Medicine-Physician

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• To become a doctor, you need to go to medical school.

• To apply to medical school, you need three things:

  1. You need a college degree

     • In theory, any degree. But the better the college program, the better your chances at med school

     • When you're in college and intending to go to med school afterwards, you're a "premed"; see a little below for some premed tips

     • Some of the yeshiva degrees described elsewhere on this site (770 etc) may not work for medical school. (However, yeshiva credits transferred to a college do work for medical school.)

  2. You need to have taken a specific set of science courses (can be part of your college degree or separate)

     • You can take these courses after you get your college degree, as a separate “post-bacc” program; see here. 

  3. You must take the MCAT, a national standardized exam

• Medical school is 4 years long, and training afterward (known as “residency”, and specific to your field) is 3-8 years long, depending on what you do

• A word about "premed", which generally means taking college courses and doing things to prepare yourself to apply to medical school:

  • Remember to be open-minded when starting on the healthcare track. Many students begin with one thing in mind and switch, for example, start thinking of going to med school and then end up choosing PA or nursing. That is totally fine. In fact, it is not necessary to decide the specific field. The main thing is to get started with the basic sciences and as time goes you can make the decision. First, you want to make sure you like the STUDY of the sciences.

  • Once in college, it very very useful to speak to other students to find out which professors and classes are good. It is ok to just choose classes or professors at random. However, you can save a lot of heartache by choosing good professors and classes that fit your preferred level of intensity. For example, sometimes an easy core-class in history can be more demanding than a chemistry class. Its good to know what you are getting yourself into. Make friends!

  • Every college has its hurdles of figuring out how it works. Have patience but definitely get the ball rolling ASAP. Registering and entering college takes time. There are deadlines all around.

 

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Medicine-Physician’s Assistant (PA)

 

• To work as a Physician Assistant, you require a national certification from the NCCPA, and a state license in each state that you practice.

  • To take the national certification exam, you must graduate from a PA program that is accredited by the ARC-PA. You have 6 years and 6 attempts to pass the exam.

  • In most states, licensure is a formality, there is no additional testing required. The only requirement is NCCPA certification.

• To apply to PA school, there are several prerequisites:

  • As all PA programs have transitioned to Master’s degrees, a bachelor’s degree is required.

  • There are certain universal prerequisite courses that apply to all programs, but certain schools require additional courses, including orgo, biochemistry, GRE, and others.

  • Voluntary or paid direct-care patient experience, including medical assistant, paramedic, EMS, radiology tech, etc. The exact amount of hours required varies by school.

  • Certain schools require non-medical volunteer work (A letter from a shliach or community organization works).

  • The minimum GPA is going up, based on the competitive level of applicants and the transition to masters.

• How long will it take?

  • Depending on your yeshiva background, 2-4 years for the bachelor’s degree

  • 2-3 years of PA school depending on the program.

  • There are optional residencies available, but most practitioners go straight to work after obtaining licensure

• Stuff you won’t hear anywhere else:

  • To make yourself stand out from other applicants, take as many “extra” or “recommended” 300-400 level science courses as you can. The impression this makes is that you are a serious science student who is committed to doing more than just the minimum. This information was directly provided by a PA program director, as one of the most consequential elements of a competitive application.

  • Bad strategy: complete all the requirements to apply for the one program of your dreams. Why is this a bad idea? Because there may be hundreds of applicants applying for the same spot, and you might end up in a cycle where you need to reapply to the same program for several years, all without guarantee of entry, only because you did not have the necessary coursework to apply to other programs.

Here is an excellent tool that sorts PA programs nationwide based on requirements: http://directory.paeaonline.org/programs

 

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Medicine-Registered Nurse (RN)

• To become a registered nurse, a high school diploma or GED is required.  One can obtain a nursing degree (RN) either from an Associate’s program (2-3 years), or a Bachelor's program (4 years). Certain science courses are required for this degree and can either be taken in college or during the nursing program. The Associate's degree is quicker and will provide you with the same title RN, but hospitals prefer a BSN degree and it is increasingly difficult to find job placement with anything less than a BSN.

• An RN to BSN degree is available online for those who choose the Associate route.

• Prior to applying, you need to take the NLN, a national standardized entrance exam for potential nursing students who seek admittance into nursing schools

• After completing nursing school, one must take the NCLEX, a standardized licensure exam.

 

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Physical Therapy:

All programs are 3 year DPT degrees.

Most require a bachelor's degree as a prerequisite with a mandatory concentration in the sciences (biology, anatomy, chemistry etc).

All schools require 100 hours paid/volunteer time prior to applying for admission to the program.

After school, you will have to pass a state exam in order to get a state license.

http://www.apta.org/ProspectiveStudents/Admissions/PTProcess/