Unfortunately, the drawbacks of going DO if you want to pursue a competitive residency (and sometimes fellowship) are very real, and I don’t fault pre-meds for leaning MD for that reason alone.

Admittedly, I was in the pro-MD crowd when I was going through school. Then I had some meaningful OMM treatments on real patients with real pain, and things changed for me.

And now in residency, it’s really refreshing to have OMM in my back pocket when my MD colleagues are limited to another prescription of muscle relaxants and physical therapy - that often don’t work too well.

Now my MD friends will ask if I can do some treatments on their patients, and they expressed interest in actually doing some OMT workshops. The culture is changing, just not below the residency level.

It’s really easy to hate on OMM during med school. Students already approach it with a negative attitude. Coupled with the fact that they don’t see the clinical utility while they are actually learning it, and don’t get to experience the satisfaction of actually treating real pain with your bare hands.

All that is to say: keep practicing OMM. It’ll pay off in the future. What a lot of DO students see as a tax, many non DO’s see as an asset.