Someone asked me a bunch of questions over PM and I thought it might be helpful to share these with y'all. I hope the admission cycle is going well for everyone and that you are looking forward to your medical education!
1) During my interview, the Dean told us that the exam are set in a
board-style format. How true is that? Are all the quizzes and final
exams in the same format? I know the grading system is P/F but what does
it take to pass? How well do you guys do on the boards and also, how does the school help you prepare for the
boards?
2) In terms of shadowing, how do you get access to the consultants? I
know most physicians don't have too much time for email so how easy is
it to get them? Set up an appointment? I think the same question holds
for research opportunities too.
3) About research specifically. I know Mayo, like a few schools give you sometime to do research. Since I the summer break b/n 1st and 2nd yr is quite short, I wanted to use that time to travel abroad and do some type of internation health work in Ghana. I will then use the research block to do an actual wet bench or clinical research project hopefully with an abstract/publication and conference presentation. Also since Mayo is a specialty hospitl, is it easy to have clinicians who will allow me to write case reports for publication et al?
4) About life in Rochester. Doesn't the clinic close down on weekends and closes at 6pm on week days? isn't that atypical since many renowned hospital are kind of open 24/7. I heard Rochester becomes a dead town during the weekends. What do you guys do on a typical weekend?
1. Yes, every single one of our exams are board style and most of them are actual shelf exams. For example, we took the anatomy national exam (and our class averaged 85% on it) and our path final is also the national exam. All the other classes do the same thing as well. The quizzes are all set up in clinical vignettes like the boards as well. I do not know about precise scores, but I asked a few of the second and third years and they said it was one of the top in the country. In order to help us prepare, Mayo has a prep course throughout second year and has a more intense review session in the weeks before the exam.
2. It is ridiculously easy to set up shadowing or research opportunities (the complete opposite of undergrad). Mayo is an academic medical center and the physicians consider educating medical students to be a priority. Thus, nearly all consultants will let you shadow in any specialty. For many of them, this is one of their favorite parts of their jobs and every student in my class has one or more mentors. For example, I have a mentor in internal medicine and another in orthopedic surgery (who is also helping me prepare my Fulbright application). I have also shadowed in radiation oncology, psychiatry, urology, sports medicine, and emergency med. I usually set up a shadowing experience via email or they set up an appt to meet with me if I have questions about the specialty or want to do research with them.
In general, research projects (especially in clinical research) just fall into our laps. There is so much research going on here and so few medical students that residents and faculty advertise to get medical students involved in their projects. Getting an email with the phrase "guaranteed publications" is a regular occurrence. That is how I got involved in a dermatology project I am currently working on.
3. Oops, already answered this question. Yep, the summers are a good time to do work abroad and you can do research during the third year or use some selective or free time to do some work if you wish.
4. When they said the clinic is closed on the weekends, they mean the elective office visits and such, not the actual hospitals. People would be dropping dead left and right if we closed Saint Mary's or Methodist
😛 Rochester actually has a decent amount happening on the weekends. It's not as exciting as a good college town or a big city, but there is some to do. I am heading out to a med school party in a little bit, actually. If you need a bigger city experience, I head up to Minneapolis maybe one in four weekends to do some clubbing or bar hopping and many of my classmates do the same. In general, we party, go to the bars and clubs in Rochester, go out for dinner, hang out at people's places, go to movies, that sort of thing. Pretty much the same list of stuff that happens in most places.
For the most part, people here are happy. That means more than you might think.
for you all.
