Wondering about Premed experience at USNA

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lenkmobile

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I was wondering about what the premed experience is like at USNA and how it could compare to that of a prestigious school like Duke (Assuming I have obtained an ROTC scholarship). If you could speak to your experience with premed at USNA that would be greatly appreciated, I have read the USNA Chemistry website about Premeds but I was looking for a more personal experience. I have no qualms about becoming a line officer, but I was heavily considering becoming a Doctor. Thank you.
 
lenkmobile said:
I was wondering about what the premed experience is like at USNA and how it could compare to that of a prestigious school like Duke (Assuming I have obtained an ROTC scholarship). If you could speak to your experience with premed at USNA that would be greatly appreciated, I have read the USNA Chemistry website about Premeds but I was looking for a more personal experience. I have no qualms about becoming a line officer, but I was heavily considering becoming a Doctor. Thank you.
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While awaiting replies, suggest doing a targeted external Google search to identify the many threads on this topic that pop up each year. Lots of good browsing.

Go to Google and use:
Site:www.serviceacademyforums.com Naval Academy medical school

It’s good that you found the pages on usna.edu about the program. It is a very narrow path, with only a handful or two of mids selected each year. The Navy gets the majority of its Medical Corps officers from civilian medical schools and direct commission programs. They can also attend the military medical school at USUHS on the Walter Reed National Military Medical Center campus. . See links below to add to your research, if your primary goal is Navy medicine.


MEDSCHOOL, Home

medschool.usuhs.edu medschool.usuhs.edu


What medical school you get into out of USNA is similar to other undergrad programs, overall academic performance, especially in certain courses, class rank, MCAT score, etc. I have seen Navy grads head off to Mt. Sinai, Johns Hopkins, UPenn, Columbia, Harvard, Duke, Emory, Tulane, GWU, Georgetown, Mass Gen, state flagship universities, etc. The quality of service academy graduates is well-known. When I was on USNA staff, I sat on the committee that reviewed and selected the med school selectees. I will never forget one stellar candidate - captain of a two-season varsity sport, minored in Spanish because he used summer leave periods to volunteer with non-profits providing medical care to underserved populations in Central and South America, volunteered at the local ER when he could, got the requisite high grades, high class rank and MCAT score - had a choice of 5 fine schools.

It can be done, but the path is narrow, and you have to be prepared to embrace a line officer career.
 
To touch on the ROTC perspective, NROTC isn't a great path to med school unfortunately. They too have like 1 slot a year for a midshipman to go straight to med school after graduation, sometimes no slots a year. I've heard of someone getting into Harvard Medical School (often ranked the #1 med school in the country), and the Navy not letting them pursue that after graduation.
 
lenkmobile said:
I was wondering about what the premed experience is like at USNA and how it could compare to that of a prestigious school like Duke (Assuming I have obtained an ROTC scholarship). If you could speak to your experience with premed at USNA that would be greatly appreciated, I have read the USNA Chemistry website about Premeds but I was looking for a more personal experience. I have no qualms about becoming a line officer, but I was heavily considering becoming a Doctor. Thank you.
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Just saying, considering USNA is primarily focused on creating line officers (with a heavier focus on engineering than the life sciences) I'd think academically they probably can't compete with Duke's pre-med program, though I'm sure USNA's opportunities for research and such are still top tier. However, I'm pretty sure your chances of going into med school from NROTC are very slim (25 nationwide maximum) while USNA's are a little better (15 max just from the college), so that's probably something you need to weigh when making a decision.
 
As Capt MJ mentioned, use the search function as there are 100s of threads on this. Not sure the two paths are all that comparable. 95% of those who go the medical route major in Chemistry at USNA. They then supplement the courses needed to round out the courses needed to apply for med school. USNA traditionally has around 12 per a year select and attend med school. They also manage summer internships in hospitals or research to boost their med school apps. Studying for MCATs is on your own time. The other part that must be understood is ‘the needs of the Navy.’ You can be the best in your class, but if the Navy does not need an another neurosurgeon, you aren’t going to be one. The traditional match process is based upon the needs of the Navy. You have to be ready to accept any specialty the Navy needs. As mentioned ROTC, gets even less spots than USNA, most years that number is zero. You can apply from the fleet. Most of my friends and clsssmates who became military doctors took this route. They took refresher courses at community colleges or to round out their apps (because they majored in something else), studied for MCATs while serving, and used their military experience as a part of their apps.
 
@Capt MJ is the day-to-day life of a pre-med path student drastically different and more difficult than any other cadets at USNA? What are the most common reasons that USNA board rejected applicants for the medical schools?
 
Excellent points by @NavyHoops - all discussed in many threads and posts going back years.

She mentions several big ones, including when it’s time to apply for residencies, needs of the Navy will outweigh the individual’s desires.

The obligated service is years and years, compared to the usual at least 5 years for USNA. I am not sure of the exact payback, except there is payback for USNA, medical school, etc., and it starts after the years of residency down the road. Going Navy medicine out of USNA essentially commits the officer to a near-full career.

There is a way to go the unrestricted line officer route out of USNA and NROTC and a few years into the officer career, in a narrow band of years, you can competitively apply to the lateral transfer and redesignation board for Medical Corps. Again, only a small handful of top-performing officers are chosen from across the officer community. And once again, if you’re, say, a submarine officer, and the Navy needs you to stay in submarines because of manpower levels, you could be the most stellar candidate the board has seen, but the sub community will not release you. Keep in mind what I posted above - the military obtains most of its doctors from civilian medical schools. That said, I always appreciated a military doctor whose uniform reflected their warfare specialty, as I knew their path had been hard and they “got me” as a line officer.

If being a doctor is the goal, not necessarily a military one, you can go to USNA or NROTC, serve honorably as a surface warfare officer (usually the shortest path in years) for your required active duty service obligation, then another 36 months to earn your full Post-9/11 GI Bill very generous veterans’ educational benefit. You will not be teetering at grave’s edge; older students are common in post-grad schools. Veterans can be found at prestigious medical, law, business and other graduate schools. You take online refresher courses, MCAT prep courses, and are a mature student who knows how to work hard. And likely no student loans!

www.va.gov

Post-9/11 GI Bill (Chapter 33) | Veterans Affairs

The Post-9/11 GI Bill (Chapter 33) helps you pay for school or job training. If you’ve served on active duty after September 10, 2001, you may qualify for the Post-9/11 GI Bill (Chapter 33). Find out if you can get this education benefit.
www.va.gov www.va.gov

 
There's no bachelors degree in Pre-Medicine, pre-law, pre-pharmacy or any other pre professional occupation. As @NavyHoops and @Capt MJ mentioned, one who aspires to be a physician takes the undergrad courses required by medical schools. University advisors are well-equipped to work with students to put them on a pre-med track to meet the medical school requirements. The majority of my medical sciences students and about half of my biotechnology students say they want to be a doctor. One of the first assignments I give every year is research on their chosen occupation so I'm not the one who tells them what the admission rate is for medical school. Part of the assignment is looking up the prerequisites. Several med schools in recent years have dropped the hard science requirements and replaced them with recommended courses which of course are the hard sciences. Regardless, a strong foundation in the hard sciences is needed to survive the first year of med school. Disclaimer: I'm not a physician.

I have a student waiting to hear from USMA and ROTC. She wants to be a physician and is fully aware of the number of academy graduates who are selected to attend medical school. She won't say the words but she is more interested in the degree and other benefits of attending a service academy than being an army officer. I've had at least three conversations with her about this. She's an awesome young lady and will be a valuable member of the healthcare team someday. How she will get there however and her motivation has me worried.
 
Lots of great advice here. In my opinion if you 100% want to be a Navy doc, go to a civilian school then apply to the Uniformed Services University Medical School. If accepted you’ll attend on a full scholarship, while getting paid as an officer at a top-tier program. Bethesda is home to the much of the finest people and tech that military medicine has to offer. While you could theoretically do this out of the Academy (seen it happen), it’d be much harder and should only be done if you truly value getting the academy experience more than you value pre med studies.
 
Kierkegaard said:
Lots of great advice here. In my opinion if you 100% want to be a Navy doc, go to a civilian school then apply to the Uniformed Services University Medical School. If accepted you’ll attend on a full scholarship, while getting paid as an officer at a top-tier program. Bethesda is home to the much of the finest people and tech that military medicine has to offer. While you could theoretically do this out of the Academy (seen it happen), it’d be much harder and should only be done if you truly value getting the academy experience more than you value pre med studies.
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Excellent way to do it. And no payback in obligated service years for USNA or NROTC.
 
Thank you for all of your responses, I have read the threads regarding this topic on this forum, but the reason I specifically made this post was because Duke AROTC and USNA are the choices I have at the moment. The part that seems to be throwing me off the most is that I understand that at USNA very few come in wanting to take an unrestricted line job like being a Doctor. I was wondering how much time will you have to study in your upperclassmen years, as I understand Plebe year is a grind.
 
lenkmobile said:
Thank you for all of your responses, I have read the threads regarding this topic on this forum, but the reason I specifically made this post was because Duke AROTC and USNA are the choices I have at the moment. The part that seems to be throwing me off the most is that I understand that at USNA very few come in wanting to take an unrestricted line job like being a Doctor. I was wondering how much time will you have to study in your upperclassmen years, as I understand Plebe year is a grind.
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All four years are definitely a grind. You have more time as an upperclass but it still never feels like enough, by design. You could have an exam the next day but not much time to study because of a parade practice, Forrestal lecture, watchstanding, and so on.

Also a note on nomenclature. “Unrestricted line officer” refers to those eligible for operational command like SWOs, Pilots, NFOs, Subs, and NSW. Restricted line officers include Intel, Cryptology, Supply, and a few others. Medical Corps falls under “Staff Corps” along with Chaplains and a few others, whom perform critical functions, but who aren’t directly in the fight.

@Capt MJ Have I got this right?^
 
Kierkegaard said:
All four years are definitely a grind. You have more time as an upperclass but it still never feels like enough, by design. You could have an exam the next day but not much time to study because of a parade practice, Forrestal lecture, watchstanding, and so on.

Also a note on nomenclature. “Unrestricted line officer” refers to those eligible for operational command like SWOs, Pilots, NFOs, Subs, and NSW. Restricted line officers include Intel, Cryptology, Supply, and a few others. Medical Corps falls under “Staff Corps” along with Chaplains and a few others, whom perform critical functions, but who aren’t directly in the fight.

@Capt MJ Have I got this right?^
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Supe’s Star quality response.
 
lenkmobile said:
I was wondering about what the premed experience is like at USNA and how it could compare to that of a prestigious school like Duke (Assuming I have obtained an ROTC scholarship). If you could speak to your experience with premed at USNA that would be greatly appreciated, I have read the USNA Chemistry website about Premeds but I was looking for a more personal experience. I have no qualms about becoming a line officer, but I was heavily considering becoming a Doctor. Thank you.
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my 2C has a couple friends that want to be doctors. it is a tough path, the biggest issue they find right now is studying for the MCAT - they are both varsity athletes so there is not much time for studying for the MCAT on top of all their science classes and labs they are taking, plus all their other military duties at USNA - they are both chemistry majors. it is not an easy path. they are working very hard to get one of the few spots to go to medical school. both did do an internship this past summer at hospitals.
 
Kierkegaard said:
All four years are definitely a grind. You have more time as an upperclass but it still never feels like enough, by design. You could have an exam the next day but not much time to study because of a parade practice, Forrestal lecture, watchstanding, and so on.

Also a note on nomenclature. “Unrestricted line officer” refers to those eligible for operational command like SWOs, Pilots, NFOs, Subs, and NSW. Restricted line officers include Intel, Cryptology, Supply, and a few others. Medical Corps falls under “Staff Corps” along with Chaplains and a few others, whom perform critical functions, but who aren’t directly in the fight.

@Capt MJ Have I got this right?^
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Staff corps officers are not a subset of restricted line officers, they're just separate categories. They even get their own special promotion boards separate from Line officers.

"Operational command" is not quite the description I would use. More precisely, Restricted Line (and LDO) is not eligible for command that would qualify for the "Command at Sea" insignia (which, despite the title, also does not necessarily mean the command must be a "seagoing" command). For example, there was some fanfare a while back about the first woman to command a Naval Special Warfare unit -- Tactical Communications Command One. She is a restricted line officer. I wouldn't call that a "non-operational" command.

It's a pretty outdated distinction that is diminishing more and more as time goes on. There was some talk a while back about allowing restricted line officers to hold billets that *would* be eligible for the "Command at Sea" insignia due to the responsibility over deployed tactical units and squadrons. Maybe it will happen someday, who knows. It wasn't that long ago that USNA only commissioned unrestricted line officers except by medical disqualification, so these things can change.

Not trying to be a keyboard warrior and poke holes, but it is an interesting distinction, rooted in some Naval tradition. It's also fascinating to officers of other services that really don't have this kind of distinction (i.e. the concept of an officer that is *unable* to take command if need arises, despite also being a line officer).
 
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Actually, quite a few people enter USNA wanting to be a doctor. As a BGO, I once had 2 candidates in the same year (both appointed) who wanted to be doctors. And there are more than 3,000 BGOs. Lots of people start on this path; few finish.

10 USNA grads from Class of 2024 will go Medical Corps. Out of 1012. That's 1%. So, it's possible, but not something I'd count on.

One other thing alluded to above . . . you are NOT guaranteed your choice of residency. I know more than one Navy doctor who did not get anything close to what they wanted. You want to be a cardiac surgeon . . . you might end up an internist. Want to be a urologist? You might end up an ophthalmologist. I'm being a bit melodramatic, but it comes down to what specialties the Navy needs at the moment, your class standing, and whether the community wants you. Needs of the navy always trump.

Finally, Duke is a great school but no more "prestigious" than USNA. Just sayin'.
 
lenkmobile said:
I was wondering about what the premed experience is like at USNA and how it could compare to that of a prestigious school like Duke (Assuming I have obtained an ROTC scholarship). If you could speak to your experience with premed at USNA that would be greatly appreciated, I have read the USNA Chemistry website about Premeds but I was looking for a more personal experience. I have no qualms about becoming a line officer, but I was heavily considering becoming a Doctor. Thank you.
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It is possible as a chem major at USNA (no premed, unfortunately). All you can do is work hard to be at the top of your class/order of merit and involve yourself in research projects -- in hopes of being selected for restricted line. Good luck!
 
basalt7728 said:
It is possible as a chem major at USNA (no premed, unfortunately). All you can do is work hard to be at the top of your class/order of merit and involve yourself in research projects -- in hopes of being selected for restricted line. Good luck!
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Med Corps isn’t restricted line actually, it’s staff corps.

From what I remember of seeing people get selected, the hard part was being a competitive med school applicant. Good grades in the pre-reqs and a high MCAT score and such. If those boxes are checked, USNA are unlikely to stand in the way.
 
As a retired Medical Corps officer and a USNA grad, I want to clarify and confirm just a few things stated here.

1) You CAN go to MC out of USNA or ROTC but the numbers are very small. For USNA it will limit your major selection as only a few majors will let you fulfill the premed requirements. There are special requirements at the SA and you also have to get into a medical school so you must do well academically and will likely forego most of any time off to do other med school requirements such as volunteer medical hours etc.

2) If you don't go straight out of undergraduate, you can serve as a line officer for a few years and then pursue Med School. This is actually what I did (I was a SWO for about 6 years then did the Health Profession Scholarship and had the Navy pick up my tab for civilian medical school). I think this is a great option as you can grow and have a better sense of whether you truly want to become a doctor (it is a long road!) and what specialty you might want to do. I have NOT seen anyone forced to do a specialty training they don't want to do. Some are much more competitive than others (derm, radiology etc). But no one was forced to do a specialty they simply didn't want to.

3) Doctors are staff corps officers but later in your career you will have the opporunity to lead/command at hospitals and other operational medical units. I commanded hospitals and medical centers and the Navy's Public Health Command.

Just a few more nuggets to put in the calculus.
 
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