Finally

So Rabbit and Musings have recently articulated a shared frustration/karmic pain that we have all been experiencing as we interview prospective applicants to our medical school. One after another, I have seen 21-22 year old, type-A kids, with a limited world view and little life experience (outside their manic, resume-fluffing activities), who all say they want to be doctors who "serve the underserved" but have probably never been in a poor neighborhood in Sacramento. They know little about the health insurance crisis or the about challenging issues impacting the practice of medicine. When I ask them how they hope to pay off their $200K in loans, pay for malpractice insurance, buy a house, school their kids and still hand out medicine (often with Bibles) in third world countries, they usually quiety mumble that they will "probably have to do private practice for a while". Anyway, the experience, described more clearly by Rabbit and Musings, has been disheartening, to say the least. I had looked forward to the process as a way to have a bit of input on next year's class, and the chance to support the promising applicants who interview at Davis. Instead, one after the other, each applicant -though no doubt qualified to be a doctor if one were to judge them soley on test scores and the necessary extra-curricular activities- disappointed me.

Fortunately, today I picked up an application of someone who I am absolutely excited about interviewing. She is an older candidate (not 22!), who immigrated to this country in her early teenage years, and despite a brevity of emotional or financial support, she managed to get herself to college, start an organization that helps others, and support herself and her family. Her MCAT scores aren't great, which can be an immediate killer on med school applications, but a closer look of her file shows great academic success in very difficult classes and an a unique intellectual curiosity about the world, medicine, and science. She reminds me of many of my friends in medical school who, though non-traditional students, are now the most promising members of our class: they love what they are learning, they have passion for medicine despite understanding the gravity of the many challenges facing the field today, and they are already giving back to society. Hopefully, our interview will go well, and our school will get back to its mission of being a welcoming and supportive environment for non-traditional students who will become excellent doctors.