PSU Magazine Winter 1999

By Melissa Steineger The premed program at Portland State proves to be a winning training ground for future doctors. hat's harder than losing the last five pounds leftover from holiday merrymaking? How about getting into med school? In 1997, the most recent year for which statistics are available, 43,000 students applied to the nation's medical schools-17,300 were accepted. At the prestigious Mayo Clinic, 3,600 applied; 42 were accepted. And at Oregon Health Sciences University in Portland, 2,123 applied and 96 were accepted. One way to beat the odds is through Portland State's premed program. For many years the University has successfully helped pre-medical, -dental, and-nursing students enter OHSU, one of the nation's premier medical schools, as well as other medical schools around the nation. One former student estimates that a quarter of his classmates at OHSU were PSU grads. He, like many others, credits Portland State's strong acade– mic program for carefully preparing students for the rigors of medical school, and the fact that many PSU teachers are well-known on "Pill Hill." A good grade in one of their classes, students believe, counts for something with the OHSU admissions committee. And for more than 20 years, PSU has provided intensive advising, espe– dally on how to apply successfully to medical school for the 400 or so students typically in premed. Pioneered by the late Dawn Dressler, 12 PSU MAGAZINE WINTER 1999 premed advising began in an era when most advisers had little time to help students find placements in medical schools. At that time, recalls Mary Taylor, associate professor of biology, advisers mostly helped students with classes within the school or depart– ment in which they taught. ressler transformed advising by focusing on helping students get what they wanted most from PSU: out and into medical school. She did the traditional class and career counseling, but she created two unique programs for premed students. She formed the Health Sciences Advising Committee, a committee of faculty that passed judgment on each student, including their materials for medical school admission. And she created a standardized, easy-to-read format for a student's multiple letters of recommendation, thus making it easy for an admissions committee to see at a glance what teachers had to say about an applicant. Since the application counts for about a third of a student's ranking, a strong, easy-to– read application helps. These innovations, along with Dressler's tireless efforts--often work– ing evenings and weekends, at first as a volunteer-helped PSU develop what former student John Yetto '78, now a distinguished surgeon at the Veteran's Administration Hospital and OHSU, called a "pipeline" to OHSU. J JJ_ Unfortunately, measuring that pipeline statistically is problematic. Some PSU students earn their under– graduate degrees elsewhere before coming to PSU to take the classes they need for med school. If they earned a bachelor's degree elsewhere, that university is listed as their official school of record when they are admit– ted to medical school. Still, what evidence there is, is sweet. Of the one percent of appli– cants who made it into the Mayo Clinic in 1996, one was a PSU grad. And more PSU grads successfully applied to OHSU than from any other Oregon school last year. Also, of the 18 PSU dental students who applied to OHSU in 1997, 14 were accepted. aren Hanson, Dressler's successor as Health Sciences adviser in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, downplays her role in help– ing students successfully apply. "All I do is try to help them make a competitive application," says Hanson, who meets with as many as eight students a day and helps them prepare their thick application packets. "But I don't do any of the real work it takes to get in. They do that." (Melissa Steineger, a Portland freelance writer, tlffOte the article "Dream Jobs," which appeared in the fall 1998 PSU Magazine.)