Admissions
Applying to medical school can be complex. Our job in the Office of Admissions is to help you decide whether OHSU’s MD Program is a good fit, start your application and stay on track throughout the process.
Students come to OHSU for:
- Access to outstanding faculty and leading-edge research opportunities at the hospital system routinely named No. 1 in the state by U.S. News & World Report.
- All the resources of Oregon’s only public academic medical center.
- Early clinical experience and increasing patient-care responsibilities as you progress through the program.
- A multidisciplinary approach that allows you to individualize your program of study.
- Our promise that your tuition will stay the same each year of the program.
Is the MD program right for you?
Students who do well at OHSU are independent, lifelong learners. Our graduates are motivated by scientific discovery and committed to becoming health care leaders who meet patients’ needs throughout the Northwest.
In particular, the MD program seeks students who have an interest in rural health, underserved areas and primary care, or an understanding and appreciation of health care issues and an interest in biomedical research.
We welcome all qualified applicants and follow all requirements for equal opportunity and nondiscrimination. As an applicant, you will be considered based on your academic credentials and your capacity to succeed in your intended program of study. No applicant shall be denied admission based on race, age, sex, religion, or disability. Since direct patient contact is involved in the clinical aspect of most programs, you must be able to perform the required duties without compromising the patient's safety or welfare.
The MD program gives strong preference to:
- Oregon residents.
- Nonresidents with Oregon Heritage.
- Nonresidents with outstanding achievements in academics and significant experiences in health care, leadership, extracurricular activities and/or community service.
- Applicants with a demonstrated ability to overcome adversity and/or applicants who have personally experienced inequities within the healthcare system.
- Students applying to OHSU’s dual degree programs such as the MD/PhD and MD/MPH
- Applicants who are WICHE-certified in allopathic medicine.
OHSU considers admission to any of our graduate programs as a demonstration of your commitment to finish that course of study before joining another OHSU program.
Because of this policy, while we encourage you to apply to the MD program or one of the dual degree programs, you will not be eligible to enroll until you have finished your current graduate program.
We do not offer deferred admission, so you should be certain of the timeline for degree completion before applying to the MD program.
Transfer/Advanced standing
We are not accepting transfers into the MD program for the coming academic year.
Admissions requirements
Your grades, MCAT scores, pre-med experience, communication and interpersonal skills, motivation and maturity all play a role in admission to the MD program.
Our entering class has:
- An average total GPA of 3.66
- An average science GPA of 3.57
- An average MCAT of 509
Our minimum academic and MCAT qualifiers may change from one admissions cycle to the next. When you apply, you must meet the qualifiers for that admissions cycle.
Currently, our minimum qualifiers are:
- Cumulative total GPA of 2.80, as reported by AMCAS.
- Cumulative score of 497 on an eligible MCAT.
Eligible MCATs for the 2025 admissions cycle are those recorded from 2021 through 2024.
Applicants must hold a bachelor’s degree or its equivalent.
The MD program doesn’t prefer a certain major or area of study. Instead, your personal interest and passion for the questions posed by your academic field should be your primary motivator.
We encourage applicants to explore undergraduate courses that span the humanities, arts, sciences, social sciences and mathematics.
The MD program’s innovative curriculum emphasizes the knowledge and behaviors most needed by 21st-century physicians. This includes not just a strong scientific background, but also skills such as teamwork and communication.
We recommend 15 premedical core competencies, based on the Association of American Medical Colleges’ framework for success in medical school. These recommended competencies have fully replaced all prerequisite coursework.
The AAMC guidelines set the foundation for the MD program, your residency and beyond. They fall into four categories:
- Interpersonal (service orientation, cultural competency, teamwork, social skills, oral communication)
- Intrapersonal (ethical behavior, reliability, resilience and adaptability, capacity for improvement)
- Thinking and reasoning (quantitative reasoning, critical thinking, written communication, knowledge of the scientific method)
- Science (application of basic science principles to human health, understanding of human behavior, anatomy and/or physiology)
Graduates of the MD program need to be able to work in many different clinical situations and to provide a wide spectrum of care to patients.
To make sure our students have the leadership skills, knowledge and emotional maturity to function well on a medical team, OHSU and the School of Medicine have developed a set of technical standards. You must be able to meet these standards as defined in the MD program student handbook and the OHSU graduate studies handbook .
Applicants to the MD program must be U.S. citizens, have DACA status or hold a green card indicating permanent residency in the United States.
We encourage permanent residents to have at least one year of full-time course work at a college or university in the United States.
Please note that our MD/PhD program currently does not accept DACA status.
How the admission process works
We understand that applying to medical school can be stressful.
We hope that by explaining the way the process works at OHSU, and offering clear communication throughout the admission cycle, we’ll make your experience as smooth as possible.
Here’s an overview of our admission cycle.
Please reach out to us if you have any questions. And to make sure you receive important information from us, add our team’s email, mdadmin@ohsu.edu, to your safe senders list
AMCAS application and letter service
OHSU participates in the American Medical College Application Service (AMCAS). If you meet our admission criteria, the first step is to set up your AMCAS account and submit the online application. Make sure to designate OHSU to receive your completed applications.
AMCAS sends applications to OHSU from May 31 through Oct. 15.
We also use AMCAS for recommendations. All letters must be sent via the AMCAS Letter Service. If your health professions advisor uses the VirtualEvals or Interfolio letter service, AMCAS will access your letters on these services and make them available to us.
Recommendations
Insights from the people you learn from and work with help the admissions team see whether the MD program would be a good fit for you.
We require letters from three college or university teaching faculty from any department, with at least one from teaching faculty in a science department.
If you choose to, you can submit a packet of at least three individual faculty letters or a premedical committee evaluation report (committee letter) instead of three separate recommendations.
If you have been out of college for five years or more, you can submit two letters from employers and one from a teaching faculty member.
OHSU doesn’t have a maximum number of letters that can be submitted. Our team encourages you to submit a well-chosen group of letters, including nonacademic recommendations that highlight your experiences in health care/physician shadowing and your extracurricular accomplishments.
All letters need to on departmental/company stationary, signed by the letter writer and submitted through the AMCAS Letter Service. We don’t accept letters that are emailed, faxed or sent directly from applicants.
CASPer test
The CASPer test is no longer be required, as of the 2024 Cycle. No other tests are required (other than the MCAT). For the 2025 Cycle, only the MCAT is required.
After we receive your primary application from AMCAS, the admissions staff will email you with a link to complete an online secondary application through our Admissions Portal. Please note we do not prescreen AMCAS applications for eligibility requirements. Before submitting your secondary application, please review your application to determine if you meet the eligibility requirements as outlined in the FAQ section below.
It can take up to six weeks from the time you certify and submit your AMCAS application for us to receive it. Secondary application email notifications go out on a rolling basis starting in mid-July.
We invite applicants to interview for the MD program from late August through February/March. This process will be remote for the current admissions cycle.
We operate on a modified rolling admissions basis. This means that spots in the class remain open until we’ve finished interviewing for the year. Regardless of when you are invited, if you are offered an interview, you are being considered for a potential spot in the class.
We run a virtual Multiple Mini Interview (MMI) circuit, interviewing 20 to 40 applicants a week. The process includes multiple 8-minute-long interviews and a longer one-on-one interview with a member of the admissions committee.
You’ll also have an orientation session, a chance to meet current students and an information session to learn more about the MD program.
Before the 8-minute interviews, you will have time to read over the prompt, prepare and take notes. The one-on-one interview with an admissions committee member will be scheduled separately.
We consider MD program candidates comparatively based on your application materials. The admissions committee reviews each applicant’s:
- Assessment of motivation, ability to communicate, life enriching experiences, problem-solving ability and maturity
- Overall academic record
- MCAT scores
- Recommendation letters
- Understanding and appreciation of health care issues and/ or biomedical research
- Interest in rural health, underserved areas and primary care
- For applicants to the MD/PhD program, commitment to and potential for biomedical research
We then give each candidate a priority score based on the admissions committee score, MMI scores, and academics.
Based on this ranking, you may be offered acceptance, placed on hold or refused admission.
If you are admitted, you will receive a notification though our Admissions Portal, followed by an email from our team.
Your initial notification will be followed by a formal acceptance letter sent by email. This message includes a deadline by which to print, sign, scan and return the acceptance and technical standards forms that will be attached.
Background Checks - following conditional admission offer:
Prospective students are not required to disclose criminal convictions prior to receiving an offer of admission. Following a conditional admission offer, prospective students will undergo a pre-matriculation background check pursuant to policy and procedures available on the OHSU Public Safety website. However, OHSU is a university of health professions, and it is possible that professional and occupational licensure requirements may prohibit individuals with criminal convictions from ultimately obtaining a professional license. Licensure requirements vary by state and prospective students are encouraged to consult their state licensing agency for more information.
If a prospective student is denied admission due to a criminal conviction, they may appeal the final admissions decision to the Office of the Provost at provost@ohsu.edu.
Accepted students
After you’re notified of acceptance, you must commit to enrolling at OHSU through AMCAS at least 21 days before the first day of orientation.
Orientation is generally the first week of August. The deadline for making the AMCAS “commit to enroll” selection is in mid-July.
We do not offer deferred admission. If you decide not to enroll at OHSU, we need to receive your notice of withdrawal directly. Selecting “commit to enroll” for another institution doesn’t automatically withdraw your application from OHSU.
You can find more details about choosing your medical school and deadlines for holding multiple acceptances on the AMCAS website.
On hold
If your application is on hold, you may be accepted out of the hold pool at any time before April 30.
By May 1, all our initial offers will be made. Our alternate list also will be created and ranked.
Alternates
To create an alternate list, we rank the top 120 to 200 applicants and assign each one a discrete number. If you are an alternate, we will let you know by May 1.
We select applicants off the list in order as spots become available between May 1 and the first day of orientation.
We only skip over applicants who have withdrawn their application by contacting us directly. Please note that selecting “commit to enroll” for another institution through AMCAS does not automatically withdraw your application from OHSU.
If you applied for a combined degree program and are on the alternate list, we encourage you to reach out to the admissions team for details about your status.
Tuition, fees and financial aid
Applying to medical school can be nerve-wracking. Figuring out whether you can afford it shouldn’t add to the pressure. That’s why the MD program is committed to making an OHSU education accessible to all qualified applicants.
Our commitment includes a “no surprises” approach to tuition rates and a financial aid team dedicated to helping you navigate all your options.
Our tuition promise
When you enroll as a new student, you’ll benefit from OHSU’s promise that your tuition for the MD program won’t go up during the remaining years of your degree program.
We make this promise to all our students as long as you finish the program within a reasonable timeframe.
Estimates for 2024-2025
For detailed information and a breakdown of costs, please visit:
The 2024-2025 provisional program-specific tuition and fee charts by term outlines quarterly tuition and fees by program and degree.
Financial aid
Almost every student who attends OHSU does so with the help of financial assistance of some kind.
In the Office of Financial Aid, our goal is to make sure that all qualified applicants have a chance to study here. We can help by connecting you with scholarships, federal and state grants, work-study aid and low-interest student loans.
Our office advises students on tuition and fees, the overall cost of your education and how to find aid through OHSU or other sources.
Our personal finance and debt counselors also work with you to create an educational debt management plan so that you have a better understanding of your budget, obligations and options after graduation.
For help navigating the financial aid process, reach out to our team at finaid@ohsu.edu or 503-494-7800.
Note to Current 2025 Cycle Applicants
The 2025 OHSU Secondary Application is now being rolled out to applicants with verified AMCAS Primary Applications. Once an applicant's fully verified AMCAS Primary Application is received by us, our office will email a link to our OHSU Secondary Application.
Note that we do NOT pre-screen for minimum requirements -- nor do we look at any primaries until after a secondary is received.
After your OHSU Secondary Application has been submitted, please continue to check the Admissions Portal for the status of your application.
Be sure to add mdadmin@ohsu.edu to your safe senders list. Please check your junk/spam folder. We have been finding issues with Gmail.
Admissions AMA ("Ask Me Anything")
Are you applying to OHSU's MD Program in the current 2025 cycle? Do you have questions for us regarding our requirements, secondary application, and overall admissions process?
Please feel free to join the Admissions Team for an drop-in, virtual, open Q&A forum -- one session will be held every other month on a Friday. Sessions are held from 10:30am - 11:30am. Please click the Pre-Medical Outreach Events button below to access the meeting links, which are housed in the Admissions AMA section. Thank you!
Pre-Medical Outreach Events
Key dates
- AMCAS application: May 31 to Oct. 15
- Secondary applications: Rolling, mid-July through December
- Interviews: Late August through March
- Initial offers: Rolling, mid-October through April 30
- Alternate offers: May 1 to early August
- Commit to enroll: Mid-July
- Orientation: Early August
Applicant snapshot
Total applications: 6,000+
- 7% Oregonians
- 93% out of state
- Applicants interviewed: 543
- Applicants accepted: 230+
- Class size: Approx. 150
Class profile
Entering students:
- 82% Oregon residents
- Average age: 27
- 32% previous applicants
- Represent 70+ undergraduate institutions
OHSU's first dreamer
Christopher Ponce Campuzano is OHSU’s first medical student with DACA status. He plans to become a pediatric oncologist or cardiologist caring for underserved children.