Course preferences in health, medicine, atar?

[gracerose1310]

Helloooo. I'm interested in a degree in health but am not sure exactly what I want. I would love to do dermatology or be a GP, but obviously I would need to attend medical school for that. My atar is only 91.75 and i have not completed chem or the UCAT.
Should I take a gap year and sit the UCAT as well as doing chem? but even then I wouldn't get a high enough score for direct entry, although I do get regional SEAS.
Or should I do a bachelor first and try and get into post-grad even though its super competitive?
Or should I just give up and do something like physio or nursing.
Please help I'm so confused and they're due in 2 days.

[ian3150]

Hey gracerose!
As someone who just got off a gap year, I can say its definitely a viable option in terms of sitting UCAT and repeating/taking new subjects. I'd recommend keeping in mind that UCAT is an aptitude test and hence there's always an inherently higher risk of scoring poorly, as you cannot rely on the traditional means of studying for it. I wouldnt' recommend taking a gap year purely to sit the UCAT, since you're essentially gambling a potential year of future income on a 2hour skill-based exam. As for VCE, it may be worth considering taking more than one subject, if you are bent on getting into undergraduate medicine (usually requires very competitive ATARs like 97/98/99+) to sufficiently boost your aggregate. With your regional SEAs, the requisite scores will be significantly lower (depending on how heavy your SEAs is). I've had mates getting into med with low 97 ATARs and UMAT (UCAT) scores in the low to mid 70s.

Moreover, rereading your post, I noticed you mentioned not being exactly sure what you want. In that case, you could potentially give biomed/science/physio a go to broaden your experiences with the health field and if, after the degree, you're still keen on studying med, you can apply for the graduate entry route via GAMSAT/GPA/Interview. This isn't backed by evidence, but from what I've heard, GAMSAT is apparently easier to score higher in compared to UCAT, simply because many parts of it are content-based rather than skill-based (so you can study for it). As long as you work hard, I don't see why you shouldn't consider grad med as an option. A final note, you can also consider sitting the UCAT when you begin your undergrad degree, as many universities also accept UCAT/GPA/Interview for entry via the non-standard pathway, which would be significantly cheaper than sitting GAMSAT (~$250 compared to $500+ for GAMSAT, which many students sit multiple times).

Hope my reply wasn't too late and best of luck on whatever you decide!