if you could change ONE thing about your medical school, what would it be ?

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medical school : one change

Eliminate anything that ends with "-based learning"

2nd year pathology. Oh, wait...

The old outdated lecture halls and study areas

I haven't even started yet, but I'm already not looking forward to professors with no clinical experience who spend too much time talking about endless minutiae and their pet research projects and do not focus on high-yield material.

One word: parking

As far as the above post goes, most of the best lecturers at our school were phds.

I wish my school taught more to the boards...

Originally Posted by drizzt3117

One word: parking

As far as the above post goes, most of the best lecturers at our school were phds.

Same over here. My neuroanatomy teacher was a Ph.D but he was incredible, lectured from a clinical standpoint and created amazing podcasts that I used to study for Step1. I also had an amazing neurophysiology teacher who was a Ph.D as well.

The worst teachers I have had are the transient "experts in their field" (majority are MD's) that give one lecture in the entire module. There are definitely exceptions to this but for the most part it is true. The contents of this lecture are 100s of slides of endless charts and graphs talking about interesting, but irrelevant research or statistics.

The best teachers I have had are the ones directly involved with medical education. The course coordinators and multiple lecture teachers. For the most part they understand what is relevant to the education of medical students and what is not.

Originally Posted by greg1184

The best teachers I have had are the ones directly involved with medical education. The course coordinators and multiple lecture teachers. For the most part they understand what is relevant to the education of medical students and what is not.

My answer: new facilities for lecture/labs. I think our facilities were built in the late 1920s/early 1930s.

A gigantic wall and moat to insulate us from the awful neighborhood around the school.

Originally Posted by drizzt3117

One word: parking

As far as the above post goes, most of the best lecturers at our school were phds.

Second to both. My parking pass cost more than a month's rent.

And the PhDs were by far better teachers than 90% of the MDs - the only good MD lecturers were the ones that had been doing it for a long time.

x

Originally Posted by drizzt3117

As far as the above post goes, most of the best lecturers at our school were phds.

Seconded.

As to changes: a more conceptual curriculum

If that won't happen, I'd settle for one of those kurig coffee machines in the library.

Edit: actually, location.

Make it easy to transfer to another school.

Originally Posted by Dr Love

Eliminate anything that ends with "-based learning"

Originally Posted by CassieBagley

I wish my school taught more to the boards and less to the in-house exams. As interesting as medical history lessons are, I try to live my life as HY as possible (jk, sorta) so just jump to the selling points that are gonna help me on Step.

I guess this is more of a critique on medical education, less wasting time with groups/activities. More teaching towards relevant medical knowledge rather than PhD trivia or minutia during the sciences, relating things to clinical usefulness more readily. More on thought process and medical reasoning, with less on memorizing minutia we're going to forget.

Originally Posted by sylvanthus

Make it easy to transfer to another school.

I never understood why it is so difficult to transfer. If the receiving school has an open spot, why do you have to have an extraordinary reason to transfer (ie family, marriage, health)? Why can't you just transfer b/c it's a better school or you like it more (assuming you've got the stats/resume to back yourself up)....thoughts?

Eliminate the useless old men that waste our time with historic crap (usually a giant pile of old studies).

Not have block 4 + final exams every other day from the beginning of April until the middle of May during MS2.

Originally Posted by Freddie Mercury

Figure out a way to reduce costs so I don't end up with almost 250k debt

Beat me to it, I was going to say "make it free".

Zero mandatory attendance to anything.

Originally Posted by Ghost22

Zero mandatory attendance to anything.

Even patient skills/doctoring/preceptorship stuff?

more medical/nursing/allied health student mixers

Originally Posted by Dr Love

Eliminate anything that ends with "-based learning"

yes!!!

On the whole I am satisfied with how preclinical has been handled. Maybe if there were more lunch spots around campus.

figure out a way to make it cheaper

No more reflection essays.

Yes, eliminate the touchy feely BS.

Also, pick it up and put it in a different location.

And, make it cheaper....

Originally Posted by dr zaius

No more reflection essays.

Originally Posted by Dr Love

Eliminate anything that ends with "-based learning"

EBM is obnoxiously important. There are dozens of outdated therapies that looked good on paper (i.e. via basic sciences) that end up hurting/killing people in the long run.

While I am a big proponent of basic science application, the basic sciences are still full of holes and EBM is the best shaped plug for that hole the we have at the moment.

Originally Posted by ericL

Yes, eliminate the touchy feely BS.

Also, pick it up and put it in a different location.

And, make it cheaper....

this is where SDN needs a "like" button

Originally Posted by flatearth22

Even patient skills/doctoring/preceptorship stuff?

Especially that crap.

Videos/Reading assignments and one or two assessments throughout the semester would still take less time than the way most schools do it.

Originally Posted by SpecterGT260

EBM is obnoxiously important. There are dozens of outdated therapies that looked good on paper (i.e. via basic sciences) that end up hurting/killing people in the long run.

While I am a big proponent of basic science application, the basic sciences are still full of holes and EBM is the best shaped plug for that hole the we have at the moment.

I wasn't talking about evidence-based medicine, I was talking about the team-based learning and group-based learning and problem-based learning and case-based learning that is all a waste of time.

That said, the standards for basic science work are infinitely higher than in the clinical world. Using EBM to patch up holes in the system is like using gasoline to put out a fire.

Originally Posted by Dr Love

Eliminate anything that ends with "-based learning"

You got my vote.

nm

Originally Posted by Dr Love

I wasn't talking about evidence-based medicine, I was talking about the team-based learning and group-based learning and problem-based learning and case-based learning that is all a waste of time.

That said, the standards for basic science work are infinitely higher than in the clinical world. Using EBM to patch up holes in the system is like using gasoline to put out a fire.

I understand what you meant... but disagree with the last statement. There are dozens of treatments which are counter intuitive to what basic science might tell us and EBM has shown them effective.

I would've liked better planning from the start

Busy-work, time wasting labs (anatomy lab, histo lab)

My first instinct was making parking more affordable and accessible, and then I read the "make it free" idea. I'm jumping on that band wagon, or any solution to make this education more affordable, easier to pay back, and less financially stressful.

Parking is horrible here. Not enough parking spaces close to the medical center.

Curriculum more focused on board exams and less about useless details. I feel like a review course at the end would be useful (if taught properly).

It would be sweet if a school could hire Goljan to come teach for that review course

Trash ms1-2 and 4.

Originally Posted by SpecterGT260

I understand what you meant... but disagree with the last statement. There are dozens of treatments which are counter intuitive to what basic science might tell us and EBM has shown them effective.

EBM is chaos. No one really knows how to accurately study human populations. There is incredible amount of noise despite our best studies. Even for things like MI or Heart failure, med school would have you believe there is a consensus and EBM to back it up and this could not be further from the truth. Let's not even get to the funding sources of much of EBM research being the same people who will profit off the results

basic sciences help you think and try to help you rationalize whether something called "EBM" makes sense. if EBM shows somethingn different, then we must think either our basic science is incorrect, or the EBM is...I usually put my bets on the EBM because there is too much variation often to make a lot of sense in these studies.

Originally Posted by todds

EBM is chaos. No one really knows how to accurately study human populations. There is incredible amount of noise despite our best studies. Even for things like MI or Heart failure, med school would have you believe there is a consensus and EBM to back it up and this could not be further from the truth. Let's not even get to the funding sources of much of EBM research being the same people who will profit off the results

basic sciences help you think and try to help you rationalize whether something called "EBM" makes sense. if EBM shows somethingn different, then we must think either our basic science is incorrect, or the EBM is...I usually put my bets on the EBM because there is too much variation often to make a lot of sense in these studies.

You must not have read my posts.... I a for basic sciences first and Ebm second. I wish our basic science understanding was complete.... but it is not so Ebm is the best patch we have until researchers fill those gaps. The alternative is we just hang a population of people out to dry (die?). You can acknowledge the problems or shortcomings of something and still understand how it is the best we have or at least the "least worse". I think a few of you have lost sight of that

Teach stuff that is Board relevant. That's all we (I) care about anyway.

And have Sattar come give guest lectures.

Originally Posted by SpecterGT260

You must not have read my posts.... I a for basic sciences first and Ebm second. I wish our basic science understanding was complete.... but it is not so Ebm is the best patch we have until researchers fill those gaps. The alternative is we just hang a population of people out to dry (die?). You can acknowledge the problems or shortcomings of something and still understand how it is the best we have or at least the "least worse". I think a few of you have lost sight of that

I reread your posts, my apologies. It's just many have totally excluded basic science thought and reasoning for "we were taught this is EBM, don't know why, but just is" and end up using that on treating patients...i think EBM is good to study things we don't know much about yet, and incorporate it and make sense of it in the context of basic science however little or much it may be

I unfortunately see too many people taking population research and essentially treat every individual patent the same,, instead of taking the basic science, clinical signs of the patient him/herself and EBM and trying to individualize a particular treatment.

I think you would agree with the above. Unfortunately EBM and basic sciences are flawed, but I think if both are integrated into an approach that makes sense to us as learners, then perhaps we can develop a theory as to why something happens and therefore treat the patent more appropriately.

Originally Posted by todds

I reread your posts, my apologies. It's just many have totally excluded basic science thought and reasoning for "we were taught this is EBM, don't know why, but just is" and end up using that on treating patients...i think EBM is good to study things we don't know much about yet, and incorporate it and make sense of it in the context of basic science however little or much it may be

I unfortunately see too many people taking population research and essentially treat every individual patent the same,, instead of taking the basic science, clinical signs of the patient him/herself and EBM and trying to individualize a particular treatment.

I think you would agree with the above. Unfortunately EBM and basic sciences are flawed, but I think if both are integrated into an approach that makes sense to us as learners, then perhaps we can develop a theory as to why something happens and therefore treat the patent more appropriately.

I agree completely. I have seen many EBM studies that point to conclusions that are contradictory (not just unsupported, but in direct contrast to) basic science principles. You can look at many of these studies and see fundemantal flaws in study designs (i.e. is it appropriate to look for rare outcomes in a cohort? think CRNA vs Anes papers that have been published in the JCRNA recently). I am especially weary of papers who claim "no difference" between established and new treatments because it is incredibly easy to hide a difference (like in the example i just gave) based on study parameters. Data can just as easily be skewed the other direction. So basic science first, EBM second, and basic science third . THAT, IMO is the proper order of things

Anyone had to do those tedious WiseMD modules?