Question for medical students: All-nighter or get some sleep?

[cryhavoc]

Purely hypothetical question. Say you are in medical school and you get hit with an illness. It puts you out of commission for two days. You couldn't concentrate, anything, etc. so you are a bit behind.

Now pretend you have a test tomorrow. Do you:

A: Take the test on a full night of rest, not knowing all the material as well as you need to.
B: Pull an all-nighter, reviewing intensely everything you are behind on.
C : Do a semi-intense review, take a few hour nap.

Which do you think would be the most effective? Keep in mind, the night before you got a full 9 hours of sleep thanks to your fever and sickened state so you aren't running on empty!

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[MrChance2]

There are plenty of people in my class that do both. Personally I haven't seen much benefit from getting less than 5-6 hours of sleep before a test but some pretty good students swear by all nighters before most major tests. I vote C if passing the class or not is at stake. The little we learned about sleep in neurology is that a little bit of sleep will retain information but that's all the objective evidence I can offer.

 

[cryhavoc]

Thanks. Still don't know which to pick.

Hate early classes.

Even if you choose the sleep option by the time you force your body to sleep, you aren't getting much anyway . . .

 

[LeftShifted]

I've only ever justified pulling an all nighter if I was worried that I would oversleep a morning exam. Otherwise, get a decent nights sleep so you're crisp and functional for the exam.

 

[deleted500612]

I don't recommend all-nighters as a "normal" form of prepping for a test, but in a situation where you are behind on material for whatever reason, pulling an all nighter or near all nighter (2-3 hours sleep maybe) will definitely be beneficial to your score. You can load up on coffee, study through the night and write the test and crash afterward. Having a good night's sleep is usually something that will help your brain function during a test, but it is not going to help you perform well if you don't know the material to begin with. I have never pulled an actual all nighter but have had many nights in undergrad I stayed up until about 5am cramming for a test due to my prior bad habit of procrastination throughout the semester, then napped for 2 hours and went and wrote the test. There was never, ever a circumstance which I regretted doing this. In every instance there were numerous questions that I only knew because of the material I was reviewing the night before at 3am instead of sleeping. Again, I wouldn't recommend doing this as a normal strategy, but if you don't already know the material as well as you should... it will absolutely be beneficial.

 

[EMDO2018]

All nighted during o chem wayyy back in the day, worst mistake I ever made. At least try to get a couple hours of sleep.

 

[HopesandDreams]

Option C. Even if I can't fall asleep, laying down , closing my eyes, and taking a rest is crucial for me to relieve some of the exam anxiety. Also, I always prefer to show up to the exam room an hour or more early. That time right before the test is when I do some of my best studying and also I think I derive some weird psychological benefit / confidence boost from being the first one there

 

[wjs010]

At the Minimum, do 5 hrs sleep. Seriously it won't help to stay up all night

 

[Marine to MD]

Sleep. Always choose sleep.

Missed 4 days of anatomy due to surgery. Test is in 3 days but the all nighters are fruitless. My retention is exponentially higher if I add in a couple extra hours each night but still get a solid 6 hours rest.

 

[MedWonk]

Sleep. Get 6 hours in. You'll be prone to stupid mistakes if you get no sleep.

 

[Serous Demilune]

If the test is early in the morning option C is what I do. If not, getting about 4-5 hours of sleep should be enough to avoid dumb mistakes.

 

[Mad Jack]

Sleep. Memory is encoded into long term storage while sleeping, while if you stay up your short term memory will simply be too jumbled and you'll be too tired to actually make much use of what you learn during an all-nighter. Sleep is critical to retention and performance, so don't skimp on it.

 

[qw098]

All nighted during o chem wayyy back in the day, worst mistake I ever made. At least try to get a couple hours of sleep.

Yah, for O-chem I wouldn't advise pulling an allnighter. O-chem demands a lot of problem solving, and without sleep you won't be able to problem solve.

 

[fancymylotus]

Bah. Bad memories of school. Our exams third year were all like 7AM, so I would review the night before maybe 8-12, fall asleep by 1230, wake up at 430, go to school in PJ's(bc **** you if youre going to make me wake up to take a 7am exam), review till exam time, take test, go back to apt and fall asleep till clinic time.

edit- whoops, apparently I have lost all ability to read as well. the title says for medical students ><

 

[DermViser]

all nighter... you'll get that one question by reviewing your notes or review book that you won't be able to reason out with good sleep. and this is from someone who usually gets sleep but then tried an all night once and felt i should have done it more

Status: Pre-Health (Field Undecided)

 

[Anicetus]

For me, exams that required complex problem solving needed good sleep, for rote regurgitation of material, the allnighter is better since more exposure to the material (if you are uncomfortable with how much you went over it) will usually benefit more since you really don't need a lot of brain power to recall a specific detail. Unless you have major memory issues, an allnighter won't delete half of your memory or anything.

 

[syma]

A. Always.

Plus I am never successful at managing to stay up for an all nighter.

I vote for sleep always.

 

[Flamen04]

Sleep. Always sleep. And this is coming from someone who only sleeps 5 hours per night lol

 

[seminoma]

Purely hypothetical question. Say you are in medical school and you get hit with an illness. It puts you out of commission for two days. You couldn't concentrate, anything, etc. so you are a bit behind.

Now pretend you have a test tomorrow. Do you:

A: Take the test on a full night of rest, not knowing all the material as well as you need to.
B: Pull an all-nighter, reviewing intensely everything you are behind on.
C : Do a semi-intense review, take a few hour nap.

Which do you think would be the most effective? Keep in mind, the night before you got a full 9 hours of sleep thanks to your fever and sickened state so you aren't running on empty!

D. Prepare so you don't have to choose A, B, or C. But probably A. Get sleep and take the hit on the test instead of not sleeping and then taking the hit on the next few days of studying (and probably the test too).

 

[sinombre]

Different things work for different people. You obviously are giving up some amount of cognitive capacity and recall ability by not sleeping, but will you ultimately gain more by having the extra time to cram things into your head? I think it really depends on the person. I used to think all-nighters were never a good idea, but I saw my roommate do it a handful of times last year and it worked out well for him. I've gone with option C plenty of times, which has worked well for me as well. Obviously learning how to study to avoid this situation in the first place is the best option. In my opinion that's kind of what ms1 is for--it teaches you how to study so that you can handle ms2.

 

[deleted564496]

I pulled an all-nighter for one of my first classes in undergrad... A practical for a class that I won't mention (definitely not hard)... I got like a 27%, then got a 145% or something like that on the next one (extra credit + bonus for every 10% you did better on your first one)... I never pulled an all nighter again for some reason.

 

[Ismet]

Moving to pre-allo.

 

[mcworbust]

(not really addressing the question directly, but worth mentioning):
If you are way behind with 2 nights to go, you can always pull a 2-for-1 (ie all nighter first night, then sleep 6-8 hrs middle of day before test, then another all nighter right up to the test) - worked for me once or twice but obviously sleep is best. But, if I can't sleep 4 hours, I just say F-it and stay up, just personal preference.
Also, FYI, I want to be a "nocturnist", so my love of studying through the night is probably just a personality thing...

 

[SuckySurgeon7]

All nighter's all the time. You can't reason through what you haven't even read yet, and the extra ten hours of studying you get out of it makes a huge difference, often in multiple classes. Everyone who thinks you would do better with at least five to six hours of sleep is assuming you know the gist of it by the time your head hits the pillow, but if you haven't even read the chapter titles, you're toast.

 

[jl lin]

Depends, but my vote is mostly for C.

 

[Pierre Escargot]

Haven't started yet but sleeping has worked the best for me all throughout undergrad. Whether or not that'll change next year has yet to be seen, but for now my vote is for A.

 

[chasm-e-baddoor]

If youve been on top of the material: sleep

If youve been procrastinating: all-nighter

 

[EvenStevens]

If youve been on top of the material: sleep

If youve been procrastinating: all-nighter

This. If you're screwed, may as well mitigate the damage to your grade by staying up.
If you're just "nervous" , sleep.

 

[LostinLift]

Depends on then type of test as well. Staying up all night cramming for the MCAT, Step 1, or test with 2nd/3rd order thinking? Not a good idea.


Straight regurgitation like most of undergrad, I definitely pulled an all nighter or seven to save a grade.

 

[jscgillissw]

I've only ever justified pulling an all nighter if I was worried that I would oversleep a morning exam.

 

[pre med 2014]

Sleep my boy

 

[Leslie_Knope]

Always sleep. And if you lose two days you should be fine if you've been studying consistently all along anyway.

 

[NontradCA]

Sleep. I think what you'd be cramming in last minute would be low yield to you actually taking the test. You are better off having a fresh, confident mind than having increased anxiety. Meds school isn't as hard as people make it out to be. It's full of neurotic people. If you're having to pull all nighters, it's not because the curriculum is tough. It's. because you don't know how to study.

Ive seen my classmates study from time to time and most of it is inefficient waste of time. Drinking beer and relaxing is probably more efficient than what a lot of med students do.

 

[Goro]

My successful student would pick A. Plenty of studies show that cramming leads to binging and purging of information. Med school is not like college and you need to retain this material.
A: Take the test on a full night of rest, not knowing all the material as well as you need to.

 

[altblue]

I'm pre-med but... etc. etc.

If it's a test with symbolic reasoning, a test with a harsh time limit, or a test where major errors are easy to make (math, physics), I usually get afull night's sleep. Usually on these tests there isn't much I can do the night before anyway.

If I'm mainly tested on memory, essay-writing, or anything that can be crammed for, I'll get minimal sleep (1-3) hours because there's a lot I can cram for if I space out the material over a night.

 

[G_Marker]

.

 

[Kaustikos]

I've used the "Study really late" and attempt to get 1-2 hours of sleep. This is only for dire situations like above. If I do that, I wake up okay and can function. This, however, does NOT work for anything outside of exams.

 

[PreciousHamburgers]

Ideally I go to sleep around 10:00 or 10:30, and I get up before 7:00am even on the weekends. If I get up after 8:00 I feel like I woke up at noon!

 

[Holmwood]

Purely hypothetical question. Say you are in medical school and you get hit with an illness. It puts you out of commission for two days. You couldn't concentrate, anything, etc. so you are a bit behind.

Now pretend you have a test tomorrow. Do you:

A: Take the test on a full night of rest, not knowing all the material as well as you need to.
B: Pull an all-nighter, reviewing intensely everything you are behind on.
C : Do a semi-intense review, take a few hour nap.

Which do you think would be the most effective? Keep in mind, the night before you got a full 9 hours of sleep thanks to your fever and sickened state so you aren't running on empty!

Option D.
Doctor's note and reschedule exam.

 

[BruceWilly]

Most of medical school is memorizing. If you sleep instead of cramming, you're not going to magically have more knowledge. Cram until you know enough to pass, get some sleep, and chug some coffee before the exam.

 

[RogueUnicorn]

P/F.