3rd year????

[DenaliView]

Okay this is probably a somewhat dumb question but thanks to the anonymity on SDN I am going to ask it anyways ... hehe

So as I understand it 1st year is learning about normal anatomy and physiology.... how the body works when everything is going well. 2nd year focuses more on pathophysiology..... and what happens to you when your ill. 3rd year you start clinical rotations.

So my question is: Are you still going to class and having regular exams during your 3rd year? Are their assignments or papers involved. And if you are learning through your clinical instor are you pretty well guaranteed you will be exposed to all the information you need to study to pass your licensing exams. Are u still on a 7-5 schedule or are you taking call on occasion? I suspect that does not start till residency but I was not sure. Thanks for the info in advance J.

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[DenaliView]

dumb font/color didnt carry through.... grrr

 

[Live4Life]

In your third year, you do not have class on a regular basis. However, when you are the wards, you will attend conferences, presentations, and mini lectures given by residents and attendings. You may also be required to give brief 5-10 minute presentations on a topic that you will have to research. At the end of each rotation, you will take a shelf exam which will be a significant portion of your grade for each rotation. And yes, you will be taking call during your third year, but how much greatly depends on the rotation and your school. Some rotations will be much more time intensive than others. The hours will not follow a normal set schedule, the time that you arrive depends on the rotation and you will leave when you are done. There is no horn that blows like on the Flintstones that signals the end of the work day, you work until all patients have been seen, your write-ups are complete, and your residents/attendings don't need your help anymore.

 

[Law2Doc]

So my question is: Are you still going to class and having regular exams during your 3rd year? Are their assignments or papers involved. And if you are learning through your clinical instor are you pretty well guaranteed you will be exposed to all the information you need to study to pass your licensing exams. Are u still on a 7-5 schedule or are you taking call on occasion? I suspect that does not start till residency but I was not sure. Thanks for the info in advance

(1) you will still have didactic education (lectures) periodically, but nowhere near as much per week as before your clinical years. You will also be expected to attend grand rounds and lunch conferences which are basically lectures.

(2) You likely will have a NBME shelf exam after each rotation, which you will have to study for throughout the rotation. You absolutely will not learn enough strictly through attending rotations to do decently on the shelf or the steps and will need to study on your own time for both of these. Expect to be working your way through board review type books throughout each rotation, notwithstanding that you may be on the wards 12 hours per day, or working overnight (30 hours in a row) every 4th day in some portions of rotations.

(3) you won't be on a set 7-5 schedule. Some rotations are intense, others arent. In surgery or medicine you may have blocks when you have to start extremely early (eg 5am) and times when you may be working overnight every 3rd or 4th night (which can mean up to 30 hrs in a row), with few weekend days off. In other rotations you might be working 7-7. Still others you may start early but get out by 4. It depends on the rotation. And as mentioned above, you often still have to go home and do some reading in prep for the shelf or to impress the attendings, or to answer a pimp question you missed. Some teams also have you do presentations (with or without powerpoint) to the team or larger groups. So expect to work hard in 3rd year. Harder than the prior years. But in a different setting, and most people find it more rewarding.

 

[TheCheerleader]

This was really helpful to read! Thanks so much denali for posting the question and 4health and law2doc for those thorough answers.
So what about 4th year, is it more of the same?
Also, is there a thread somewhere explaining the whole process? I am a little confused about the order and differences between clerkship/internship/residency/fellowship, etc. and how they relate to the notations such as MS3 and PGY4, etc.
TIA

 

[Law2Doc]

So what about 4th year, is it more of the same?
Also, is there a thread somewhere explaining the whole process? I am a little confused about the order and differences between clerkship/internship/residency/fellowship, etc. and how they relate to the notations such as MS3 and PGY4, etc.
TIA

4th year is different. Your main job during the first half of 4th year is to line up a residency. So you will be applying for residencies and going on tons of interviews. Schools also will require you to do 1-2 months of "sub-internship" (aka sub-I) where you function similarly to an intern and get a taste of increased patient responsibilty. And during 4th year, you likely will be taking the two parts of Step 2. Other than that, you take electives in things you enjoy, or do away rotations at programs you want to "audition" at.

The basic science years are MS1 and MS2. Clinical years are MS3 and MS4. They basically just mean years 1-4 of med school. MS3 is when you do your rotations (aka clerkships) in the basic core disciplines of medicine, surgery, neurology, psychiatry, OBGYN, Peds, etc.
PGY is the acronym for residents. You apply to residency in your 4th year of med school. PGY stands for post-graduate year and is used for residents. Your "intern" year is now your PGY-1 year, and so on.

 

[Live4Life]

This was really helpful to read! Thanks so much denali for posting the question and 4health and law2doc for those thorough answers.
So what about 4th year, is it more of the same?
Also, is there a thread somewhere explaining the whole process? I am a little confused about the order and differences between clerkship/internship/residency/fellowship, etc. and how they relate to the notations such as MS3 and PGY4, etc.
TIA

Law2Doc gave some good advice, but one thing you should note that I wasn't aware of until just recently is that a few residency programs (primarily highly competitive ones) this year are requiring step 2 scores before they will rank you, so it might behoove you to take it before interviews for residencies start in November since interviews continue until the first week of February and are really time consuming. With that said, the programs that I've encountered that do that will interview you prior to having the score, but just won't rank you. You will usually have two months off during your 4th year also, one for interviewing, and one for an elective or studying for step 2.

 

[Law2Doc]

Law2Doc gave some good advice, but one thing you should note that I wasn't aware of until just recently is that a few residency programs (primarily highly competitive ones) this year are requiring step 2 scores before they will rank you, so it might behoove you to take it before interviews for residencies start in November since interviews continue until the first week of February and are really time consuming. With that said, the programs that I've encountered that do that will interview you prior to having the score, but just won't rank you. You will usually have two months off during your 4th year also, one for interviewing, and one for an elective or studying for step 2.

A fair point. But the number that require Step 2 so early is still a minority (most competitive specialties don't require this as of now), and even for the minority of programs do require it prior to ranking, you just have to have a score in by January. If you are at a non-US med school, the rules are different, and you need all your steps in time to apply.