Incoming med student Fall 2006 - Advice on books?

[uscitisen]

Hi everyone. I am currently slated to start medical school this coming fall and have heard all the horror stories about the difficulties of medical school. Thats why I thought I should maybe start reading some material (not text books) that deal with the pressures and demands of medical school. I was hoping that one of you may have done this before you started and have some advice for me. I appreciate this very much. Thanks guys.

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[Brainsucker]

Don't listen to anyone's advice...except mine. Really, only you can figure out how you learn best. It took me until the end of this year, but I'm a friggin' memorizing machine now. Trial and error is the key. You can get away with studying any way you want in ugrad because you can take as long as you need no matter how misguided your study methods. Not true now. So, experiment with different study methods.

 

[cdql]

I'm not sure there are any books on this topic. And you'll hear this a million times so I might as well repeat it: the students who do well in med school are the ones who find out early what study method words for them.

Methods you might want to try: attending all classes, only studying in the library, group studying where everyone quizzes each other, exclusive use of textbooks only (BAD BAD IDEA!!), exclusive use of board review books only (this is a better idea and it'll help you pass your courses but I think it would be tough to honor them this way)

Basically, you'll know after the 1st 3 exams if you've found a study method or not!

 

[velouria]

my best advice -- don't worry about the books right now! read whatever you want to read for enjoyment because you'll have precious little time to do it once school starts!
once school rolls around, you'll find what works for you (even if it takes a try or two). better to arrive refreshed and ready to go.
good luck to you!!

 

[uscitisen]

my best advice -- don't worry about the books right now! read whatever you want to read for enjoyment because you'll have precious little time to do it once school starts!
once school rolls around, you'll find what works for you (even if it takes a try or two). better to arrive refreshed and ready to go.
good luck to you!!

I appreciate all of your help, but I think you guys take me for a student thats trying to prepare hard now. I was just hoping to get some info about daily lives of med students and read about it poolside with a cocktail. Nothing serious, just something to prepare me for possible roadblocks or at least to see what others went through and how they managed the difficulty.

 

[cdql]

Yea...like I said earlier, I'm not sure there's a book like that. (I know there are plenty of books out there about residency experiences)

But I'm sure if you browse around here long enough, you'll find out about the highs and lows of med school and what you can do when your in that situation!

Or the best solution yet, watch Scrubs It's not med school but it's still good entertainment!

 

[velouria]

I appreciate all of your help, but I think you guys take me for a student thats trying to prepare hard now. I was just hoping to get some info about daily lives of med students and read about it poolside with a cocktail. Nothing serious, just something to prepare me for possible roadblocks or at least to see what others went through and how they managed the difficulty.

sorry i misunderstood! in that case, i would say go to barnes & noble and browse. or search amazon for "medical student" - i read one about a girl who was a med student at harvard. she wrote about her 4 years, mainly the last 2 years of school. wish i could remember the name of it.
here are some other ideas:
house of god (it's hilarious!)
the intern blues
complications
a not entirely benign procedure

i think those will be kind of what you're looking for.
enjoy!

 

[MollyMalone]

sorry i misunderstood! in that case, i would say go to barnes & noble and browse. or search amazon for "medical student" - i read one about a girl who was a med student at harvard. she wrote about her 4 years, mainly the last 2 years of school. wish i could remember the name of it.
here are some other ideas:
house of god (it's hilarious!)
the intern blues
complications
a not entirely benign procedure

i think those will be kind of what you're looking for.
enjoy!

I think the one about the Harvard student is called White Coat. It wasn't bad.

 

[cdql]

Yup...I read that one! I thought White Coat was about the residency years though? Or maybe in my rush to skim over it I completely messed up

 

[beponychick]

Don't listen to anyone's advice...except mine. Really, only you can figure out how you learn best. It took me until the end of this year, but I'm a friggin' memorizing machine now. Trial and error is the key. You can get away with studying any way you want in ugrad because you can take as long as you need no matter how misguided your study methods. Not true now. So, experiment with different study methods.

Can you share what techniques you use now to help you memorize. Im also one of those paranoid soon to be first years!

 

[Baby Einstein]

Perri Klass's "A not entirely benign procedure". She talks mostly about the clinical years. I'm not sure you'll be better prepared because of it, but it's well written and entertaining.

 

[katiekate]

Danielle Ofri's "singular Intimacies" - very good one. I read this one last summer by the pool. Took only a few days.
"Intern Blues", is another good one about the inadequacies of med students/young residents.

search your library for "medical school" or "medical students" and you should come up with some good ones.

 

[Brainsucker]

You're going to have a lot of trouble finding something that describes the pre-clinical years because it's just not a compelling story: "I went to class that day, then I studied. The next day, I went to class again."

 

[gschl1234]

Can you share what techniques you use now to help you memorize. Im also one of those paranoid soon to be first years!

I'm not sure there's a "trick" other than modification over time. I might be totally wrong but I think as you go thru the process of medical school your nuerons become more efficient at making new synapses. Also, as you build up your fund of knowledge it does make learning new things a little easier (but it's still challenging and painful). The only "trick" would have been to force volume on yourself back in college but if you did that, you probably wouldn't have gotten into med school in the first place due to low GPA.

To the OP, it seems like you'd like a book on coping skills and not necessarily a book about medical school/residency. Would you say you already have good coping skills? Maybe you don't need a book. As with memorizing, coping skills are developed over a lifetime but then again, behavior modification's always worth a shot.

Remeber that just like everything else in life, there will be highs and lows and plateaus. At times, you'll have painful experiences but you'll make it through. Congratulations on starting school next year and good luck

 

[cdql]

Mnemonic devices work well. But most of the time, it's as simple as it sounds. To get it in your head, you have to beat it in. So it means reading the material 5 times. If you don't have it memorized by then, read it another 5 times

 

[Labslave]

Check out "What I Learned in Medical School: Personal Stories of Young Doctors"

I thought the collection of stories covered a broad range of emotions and hardships faced during medical school. Great book IMHO.

 

[Brainsucker]

Can you share what techniques you use now to help you memorize. Im also one of those paranoid soon to be first years!

It depends a little on the class. I usually don't prep at all for lecture because that means that I'll be really bored during the lecture. I usually go to lecture, but if I oversleep, it's okay. Some lectures are useful, some aren't. Most of our GI lectures were by the same guy and he was terrible, so I skipped those. I read the book only if I don't understand the topic or I'm really interested in it. (I read a fair amount of our neuroscience book because I'm really interested in it and the lectures aren't comprehensive.) Basically, I go through the lecture objectives (if they're detailed enough, which they usually are) or lecture outline (we get lecture outlines for neuroscience that are sometimes detailed enough to study by themselves) and I use lecture transcripts to fill out each point of the objectives or outline. I then test myself to make sure I can answer or explain those points without my notes. (I used to rely on passive recall for multiple choice tests, but I find that this way involves less "I knew that, really, I even remember the figure that describes it" during tests.) Now, it's time for practice tests. While I do a practice test, I mark questions that I'm uncertain about. I find that this turns up more things to look up afterward than just looking up stuff I got wrong. And then it's time for sleep, beautiful sleep.

Anatomy classes are different, though. I don't know how your school will do anatomy and neuroanatomy, so it's hard to say how to approach that.

 

[hunter1077]

I am reading "The Magical Scalpel".

It is funny and slightly informative.

You can read the first 6 chapters on the internet just google it.

 

[USCguy]

I read Body of Knowledge over Christmas break. It was good. 1/2 of it talks about the guy who donates his body to science, and the second half (maybe more) talks about the 4 students dissecting his body in Gross Anatomy, and all the "fun" stuff that goes along with that. It put a new spin on body donation for me.

 

[BananaSplit]

Don't read House of God. It can be very depressing at times. And it's about internships, not med school. Worry about crossing that bridge when you get there. One semi-medical book I really liked was "Stiff: The Secret Lives of Cadavers." I read the entire thing when my friend and I were driving down from SF to SD. Few other book tips: Don't BUY Stedman's Dictionary (most likely your local medical society or the AMA or AMSA will give you one when you sign up as a member). The same goes for Netter's. One of my favorite med school books is Pathophysiology for the Boards and Wards. I carry it around in my backpack wherever I go. It's geeky, but the book is so dependable. I find it's also really helpful for case discussions.

 

[Iwy Em Hotep]

If you want to read about the lives of medical students, there are many blogs on this topic that you can find linked on SDN. The only good reading that I would suggest is to get a copy of Iserson's and leaf through that.