Medical Schools in Oregon: How to get in (2024)
/Discover your chances of getting into medical schools in Oregon, including GPA and MCAT scores plus strategies for entry
learn everything you need to know about gaining entry to medical schools in oregon
Part 1: Introduction
Part 2: List of medical schools in Oregon: 2024 rankings & admissions statistics
Part 3: Oregon medical school profiles
Part 4: Oregon medical school admissions strategies
Appendix A: Oregon medical schools by degree type
Appendix B: Oregon medical schools by institution type
Appendix C: Oregon medical schools by region
----
Part 1: Introduction
Oregon, known for its breathtaking natural beauty and vibrant—if quirky—culture, is home to both Crater Lake and Mount Hood, the deepest lake in the U.S. and the third most climbed mountain in the world. Its thriving city of Portland is where you’ll find both the smallest park and the largest privately owned bookshop in the world.
While Oregon may be an outdoorsy bookworm’s dream, many may not immediately associate it with a medical school education. For those seeking to earn a white coat in the Beaver State, their options come down to the two medical schools in Oregon—Oregon Health and Science University (OHSU) in Portland and the College of Osteopathic Medicine of the Pacific Northwest (COMP-NW) in Lebanon.
Both of these institutions offer high-quality programs that will challenge and enrich medical school students on their journey to becoming qualified physicians. However, gaining admission to either school is far from easy and requires substantial planning and dedication long before stepping foot onto campus.
In this guide, we’ll take an in-depth look at what it takes to get into medical schools in Oregon, including admissions statistics, short profiles of each school, and strategies to maximize your chances.
----
Part 2: List of medical schools in Oregon: 2024 rankings & admissions statistics
The two medical schools in Oregon offer quite different paths to a career as a physician, and the first step in deciding which path suits you best is to dive into the rankings and admissions statistics for each school. This will give you an idea of how your stats match up to the stats of their matriculants, as well as the quality of education you’re likely to receive.
Whether you’re keen to follow the MD path or obtain a DO, the medical schools in Oregon have you covered. The oldest medical school in the state, Oregon Health and Science University (OHSU), offers an MD. And the more recent addition to medical education in Oregon, the College of Osteopathic Medicine of the Pacific Northwest (COMP-NW), offers a DO degree. Whichever school you choose, this will largely come down to your preference of philosophy for medical practice.
Suggested reading: (MD vs. DO: The Biggest Differences (And Which is Better))
We’ve compiled the most recent available data regarding each school in the table below to give you an idea of exactly what it will take to get into each school.
Here are a few things we noticed while gathering this data.
While the College of Osteopathic Medicine of the Pacific Northwest is ranked a tier 4 institution by U.S. News and World Report in research, it is ranked a tier 1 in primary care. This actually falls in line with many DO schools who make it a mission to produce excellent primary care physicians.
The average GPA and MCAT scores among acceptees at both schools are quite similar, with OHSU having slightly higher stats.
Oregon Health and Science University’s tuition is substantially cheaper than COMP-NW, even for out-of-state students.
(Note: We strongly advise you to sign up for MSAR for the most up-to-date and comprehensive data on individual MD programs and to sign up for Choose DO for DO program data.)
| Oregon Medical Schools | |||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Oregon Health and Science University (OHSU) | $21,345 OOS |
||||||||
| College of Osteopathic Medicine of the Pacific Northwest (COMP-NW) | $68,763 OOS |
*Public medical schools in Oregon | UR: Unranked | IS: In-state | OOS: Out-of-state | N/A: Not available
----
Part 3: Oregon medical school profiles
As mentioned earlier, the primary difference between the two med schools in Oregon is the type of medical education they offer—MD or DO. However, both schools have their own unique focuses and curriculums.
Oregon Health and Science University
The only MD program in Oregon has been around for quite some time, taking its first cohort in 1887. Its stated mission is to improve the health and well-being of people in Oregon and beyond.
During your four years as a med school student at OHSU, your studies will balance the scientific foundation of medicine with clinical experience, gradually introducing more patient care responsibilities as you move through the curriculum.
The Foundations of Medicine phase is where you’ll start med school and is primarily divided into blocks covering core topics from Blood and Host Defense to Nervous System and Function. You’ll then move on to the Clinical Experience phase with core experiences in Family Medicine, Internal Medicine, Neurology, and more. Additionally, you’ll be expected to take a minimum of 34 elective credits before the Transitioning to Residency course.
Dual degree programs
OHSU offers two dual degree programs for students interested in supplementing their medical education for careers in research or public health policy.
MD/PhD program
The OHSU MD/PhD program will allow you to pursue research training in addition to your MD in a wide variety of fields including Molecular and Cellular Biosciences, Neuroscience, and Quantitative Biosciences & Biomedical Engineering. Typically, the program takes seven to eight years, during which students follow a curriculum of combined training that will allow them to maintain ties to the hospital while engaging in clinically relevant questions under the guidance of a graduate program mentor.
Suggested reading: (MD-PhD Programs: The Ultimate Guide)
MD/MPH program
If you’re interested in working for a nonprofit, for a government agency, or as an epidemiologist, you may want to add an MPH to your MD training. OHSU offers a five-year MD/MPH program that will equip you with both the medical and public health training necessary to make informed policy recommendations impacting the lives of large numbers of people.
In this program, your MD and MPH coursework will be woven together. During the first two years of medical school, you’ll take foundational MPH courses and then focus on your MPH full-time during your third year. You can choose to focus your MPH on one of two areas: Epidemiology or Health Management and Policy.
Suggested reading: (How to Get Into an MD/MPH Program)
College of Osteopathic Medicine of the Pacific Northwest
Oregon’s DO program at the College of Osteopathic Medicine of the Pacific Northwest (COMP-NW) has been around in the state for a little over ten years, but is already known for producing highly skilled osteopathic physicians through their “integrated, interdisciplinary, discussion-based approach to learning.”
Their preclinical curriculum during your first two years of med school will have you internalizing the foundational knowledge of medical practice with hands-on experiential learning to prepare you for the clinical experiences of your third and fourth years. This hands-on learning is to ensure you’ll be well prepared for rotations later on.
Your third and fourth years will consist of rotations in different specialties that last from four to eight weeks each. The order of your rotations is determined by a lottery system.
Additionally, you’ll choose electives in various disciplines and at locations with affiliated institutions. Some electives require the discipline and location to be approved by COMP-NW, while others are entirely up to you.
----
Part 4: Oregon medical school admissions strategies
Strategy 1: Demonstrate your fit for medical schools in Oregon by studying their missions
When applying to medical schools in Oregon, understanding and aligning with the missions of these institutions is crucial to your admissions success. Both OHSU and COMP-NW emphasize a commitment to community service, diversity, and innovative healthcare solutions, but by closely reviewing their mission statements and researching their website, you can deduce areas they’re likely to focus on—and as such, looking for candidates with similar interests or backgrounds.
For instance, OHSU mentions that part of their mission is to “Lead and advocate for programs that improve health for all Oregonians...through community service, partnerships and outreach.” COMP-NW states, “The Mission of the College (COMP and COMP-Northwest): is to prepare students to become technically competent, culturally sensitive, professional and compassionate physicians…providing comprehensive, patient centered healthcare with the distinctive osteopathic philosophy.”
From these two mission statements, we can tease out a few key terms that you can use to brainstorm ideas around your personal statement and secondary essays. For instance, OHSU’s mission statement highlights “all Oregonians...through community service.” Demonstrating your desire to help Oregonians in your essays and even through your extracurricular activities would be a great boost to your application for this school.
When it comes to COMP-NW, words like ‘culturally sensitive,’ ‘compassionate,’ and ‘patient centered’ jump out. This could indicate that they aim to support underserved communities and underprivileged individuals via their work. Consider how you can showcase your commitment to these groups in your application.
Suggested reading: (How to Choose the Right Extracurricular Activities for Medical School)
Strategy 2: Organize your time around your secondary essays
It’s no secret that the medical school admissions process is a long and often grueling one. Your ability to divide your time effectively is vital when it comes to submitting quality applications on time that effectively speak to your candidacy. Any edge you can gain by thinking ahead should be utilized to the utmost of your ability.
One tip we often give students is that since you’ll be juggling multiple responsibilities during the application process, you should plan your workload as much as possible. Look ahead to your secondary essays and take a few minutes to determine which ones to tackle first.
Depending on your working style, you may want to start with schools that request a large number of essays—or it may be easier for you to begin with schools that have only one or two prompts. Additionally, some schools that have a small number of prompts request longer essays, so you’ll want to take word and character counts into consideration as well.
The point is to think about how you can work most efficiently. To this end, we’ve put together a table of the number of secondary essays required by medical schools in Oregon below.
| Oregon Medical Schools | |
|---|---|
| Oregon Health and Science University (OHSU) | |
| College of Osteopathic Medicine of the Pacific Northwest (COMP-NW) |
Looking for medical school secondary essay examples? We have a sample essay in response to every prompt required by every medical school in the US and Canada. You can subscribe below.
Gain instant access to med school secondary essay examples for every single prompt required by every medical school in the United States and Canada. Subscribe today to lock in the current investments, which will be increasing in the future for new subscribers.
Strategy 3: Ensure you’re fully prepared for interviews at medical schools in Oregon
Preparing for medical school interviews in Oregon is necessary to make a strong impression. This doesn’t mean simply memorizing answers to common questions or regurgitating talking points. You want to come off as natural and confident without your responses sounding canned or rehearsed.
To do this, the first step is to have a thorough understanding of the interview format you’ll encounter. While COMP-NW employs a traditional one-one-one interview, OHSU follows the MMI format, which consists of several eight-minute stations designed to assess various competencies, including ethical reasoning, communication skills, and problem-solving abilities.
These two formats will present you with vastly different scenarios and questions. In the traditional format, you may be asked questions such as, “Why COMP-NW?” or “Why do you want to be a doctor?” In an MMI-style interview, you may be asked how you would respond to ethical issues—such as a patient with kidney failure who refused dialysis—or to respond to anxiety-inducing questions such as, “What is your greatest weakness?”
Whichever format you encounter, it’s best to look over common questions and practice answering them. This practice should not only cover the content of your answer but also the style of your delivery. Remember, admissions committees are interviewing you because they want to see how you interact with others—especially whether you're easy to work with and capable of communicating effectively.
Suggested reading: (How to Ace Medical School Interviews (Questions Included))
Invited to a med school interview? Congrats! There's no need to land in waitlist purgatory or the rejection pile. Learn how to craft memorable, acceptance-worthy responses using the resource below.
Gain instant access to the most common traditional and MMI interview questions, plus sample responses for each, to help you craft responses that lead to acceptances. Subscribe today to lock in the current investments, which will be increasing in the future for new subscribers.
Final thoughts
Gaining admission to medical schools in Oregon requires a strategic approach that considers your stats and emphasizes your alignment with each institution's mission. By thoroughly understanding the values and goals of Oregon medical schools, you can maximize your chances of acceptance.
About the Author
Dr. Shirag Shemmassian is the Founder of Shemmassian Academic Consulting and one of the world's foremost experts on medical school admissions. For nearly 20 years, he and his team have helped thousands of students get into medical school using his exclusive approach.
----
Appendix A: Oregon medical schools by degree type
Allopathic (MD) Schools in Oregon
Oregon Health and Science University
Osteopathic (DO) Schools in Oregon
College of Osteopathic Medicine of the Pacific Northwest
----
Appendix B: Oregon medical schools by institution type
Public Medical Schools in Oregon
Oregon Health and Science University
Private Medical Schools in Oregon
College of Osteopathic Medicine of the Pacific Northwest
----
Appendix C: Oregon medical schools by region
Medical Schools in Portland
Oregon Health and Science University
Medical Schools in Willamette Valley Oregon
College of Osteopathic Medicine of the Pacific Northwest
