The nursing degree might help a little, but the important thing is really going to be the med school prerequisites. These will not necessarily be met in the course of your nursing studies, so you'd have to check which courses you need to take to apply to med school. The prerequsites and your MCATs are going to be more important than the nature of your undergraduate studies, major, or degree.

Your crappy GPA from your BA could be a problem, but again, if you go back and take the med school prerequisites, assuming you haven't yet taken them, and do well, that may compensate considerably (or at least some) for the GPA. You may however need to discuss in an interview the reasons for the past academic difficulty.

There are alot of people starting med school at 30. I wouldn't call it stupid, but only you can decide how much you want to be a physician and what kind of sacrifice of your time, money, and other opportunities it is worth to you.

Well I don't have a "good" reason for my bad grades..honestly I was just not very responsible then and slacked in my classes. They weren't overly hard I just didn't put any effort in. Would that be overlooked if I did really well in my nursing and med pre req classes? My GPA for my BA was a 2.13. Is it possible to go to a med school and talk to one of their advisors..before I take all the pre reqs, so I can find out if I should even bother trying? None of this would really start until after I got my nursing degree..I'm just wondering if I should plan on it. Thanks!

In my opinion, especially since it seems that you have definitely turned the corner on the GPA situation, your pre-medical sciences (outlined on this website by Doc Admin) will weigh very heavily in the admissions equation.

Look for schools (talking with admissions reps is a great idea) that are big into reviewing the "whole applicant" and you will likely have more luck getting in. I applied later to med school, myself (even older than 30!), and it is working out fine. I mean, all things considered. 😉

Doc Polymath is right, only you can decide if the slog is worth it to you. If it is, and you know it in your heart of hearts, then go for it!

Best of luck to you... 🙂

Thanks for the advice! This is very helpful. I'm happy to know I can at least consider going for it, if that's what I decide to do later on. How do I find out if a school is into looking at the whole applicant? Look at their websites? Thanks 😛

Err..that was me who just posted...duh.

Getting a vibe on individual schools is a process... check on the websites, see what the school lists as their admissions criteria, and definitely check with the admissions coordinators. They might even place you in e-mail contact with one of their students, which can help a lot.

I can tell you that osteopathic colleges (like mine) are often very interested in an applicant's total background (although you definitely still need to do well on your GPA/MCAT).

Medical schools usually don't even start to look at individual applications until after the initial cut of GPA and MCAT scores, which sometimes are quite high in order to trim the number of applicants. Yeah, you might have medical experience out the ying-yang, have done field research in the Congo, worked with orphans, and speak six languages, but if your MCAT total was 29 and their cut-off is 30, yer screwed.

Other schools, both MD and DO, will have lower cut-offs initially, and will check into the complete background of those who make the cut. This could play into your favor if you started out slowly in college, but you have turned it on later.

Good luck... 🙂