What would be one class you would recommend for undergrads?

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hnbui

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Seeing as how you guys have gone through the whole process and are performing quite well in medical school, i was wondering what would be one class that you would recommend or suggest current undergrad students to take before entering medical school?

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hnbui said:
Seeing as how you guys have gone through the whole process and are performing quite well in medical school, i was wondering what would be one class that you would recommend or suggest current undergrad students to take before entering medical school?

1 - ignore the stupid premed kiddies (above).

2 - The only classes that you should take are cell bio and biochemistry. These will help you quite a bit in your first year. Beyond these two, take whatever you want. Use your college education to transform yourself into a well-rounded individual
 
idq1i said:
1 - ignore the stupid premed kiddies (above).

2 - The only classes that you should take are cell bio and biochemistry. These will help you quite a bit in your first year. Beyond these two, take whatever you want. Use your college education to transform yourself into a well-rounded individual


For the record, I am MS2. How is taking a class like golf not transforming yourself into a well rounded individual? Find a class in junior or senior year that allows you to get away from your major and lets you do something you enjoy. Life is not all about sciences and medicine.
 
idq1i said:
1 - ignore the stupid premed kiddies (above).

2 - The only classes that you should take are cell bio and biochemistry. These will help you quite a bit in your first year. Beyond these two, take whatever you want. Use your college education to transform yourself into a well-rounded individual

I'm an MSII and still would recommend Physiology, Biochemistry is somewhat different from that presented in undergrad, more medically related. Other than that take what you need to get in, you'll be getting so much science when you get there, and taking some of the aforementioned classes will only help you for maybe the first round of exams.
 
Physio and micro if they offer a pathogenic micro class.
 
Karate and Histology. Sometimes these classes are offered together and rightfully so.
 
LevatorAni said:
For the record, I am MS2. How is taking a class like golf not transforming yourself into a well rounded individual? Find a class in junior or senior year that allows you to get away from your major and lets you do something you enjoy. Life is not all about sciences and medicine.
I am also MS2 and wholeheartedly agree. The last thing you need is more science before entering medical school.

Most useful classes? Maybe a public speaking class, if you're not a great public speaker. English composition classes are always useful.
 
idq1i said:
1 - ignore the stupid premed kiddies (above).

i'm a lowly, ignorant (per idq1i ) soon-to-be-MSI, but i would recommend language classes. maybe it was because i was sick of science classes being an engineering major, but language classes were the only ones i truly enjoyed.
 
I'm a pre-M1 like the above poster; the folks at Stony Brook told us at the pre-orientation that students without undergrad Biochem tend to do poorly or low-pass during the medical school class....I kinda wish I'd taken it now...

dc
 
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hnbui said:
Seeing as how you guys have gone through the whole process and are performing quite well in medical school, i was wondering what would be one class that you would recommend or suggest current undergrad students to take before entering medical school?


I was at a big ten school and we had a whole bunch of courses to pick from. I would suggest picking as many subjects from the following:

Biochem
Physiology
Genetics
Immuno
Micro
Anatomy
 
stunt 101
by Prof. 50


seriosly: ethics-social debate like lecture stuff bc you learn there are all sorts of crazy people in ur class and they are serious as you are. and none of you can fix or diag the world - teaches you to shut up and do your part and not try to become a know-it-all-dictator.
 
Don't listen to all these people here telling you to use your time to become more "well rounded." That's definitely important, but it doesn't preclude taking some classes that will make your medical school life much easier, especially if you need some science credits anyway. Definitely take some biochemistry if you can. After that, I'd recommend taking an anatomy and physiology class. Keep in mind that most of your fellow med school classmates will be biology majors (or some similar major) and will have taken a lot of classes like anatomy, physiology, etc as part of their undergrad major. So if you don't take any of those classes you will be a bit behind the power curve (I was an engineer in undergrad, and I did far better in my MS1 classes that I had an undergrad background in, and felt very far behind the power curve in classes that the biology majors had a background in but I didn't).
 
BTW, I took a public speaking course in undergrad. It probably helped a bit, but overall it wasn't that useful.
 
preMSI as well. In all seriousness, I would not like to give up the biology classes I took because I found them very interesting.

I would recommend doing as much writing as you can, but try and make it pass/fail so you can actually improve rather than give up so you don't ruin your GPA. Other than that just take classes that are either easy or fun.

I think we all would be better if we could take a P/F writing seminar every semester of college.
 
rockit said:
I would recommend doing as much writing as you can, but try and make it pass/fail so you can actually improve rather than give up so you don't ruin your GPA. Other than that just take classes that are either easy or fun.

I think we all would be better if we could take a P/F writing seminar every semester of college.

No doubt that writing is an important skill. However, other then a small handful of essays and your personal statement, writing is not a skill you'll need during medical school. The main benefit of taking additional writing seminars will just be that it will take you longer to forget how to write while in med school.
 
hnbui said:
Seeing as how you guys have gone through the whole process and are performing quite well in medical school, i was wondering what would be one class that you would recommend or suggest current undergrad students to take before entering medical school?

I wish I'd taken enough semesters of Spanish (and/or studied abroad) to be at least semi-fluent...would have been SO useful...
:luck:
 
Would taking Cell bio be really that helpful? How much cell bio is taught in med school, is there a complete course taught in cell bio or is just presented every now and then?
 
Yes, in medical school there are courses such as Cell Biology, Molecular Biology, Genetics, and Biochemistry. They are not easy to pass. I would suggest you look into that. Also knowing biostatistics doesn't hurt because you have to take epidemiology. Of course, it all doesn't matter in the end if you end up forgetting everything after the course is over, so trust your own judgement.

NRAI2001 said:
Would taking Cell bio be really that helpful? How much cell bio is taught in med school, is there a complete course taught in cell bio or is just presented every now and then?
 
PiccoloPlaya said:
Yes, in medical school there are courses such as Cell Biology, Molecular Biology, Genetics, and Biochemistry. They are not easy to pass. I would suggest you look into that. Also knowing biostatistics doesn't hurt because you have to take epidemiology. Of course, it all doesn't matter in the end if you end up forgetting everything after the course is over, so trust your own judgement.

Any class that doesn't meet on Fri's/nights that coincide w/happy hour. Or, maybe a public speaking class and cell bio.
 
None of those classes (when I took them) coincided with happy hour :D why else would I have taken them?

bbake87 said:
Any class that doesn't meet on Fri's/nights that coincide w/happy hour. Or, maybe a public speaking class and cell bio.
 
idq1i said:
1 - ignore the stupid premed kiddies (above).

2 - The only classes that you should take are cell bio and biochemistry. These will help you quite a bit in your first year. Beyond these two, take whatever you want. Use your college education to transform yourself into a well-rounded individual


i agree. biochemistry and molecular/cell bio were by far the most during the 1st year. taking anatomy might be useful... i don't know, i didn't take it undergrad, but it kinda seemed like everyone was in the same boat for anatomy.
 
If you're brave, take PChem. Everything in biology will suddenly make sense.
 
Underwater Basket Weaving 101

This class builds your hand-eye coordination & teaches you how to work a needle under scrutinizing pressure, i.e. water pressure. :laugh:
Wow! A great class for a future surgeon!
 
i know this is probably a stupid question, and i tried a google search, but what does MSI and MSII mean?

also, i need to choose between cell bio and microbiology. which class would be more beneficial to take before the MCAT?

i think glassblowing would be a fun class to take :). i might take it last semester senior year
 
curlykid said:
i know this is probably a stupid question, and i tried a google search, but what does MSI and MSII mean?

also, i need to choose between cell bio and microbiology. which class would be more beneficial to take before the MCAT?

i think glassblowing would be a fun class to take :). i might take it last semester senior year

MSI = med student year 1

Ur school offers glassblowing classes?
 
curlykid said:
i know this is probably a stupid question, and i tried a google search, but what does MSI and MSII mean?

also, i need to choose between cell bio and microbiology. which class would be more beneficial to take before the MCAT?

i think glassblowing would be a fun class to take :). i might take it last semester senior year


cellbio covers more of the material found on the mcat. I will be taking micro though because i'm a micro major.
 
Take an Investments class. Something you need to know but won't get in med school.
 
NRAI2001 said:
MSI = med student year 1

Ur school offers glassblowing classes?


thanks NRAI2001

my school offers glassblowing through the School of Art (or maybe it is through UCollege, I'm not sure). The Art School also offers blacksmithing and bookbinding among other courses.
 
KidDr said:
I wish I'd taken enough semesters of Spanish (and/or studied abroad) to be at least semi-fluent...would have been SO useful...
:luck:
I agree with this. I really wish I took Spanish. Depending on where you'd like to practice, this can be important.

(I don't know if she was just trying to scare us, but recently a faculty member at my med school said that some programs, particularly in border states, are taking fluency in Spanish as basically a pre-req, and will actually ROUND in Spanish if all of the patients and staff are Spanish speaking).
 
The fact that we should learn spanish so we can all take care of illegal immigrants is such a pisser I want to start screaming (in english) and pull out all my hair. If they want doctors who speak spanish then why don't they just stay in Mexico where everyone speaks spanish? Then, they can have their 13 children there and we could have hospitals that aren't bankrupted by illegals and other douches that don't pay their bills.

But that's another subject all together.

Honestly, I think some of it depends on what school you're at. At my school, biochem was a joke - totally no big deal (ironic, but true). Anatomy was a complete and total nightmare (an entire year of dealing with a fat sociopath - talking about our teacher, not the cadaver) and the people that had never seen it before were really behind (me included). Even having a dinky A&P class is preferrable to not having any anatomy at all. If only to get yourself oriented (like learning the stupid terms, proximal, distal, sagital, transverse, etc and get a few names memorized of random bones and crap). I have to tell you it's a lot easier to RE-learn something than it is to learn it for the first time. It takes half the time, seriously. And you need lots of time in med school, to learn the 69804649 other things you're supposed to know. If you're not a science major (or a science person) I would take as many classes as you can. All those bio folk have these classes under their belt. You might as well too.
 
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I agree with Shah_Patel_PT above who suggested Biochem, Physiology, Genetics, Immuno, Micro, and Anatomy. I think Biochem would've stood out as especially difficult if I had never seen any of it before. Thankfully for me, it's a prereq at my school (Univ Wash).
 
Elysium said:
The fact that we should learn spanish so we can all take care of illegal immigrants is such a pisser I want to start screaming (in english) and pull out all my hair. If they want doctors who speak spanish then why don't they just stay in Mexico where everyone speaks spanish? Then, they can have their 13 children there and we could have hospitals that aren't bankrupted by illegals and other douches that don't pay their bills.

But that's another subject all together.

Honestly, I think some of it depends on what school you're at. At my school, biochem was a joke - totally no big deal (ironic, but true). Anatomy was a complete and total nightmare (an entire year of dealing with a fat sociopath - talking about our teacher, not the cadaver) and the people that had never seen it before were really behind (me included). Even having a dinky A&P class is preferrable to not having any anatomy at all. If only to get yourself oriented (like learning the stupid terms, proximal, distal, sagital, transverse, etc and get a few names memorized of random bones and crap). I have to tell you it's a lot easier to RE-learn something than it is to learn it for the first time. It takes half the time, seriously. And you need lots of time in med school, to learn the 69804649 other things you're supposed to know. If you're not a science major (or a science person) I would take as many classes as you can. All those bio folk have these classes under their belt. You might as well too.


:mad:
How disappointing it is to find these kinds of comments in such a sophisticated forum. You are so ****ing stupid making comments like that, who the **** do you think you are???? Another member of the KKK I believe, by the way you let you venomous tongue lose. The whole thing about people staying in mexico is so damn ignorant, how can you believe that everyone that is illegal in this country is from mexico, NEWSFLASH mother****er, there are illegals here that speak spanish from many other countries not just mexico, for example, cuba, puerto rico, domican republic, chile, the list goes on and on. It just goes to show you how uncultured your bitch ass is. You are going to be ****ty ass doctor, a person becomes a doctor to cure the sick, to care for the fellow human, and not judge people because of what they are, but I guess your those kinds of people that want to be a doctor because of the money, but hey, thats you. If I were you, I would grab the scaple and stab myself a billion times. Im probably going to kicked off this forum, but atleast Im going to feel proud knowing that I was able to let you know what I thought about you crazy ass beaver. :)
 
NEWSFLASH mother****er, there are illegals here that speak spanish from many other countries not just mexico, for example, cuba, puerto rico, domican republic, chile, the list goes on and on. It just goes to show you how uncultured your bitch ass is. You are going to be ****ty ass doctor, a person becomes a doctor to cure the sick, to care for the fellow human, and not judge people because of what they are,

While I share you sentiment I wanted to clear one thing with you. There are no illegal immigrants from Puerto Rico because the island is part of the United States. Therefore, all puertorricans are US citizens, those on the island and on the mainland.
As for the guy who made those comments report his racist ass to the mods. That kind of ignorant and hateful behavior shouldnt be tolerated here. BTW as far as I know the everyone in the US are immigrants , yes even those of European descent. So if he says that all immigrants should go back to their countries then he, and his family should take their asses back to Europe. Assuming he/ she is white of course.
I never understood the white racist idea that somehow America belongs to them, arent they are also decended from immigrants. If anything the US belongs to native americans but as you can see they got the short end of the stick by those european immigrants.
Anyways, enough of my rant. Sometimes I just lose it when I read some of these comments. I cant believe people still come out with ignorant **** like that.
 
Elysium said:
The fact that we should learn spanish so we can all take care of illegal immigrants is such a pisser I want to start screaming (in english) and pull out all my hair. If they want doctors who speak spanish then why don't they just stay in Mexico where everyone speaks spanish? Then, they can have their 13 children there and we could have hospitals that aren't bankrupted by illegals and other douches that don't pay their bills.

But that's another subject all together.

Honestly, I think some of it depends on what school you're at. At my school, biochem was a joke - totally no big deal (ironic, but true). Anatomy was a complete and total nightmare (an entire year of dealing with a fat sociopath - talking about our teacher, not the cadaver) and the people that had never seen it before were really behind (me included). Even having a dinky A&P class is preferrable to not having any anatomy at all. If only to get yourself oriented (like learning the stupid terms, proximal, distal, sagital, transverse, etc and get a few names memorized of random bones and crap). I have to tell you it's a lot easier to RE-learn something than it is to learn it for the first time. It takes half the time, seriously. And you need lots of time in med school, to learn the 69804649 other things you're supposed to know. If you're not a science major (or a science person) I would take as many classes as you can. All those bio folk have these classes under their belt. You might as well too.

Believe it or not, some people actually learn Spanish because, get this: they're interested in it! :eek: Shocker!

Anyway, I hope you really don't have a stick up your ass about Spanish-speaking people (or any particular ethnicity of people), but your entire first paragraph paints you as a bigot. I hope to God, that if you're a med student, that you do know for a fact that Mexico is certainly not the only country where Spanish is the primary language and that not every Spanish speaking person (Mexicans, included) who is living in the US is an illegal without mastery of prophylactic usage. I've met people from various countries who speak other languages living in this country tax-free, and I've met hardworking legal citizens as well. I've also met hardworking illegals as well as legal citizens who are basically just government leeches.

If you really are in med school and uphold such a perspective about Spanish-speaking people, especially after obtaining so many years of education in an age when so many types of advancements have been made, then the educational system has truly failed you.
 
BIOCHEM! And definitely Physiology.
 
What about neuroscience and neuroanatomy? I m thinking about taking those classes next semester, in the fall.

Also what about immuno or genetics? If u had to choose between immuno or neurosci/neuroanat, which would u choose?

Would taking endocrinology be helpful?
 
In college I took:

Histology
Gross anatomy
Embryology
Biochemistry
Cancer and the Environment (Journal Club)
Film Criticism

I reccomend all of those, especially the last one because Goodfellas is one of the required films.
 
PiccoloPlaya said:
Human sexuality 101. :D

Dix on stix are for chix. Bay-beeeee!

Took that in high school, what would you recommend for college?

fiddler
 
I've heard biochem, histology, and embryology. Having sat through my first embryology lecture, I wholeheartedly endorse the third choice!
 
College level version. Mucho more difficulto

fiddler said:
Took that in high school, what would you recommend for college? fiddler
 
Take every class that med schools have during the first year.
 
immuno and or microbiology. It will come in handy when you don't have to study and everyone else is baffled by the compliment system. "3a and 3b for C5 convertase and cleave C5 to C5a and C5b"
 
Elysium said:
The fact that we should learn spanish so we can all take care of illegal immigrants is such a pisser I want to start screaming (in english) and pull out all my hair. If they want doctors who speak spanish then why don't they just stay in Mexico where everyone speaks spanish? Then, they can have their 13 children there and we could have hospitals that aren't bankrupted by illegals and other douches that don't pay their bills.
So not only you whine all the time how your life is horrible, now you're insulting an entire population ? Good work there, great future doctor. :oops:

You think you can send me your medical school essays ? I'd love to read about your altruism and compassion. I'll pay for the shipping, as long as I get a good laugh ;).

Original signature by the way. Please try responding without too many insults. Thanks :cool:
 
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