I am in college and strongly considering pre-med, and thought that I would consult the collective wisdom of the SDMB. What sort of things (besides grades and MCAT scores) look good to the admissions people? What is the application process like? Once in, what is med school itself like? And finally, how does the practicing physician/medical researcher dichotomy play out; is it pretty much exclusive or is there some overlap? Thanks for your input.
I am not in Med School, but I did consider it and had many long conversatuons with the admissions people.
At our school they got tired of graduating doctors that, while brilliant, had no personality. Now they do not only look at grades and MCAT scores (although they are still important). They want to see a well-rounded person that found hobbies and otehr things to do with their time rather than just study.
A doctor is expected to deal with people, so they like people that are sociable too.
That’s my .02.
I highly recommend checking out www.studentdoctor.net - although I have to warn you, it’s not necessarily representative of most med school applicants. For one thing, the standards they all seem to meet are higher than the average. However, it’s a good start for looking at doing the pre-med route.
I suggest that you first think about why you want to be a doctor. I think it’s perfectly fine to say financial security, at least in part, but there are definitely better ways of becoming rich without having to go $100k in debt on top of at least 8 more years of schooling.
I was on the interview panel for my medical school, and was chair of the recruitment committee for residency.
Besides the general stuff? (good grades, good MCAT), it is important to have something that makes you stand out. All the applicants who are bio/premed and had done nothing else but live in the basic sciences building start to blur together after a while. HOWEVER, make sure that your “well-rounded” activity is something that you REALLY enjoy or feel passionate about. I would cringe during medical student interviews when it became apparent the “passion” noted in essays or applications was nothing deeper than “CV fodder” to get attention.
Also, reread your essay. Several times. Have it read by others. Preferably English teachers (or whatever language the essay is written in). It’s amazing how many essays I’ve read that had glaring grammar or spelling errors.
The interview process varies, but you can usually count on a tour of at least the medical school and interviews with several faculty members, including one in your professed area of interest (if you listed one and there is a faculty member available).
I can speak to one medical school’s curriculum, circa 1990-1994 
The first two years are generally lecture oriented - think a full course load at college, but, er, amped up a bit. If you have the ability to memorize large quantities of material, that helps. In the second year, schools will start introducing you to patients and/or case presentations in very controlled circumstances (for example, we would have a group of students come in an interview a hand-picked psychiatric patient under the supervision of an attending).
Third and fourth year were the clinical rotations; there are basic rotations that everyone does (surgery, family practice, etc.), then there are electives that are typically done during the fourth year. During the fourth year, you go for interviews in your area at residency programs - and you find out where you’ll spend the next few years of your life on “match day” (near the end of your fourth year). If you’re unlucky (no program picks you), you have to “scramble”, which is where you contact programs that did not fill and try to line up a residency post haste.
As far as the clinician/researcher issue - well, it depends on what you want to do. I am a clinician; while there are little studies I have done, I have no interest in being a “lab rat”. I know some really bright researchers who have essentially no interest in seeing patients except for research trials. And I know a bunch of practitioners that fall in the middle.
Research is something of a “calling”. Although academic departments LOVE for their clinicians/professors to be researchers too, I wouldn’t go there unless you’re really into it. If you think that research is where you want to be, there are additional training programs that are helpful (that start at the medical school level (MD/PhD) and go up to fellowships in research after residency).
Hope this helps. It’s a big question, figuring out what to do with the rest of your life 
FS
Current second year med student here.
Others have already explained the issue of how to get into med school pretty well. Good grades, a good GPA, and firsthand experience with the medical field (either in a job or as a volunteer) are essential.
It is important to have firsthand knowledge of medicine so you can be sure you truly are attracted to medicine itself. Do enough soul-searching to be sure you legitimately enjoy medicine and are NOT just attracted by the idea of a high salary or prestige.
Docs don’t make as much money as they used to, and now that so many patients try to self-diagnose themselves with the Internet (often leading them to think they know more than their doctors do) the prestige isn’t what it used to be either. There are many lucrative, respectable careers that don’t involve taking on so much student loan debt, stress, sleepless nights, or fun tasks like putting your finger in some random stranger’s rectum or having to put some of the pus from some dude’s gonorrhea infection on a microscope slide. If you go into medicine just for money, it’s a safe bet you’ll end up being very unhappy.
The application process is pretty straightforward. The only annoying thing about it is that it gets very expensive fast with all the application fees and travel costs (but you want to err on the side of applying to too many schools, because it sucks so much more if you don’t get in anywhere and have to apply a second time). Most of the interviews I had were friendly conversations, not hardcore grilling sessions.
As for school itself, it’s still pretty much as Freudian_Slip said. First year classes are mostly like undergrad science classes at a MUCH faster pace. The common analogy of “It’s like trying to drink from a fire hose” is very apt. The sheer volume of information is shocking at first. You’ll probably often be very overwhelmed and stressed out, but most people make it through and adapt to the pace just fine. Second year is more “clinically based”, where you start talking about specific diseases and treatments, and most of us find that a lot more interesting.
I haven’t gotten to third year yet so can’t say much about that yet, but maybe next year I can give an update. I love medicine, so I’m very happy so far.
Good luck to you!
MD/PhD student here. What the others have said is all true, though I’d like to emphasize the amount of material you have to absorb in the first two years. If your transcript indicates that you have difficulty adjusting to high-load courses, the admissions committee might decide against taking you, even if the rest of your application looks good. Reason being, it only gets harder from here, and medical schools want people with the highest chances of successfully completing the curriculum.
That said, you want to have the opportunity to shine. Like the others said, “medi-clones” are a dime a dozen. Ever read the Brag of the College Applicant? Nobody expects you to have conquered Peru by the age of 22, but you want to be able to claim something relatively unique.
MD/PhD applications are a bit specialized. On the bright side, most MD/PhD positions are fully or nearly fully funded. This means free medical and graduate tuition for 8 years (the average time to complete an MD/PhD). On the other hand, competition is fierce. Keep in mind, the average size of an incoming medical school class is 100 people. MD/PhDs will be at most 10% of that, if the school has an MD/PhD program. Most MD/PhD programs are funded by the MSTP training grant, and have a pretty rigid layout: M1, M2, G1-G4, M3, M4. This means you take your first two years of medical school with the rest of the incoming class, then you spend 4 years fulfilling your graduate requirements (coursework, TAing, publications, etc., culminating in a dissertation defense), and then you spend 2 years in the clinic. There are programs that are more flexible - Rochester (MSTP) has a system for maintaining clinical exposure while in the lab (one day a week, I believe), UIUC (internal funding) does the PhD program first, with M1 decompressed over the course of the PhD, etc.
As for the clinician/researcher dichotomy…well, it plays out in all sorts of ways. I’ll be honest: most MD/PhDs tend towards one side or the other. Although “translational research” is the current buzzword, being a 50/50 physician-scientist is a very delicate balancing act, and most people will go toward the side that best suits them. It really does depend on your unique capabilities and personal tendencies. It’s hard to make a blanket statement about all MD/PhDs, just because they’re so varied - an MD/PhD (Biochem) is not an MD/PhD (EE) is not an MD/PhD (Comparative Literature).
One of the guys who was in my research group at U of Miami wanted to go to medical school. Tried at least 4 times, never could go in. Two huge mistakes he made, in my book:
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while he could be a great salesman when he’d been able to prepare his pitch, anybody who was any good at dismantling sales spiels could tell within seconds that all he gave a shit about was the money.
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when he came from his third interview with UM’s med school, he was complaining about how the interviewer kept trying to talk about “unimportant stuff” like the previous day’s big baseball game and he (the student) kept having to redirect the conversation back to his wonnahful grades (:pukey:). DUUUUUDE! All I know about baseball is that Sluggers are made in Louisville, but fer Chrissakes, even I would have passed that “small talk and making people feel at ease” test better than that!
Most of my own students were pre-med and felt completely entitled; some lines:
S: but you can’t give me a B! I’m pre-med, this lowers my GPA! (So, study more or, preferably, learn to study better. These daily tests were based on having read two pages in the book.)
S: you… you… you…! I’ll be a doctor and I’ll be damn rich and then you’ll hear me! (With THAT attitude, I do hope you never become one. I want a doctor who’s interested in giving the best possible care, not in screwing patients for the most possible money)
One of my students hadn’t wanted to go to college because she didn’t know what she wanted to do that would be college-related. Having done office work for five years, the last three as the receptionist in a doctor’s office, she decided to go to college and try for med school. She thought that being older would work against her but she had better motivation than everybody else and there was nothing wrong with her brain. I would have given her a recommendation letter in a heartbeat, if I’d been in a position to do so. She got admitted into the three schools to which she applied: good for her and specially - good for her patients!