” (here: https://www.collegevine.com/livestreams/506/the-ultimate-guide-to-bs-md-programs?utm_cv_source=watch-share) or wait for my next posts on gaining admission to these programs.

The first thing to note is that guaranteed medical programs are NOT the same as early assurance programs. Early assurance programs are those that allow you to apply for conditional acceptance to medical school during your sophomore year of undergrad. Like guaranteed medical programs, early assurance programs are for students committed to medical school. However, the advantage is that these early assurance programs provide an extra 2 years (first and second year of undergrad) to ensure that the medical path is right for you.

Within guaranteed medical programs, you want to consider that you are essentially applying to undergrad and medical school at the same time, which may be a lot of pressure for some. You are usually committing to one school for 8 years, or a partnership of two schools (one for undergrad and one for medical school) as early as highschool. Not to mention that you are also committing to a career in medicine! Because this is the case, I would highly recommend that you take the time to consider if these programs are right for you and if you are willing to lock yourself into this many years of education and the career as a physician before applying.

I first heard of BS/MD programs during my freshman year of highschool. Maybe like most of you reading this post now, I was a really anxious freshman who wanted to plan out my next four years and beyond. So to discover more about the educational options available to me I turned to the internet for help. Slowly but surely, after dozens of hours of browsing college websites and blog posts, the promise of BS/MD programs captured my attention. For as long as I can remember, I could only imagine myself as a physician in the future. So when it came to applying to these programs at the start of my junior year it was sort of a no-brainer for me. That being said, I did use high school to really explore medicine and science to make sure that I wanted to make this commitment. I got involved in the local red cross, my town's emergency medical service, advanced science classes and a ton of science clubs to name a few like one involving synthetic biology called iGEM and another jeopardy-esque trivia competition called Academic League. If it weren’t for my early research and three years of high school preparation, I’m not sure I would have been as competitive of a BS/MD applicant as I was.

Hopefully this inaugural post of guaranteed medical programs was helpful for you all, and definitely look forward to hearing more from me on this topic in future posts. Have a great weekend, and I will see you for part 2 in a few days!

EDIT: Here are links to Part 2 and Part 3! I'll update again once more parts are out.

Part 2 - https://www.collegevine.com/questions/17523/expert-advice-on-bs-md-programs-part-2

Part 3 - https://www.collegevine.com/questions/17849/how-i-applied-to-bs-md-programs-thinking-of-the-application-as-a-checklist-part-3