A comparative study, using data from hospitals, concluded that the surgical program a doctor chooses produces no significant differences in their career surgical outcomes performed by allopathic and osteopathic surgeons.
The October study analyzed Medicare data from 2016 to 2019 of patients who underwent one of the 14 most common surgical procedures for 30-day mortality and readmission. The studies examined whether the difference in the surgeon’s medical school training through allopathic or osteopathic doctoral pathways affects patient treatment.
People hoping to be a licensed physician need to be either a Doctor of Medicine or a Doctor of Osteopathic Medicine to become a licensed physician in the United States, according to UCLA Health. Both programs require four years of medical school and further years of residency depending on the specialty.
According to Scripps Health, a non-profit healthcare organization, the difference between the two programs comes in the training as osteopathic programs focus more on holistic treatment and preventive care, while MD programs focus on diagnosing and treating patients.
Dr. Tara Russell, the study’s primary author and a colorectal surgeon at the Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center, said there is a stigma around the capabilities of DO-accredited doctors, as people believe medical schools with DO programs tend to accept applicants with lower grade point averages and medical college admissions test scores.
Although Russell has not personally experienced this stigma as an MD, she said that there have been DO doctors who expressed their gratitude for how the study spotlighted that there are no surgical outcome differences between the surgeons of the two degrees.
“There’s so many parts that go into becoming a physician or a surgeon,” Russell said. “So much of your training is really based on your individual work effort and how you learn and learn how to learn throughout your education.”
Jorja De Jesus, a UCLA alumnus, said she thinks a negative bias exists among pre-med students as many favor MD schools and that some people may be condescending about other’s choices.
However, she said as she learned and researched more about medical schools, the stigma faded away.
Russell said one limitation of the study was drawing a clear line between MDs and DOs, as the information about the surgeon’s residency, which is when doctors train to specialize in a field, was not provided for this study.
Medical school graduates are able to apply for any residency program regardless of their degree, so residency training could be viewed as a confounding variable that blurs the line between MDs and DOs, Russell said.
Russell also said she believes that the physician’s degree should not play a big role in patients’ decisions. She added that patients should pick their doctors based on factors like personal experience and consultations rather than their degree.
“It just pushes us to figure out, what are those things that make one surgeon have better outcomes than another, or what is it about the environment that they work in that make sure that they have better or worse outcomes,” Russell said.
As a student looking specifically into DO schools, Gabbie Go, a fourth-year human biology and society student, said that she used to be scared of telling people about her interest in DO programs because of the stigmas surrounding the degree.
As the UCLA Pre-Med Community’s co-president, Go said she tries to bring in more DO guest speakers into her club to combat those stigmas and provide students with different perspectives.
Go said she was drawn to DO schools because of their holistic approach to medicine, but she is still open to MD schools as she does not want to limit herself to one education pathway. Go added that she advises other pre-med students to talk to people who can provide nuanced perspectives.
“The more you talk to people, the more you can make your own opinion on what you want to do in the future, and it’s okay that it changes over time,” Go said.