Then again, is the extra $$$ worth putting yourself through 80+ hour residency work weeks?
Also, don't forget that, in medical school (regardless if they award the MD or DO), you still have to apply to anesthesiology residencies, which are often regarded as being uber-competitive to gain acceptance to.
Of course, the DO route is very tempting; I currently have a 3.74 GPA (Organic Chemistry and Anatomy may fix this number, LOL) and could take the MCAT this spring. A relatively new DO school, PCOM-GA, is only an hour and a half away from where I currently live, and tuition is less than $40k. They will also accept students with only three years of "outstanding academic performance."
Can you believe that? It's actually cheaper to become a doctor than an anesthesiologist assistant.
Of course, I would have to engage in some self-studying to learn physics for the MCAT, since that's the only class I haven't taken. But, since since the physics questions on the MCAT are lumped in with other science questions, it shouldn't be *too* hard to learn the basics.
Isn't a 22-24 on the MCAT considered to be a pretty low score, anyways? Not to put anyone down, but people have told me before that someone could feasibly pull-off a score in that range (22-24) by guessing on most of the test. So, maybe I could get away with learning just the bare basics of physics...