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MissionComplete said:
Or you could get them from the amazon link at the bottom of the page and support SDN instead
About to start M1 and freaking out!
- Thread starter Dov
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Or you could get them from the amazon link at the bottom of the page and support SDN instead
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Don't worry, you won't have any actual responsibility for a couple more years.NonTradMed said:I freaked out a few weeks ago when I realized that throughout my medical career, I will have lives in my hands, and I will make mistakes during training and probably beyond which could be fatal.....so....it's a bit scary to think that. Also, having done premed or been in the "I am hoping to go to med school" mode for so long, actually attending it seems like a far off dream still, and not something that will happen in a couple months' time. For me, the most important way to maintain sanity is to enjoy my summer and remember that med school is going to be like college on steroids.
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1. Columbia anatomy's really not that bad, but it takes some getting used to. Few people have had a class like it in undergrad.MissionComplete said:
2. No way you need that many books for the class. Maybe some are good for the boards, but all you need for the class are Netter and NMS Anatomy (April). Use the library computers and class websites to access all the review questions. The Netter flashcards are useful IF you aren't that hardcore about anatomy. Once you start thinking about structures in terms of how they relate to each other, where nerves synapse and stuff like that, memorizing the cards is superfluous. Similarly, if you really want to know anatomy well, you'll spend a lot of time going through stuff in the lab. I hear that Rohen (photo atlas) is a good aid to passing, but if you've put the time in in lab, it's not necessary.
3. Anatomy is the only class you get to take where you see things for yourself instead of just taking someone's word for it. (You could argue histology, but they could tell me those little suckers were just about anything.)
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Brainsucker said:
You missed the point -- if you buy all 6 books he'll make more money from his amazon referral. All MS1's must support his amazon referrals and buy them all if they wish to pass anatomy.
N
njbmd
Law2Doc said:I think Dante summed up entrance into med school pretty well:
"Through me you pass into the city of woe:
Through me you pass into eternal pain:
Through me among the people lost for aye.
Justice the founder of my fabric mov'd:
To rear me was the task of power divine,
Supremest wisdom, and primeval love.
Before me things create were none, save things
Eternal, and eternal I endure.
All hope abandon ye who enter here."
Hi there,
Having been through medical school I can say is it more like "Paradise Lost" by John Milton.
"The mind is it's own place
And can make a heave of hell
And a hell of heaven
It is better to RULE in Hell than serve in Heaven"
Medical school was its own kind of Hell but it was much better if you ruled.
njbmd
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njbmd said:Hi there,
Having been through medical school I can say is it more like "Paradise Lost" by John Milton.
"The mind is it's own place
And can make a heave of hell
And a hell of heaven
It is better to RULE in Hell than serve in Heaven"
Medical school was its own kind of Hell but it was much better if you ruled.
njbmd
Gotta love the classics. Still as true today as then.
N
njbmd
Law2Doc said:
Hi there,
And how did I know that you would appreciate John Milton and Dante?? Great stuff
njbmd
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Most of the time I don't feel any anxiety. But that's because I'm being a couch bum as of now, since I probably will never get such a chance again.
But I do experience momentary lapses in my summer bliss and I become a bit
. I guess it depends on what fuels you. If you do better being relaxed, then you need to calm yourself down. If you do better by stressing yourself out before you even start, then by all means, continue with the stressing.
But I do experience momentary lapses in my summer bliss and I become a bit
. I guess it depends on what fuels you. If you do better being relaxed, then you need to calm yourself down. If you do better by stressing yourself out before you even start, then by all means, continue with the stressing.- Joined
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LJDHC05 said:
unless it's a redemption check from a mutual fund...
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LJDHC05 said:
Is that for one year?
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Yep that's NYMC for ya. I'll be able to pay that back that 250k in like 30 years I hope.Apparition said:
If only my freakin state school could have accepted me and I'd be paying almost half that, but no...waitlist purgatory.
I'm still working on that one...looks like it wont happen until after 2040 or soetf said:
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LJDHC05 said:
I thought that we can't exceed 220K for four years. Is this not true?
I'm waitlisted at my state school too...sucks.
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It's school dependent...for NYMC the max is 250k, but with the ~5% annual increase in tuition costs and Westchester County Cost of living, I imagine that will be increase to like 270k.
I agree that some fear is expected since you dont know/have not experienced it for yourself. A few things to keep in mind:
1. when you were in elementary, junior high seemed scary and high school was impossible. When you were in high school college seemed like a monster(unless you really though animal house was a real place and you were going there).
2. A lot of people have alterior reasons for the content of there advise to you. i.e. people that were not accepted into medical school generally talk about how it is near impossible. People that flunk med school tell you how passing is imposible both cases usually contain various reason why the program sucks and they rule if the school would do this or that right.
For me I found ms1 to be quite easy. I had prepared in my undergraduate for those types of classes. I was ranked in top 13% of my class and > than the top 10% in national boards(not trying to brag see what happens in ms2 and I can't spell for sh@% to boot) and spent little time to achieve that. ms2 was a different story, was difficult for me and had hard time keeping above water too much memorization and I'm to old I guess the old hippocampus aint working so well. For others it was opposite. Either way if you got in you can do the work again >90% finish. The concepts are not that difficult it's just that there are so many of them. Then they give comprehensive exams that cover the whole year the past two years(step1) past 4 years(step2) past 6 years(step3).
Finishing is not the hard part but being at the top of the class is . You will have a lot of very bright people around you, the dumbest/poorest student in your class was one of the top students at his/her college(unless his father/mother was dean of that or the med school or name was bush or gore who knows although with those pedigrees it would be hard to not be somewhat smart I mean bush made his own millions and gore was VP and invented the internet, and the others parents were smart enough to become Deans ). Most are young kids that are extremely mature and responsible,and some are old people like me that can add lots of life experience.
I guess bottom line is don't let it ruin thet last of your vacation. Plan/prepare well and get ready at leisure(get some rest), i.e. get your schedule/list of classes you will take either by asking administrative office or newly ms2's. Study some of the major concepts which will help you feel prepared and reduce your anxiety. If you cant get a schedule from your school, biochem, anatomy, cell phys/histology, general physiology are good bets for ms1. for the rest of your career preparation is the best means for reducing anxiety.
Good luck
1. when you were in elementary, junior high seemed scary and high school was impossible. When you were in high school college seemed like a monster(unless you really though animal house was a real place and you were going there).
2. A lot of people have alterior reasons for the content of there advise to you. i.e. people that were not accepted into medical school generally talk about how it is near impossible. People that flunk med school tell you how passing is imposible both cases usually contain various reason why the program sucks and they rule if the school would do this or that right.
For me I found ms1 to be quite easy. I had prepared in my undergraduate for those types of classes. I was ranked in top 13% of my class and > than the top 10% in national boards(not trying to brag see what happens in ms2 and I can't spell for sh@% to boot) and spent little time to achieve that. ms2 was a different story, was difficult for me and had hard time keeping above water too much memorization and I'm to old I guess the old hippocampus aint working so well. For others it was opposite. Either way if you got in you can do the work again >90% finish. The concepts are not that difficult it's just that there are so many of them. Then they give comprehensive exams that cover the whole year the past two years(step1) past 4 years(step2) past 6 years(step3).
Finishing is not the hard part but being at the top of the class is . You will have a lot of very bright people around you, the dumbest/poorest student in your class was one of the top students at his/her college(unless his father/mother was dean of that or the med school or name was bush or gore who knows although with those pedigrees it would be hard to not be somewhat smart I mean bush made his own millions and gore was VP and invented the internet
, and the others parents were smart enough to become Deans ). Most are young kids that are extremely mature and responsible,and some are old people like me that can add lots of life experience.I guess bottom line is don't let it ruin thet last of your vacation. Plan/prepare well and get ready at leisure(get some rest), i.e. get your schedule/list of classes you will take either by asking administrative office or newly ms2's. Study some of the major concepts which will help you feel prepared and reduce your anxiety. If you cant get a schedule from your school, biochem, anatomy, cell phys/histology, general physiology are good bets for ms1. for the rest of your career preparation is the best means for reducing anxiety.
Good luck
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i was in santa cruz the other day in a coffee shop that had a stand of post cards...really interesting ones. I saw this one postcard with a rhinocerous on it that read, "I've lost all hope." I was thinking of buying it so that about midway through M1 i can send it home to my parents.
But i didn't buy it.
But i didn't buy it.
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Dov said:
Hey Dov, I'm definitely nervous as well... good to know I'm not the only one
. I'm mostly worried that everyone will be ridiculously smarter than I am... I'm prepared to work hard, but it's difficult for me to mentally prepare when I don't really know what to expect. I'll be seeing you soon!
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Repeat after me: Intelligence has nothing to do with preclinical performance.Wolfgang12345 said:Hey Dov, I'm definitely nervous as well... good to know I'm not the only one
Maybe that's not absolutely true, but concentration and discipline are what's really important. And no one really cares about how smart you are. If you're friendly and outgoing, you'll do fine.
Also, one thing that you'll come to figure out is that P&S starts slowly (particularly if you were a biochem, molecular bio, MCDB, or some such major). Enjoy your first couple blocks but be aware that it gets worse.
The main way I'd describe it is that it's not as bad as you think it'll be, but it's bad enough. You won't need to spend every waking hour studying, you won't even need to spend the weekends studying. Hell, plenty of my classmates got away with not studying for the first half of each block. That said, keeping one's head in the same few subjects for hours and hours on end before exam weeks is pretty trying.
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Brainsucker said:
Thanks for the advice... I just don't know if I'll be good at learning (and practicing) medicine... I've always been *that* person who picks things up quickly and doesn't need to study excessively... I know it will be an adjustment for me to have to study consistently. Although this will be the first time I'm in school without having to work - which I hope will help. The thing that makes me feel better is that every single person I met during my interview was a student I'd enjoy working with...
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The challenge is to decide what you want and stick to it. The first year is pass/fail. If you study a reasonable amount, you'll pass. The thing is, you and most of your classmates probably don't want to just pass.Wolfgang12345 said:
Every test time, people tell each other "pass/fail" and "P=MD." The averages show that that's not really how people feel. You can easily get sucked into studying more than you want to because you're used to being at the top of the class.
I want to make a specific point that people study hard to do well, but that I've never seen anyone try to undermine anyone else and that people who make study aids are pretty free with them. Whether or not the study aids are helpful, well that's another story.
Your experience will differ, but here are a few things that have been helpful to me in terms of studying:
-Study at the library. There are too many distractions at home.
-Study time and social time should be separate. Mixing them up degrades both. This isn't to say that you shouldn't be friendly with the students you see around the library, just that trying to have a conversation and study at the same time isn't effective.
-Organize your time. A 10 minute break every hour was a good setup for me. I find that if I let myself go, it turns into a 1/2 break after each 1/2 of studying.
-Experiment. Just reading everything over is one method, one that you might be used to as *that* person. There are a host of other methods. Some people do flashcards for everything (not something I recommend) others highlight and underline everything. I find that reading over transcripts and copying out the information that looks testable and I know that I won't remember just by reading is effective. For SBPM, you'll have a very nice resource a couple of my classmates are setting up this summer (outlines to go with the lecture slides). I would have loved to have it last year.
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Wolfgang12345 said:
Because I'm feeling guilty and my posts have been more negative lately, I thought I'd try to contribute something constructive.
The thing is, pretty much everyone in medical school was *that* person who picks things up quickly and didn't need to study excessively. That's why you're there - you have been filtered out to be one of the people who medical school won't bury. Medical school studying is much different from undergraduate, most med students will tell you "I never had to study all that much as an undergrad, but I do here", not because it's intellectually difficult, just because the volume is so much higher. To keep up (you can *not* keep up as well, as someone else noted if that's your priority and still probably do alright) you need to study a lot. However, you'll probably get better yield on all those study hours if you have a particularly high absorption rate.
Bottom line: they admitted you because you have an aptitude for biomedical science and seem like you'd make a good doctor. Be tenacious, and you'll prove them right.
And while it's an interesting form of self-deprecation to bemoan medical school and play the "I'm already bitter about medicine" joking schtick (some students do this), it's not a good way to approach it. You'll never have the mental and emotional stamina and dedication for 10 months straight of M1 if you're thinking or acting that negatively. Just be careful who you listen to, who you surround yourself with, and remember how much you actually do love it, despite all the hard work and duress.
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This was actually my high school senior quote!Law2Doc said:"...All hope abandon ye who enter here."
I like this additude. This is a lot like engineering school - it's terrible going through it, but everyone's going through it with you, so you do it well and after you're done you all get some beers down at the bar.njbmd said:
Pewl - I've seen you post here and other places about the difficulty of med school, but if you just keep at it with the determination you've had for grad school, and I'm sure you'll do great.
4
45408
honestly, I'm not scared. I'm looking forward to it. I know it'll be more challenging, but I've been waiting for this for a while.
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chrisjohn said:Orientation should clear that up. Remember "they", the administration, can't F*** you all.
Sure they can, if they do it in shifts.
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Law2Doc said:Sure they can, if they do it in shifts.
M
mountainman123
I think it is a good thing that you are scared. Med school is hard and like others have said- if you aren't concerned about it then you are not aware of how much time it takes and how hard you have to work. Don't worry though, when you get started you will learn that everyone feels that way to some degree and the first year will fly by and you will be doing fine. I know from experience. Don't doubt yourself because you were good enough to get in, then you will be able to pass.
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It's all relative my friend. Everyone is nervous about the 1st day of med school, and then nervous the night before Step 1, then nervous the night before 3rd year starts, and nervous the night before Step 2 (like I am right now). Ok, now back to meditating.
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For all those saying they aren't afraid about starting medical school, it just makes me think of this quote...
Luke:
"I am not afraid"
Yoda:
"You will be, you will be"
I know, I'm a nerd.
Luke:
"I am not afraid"
Yoda:
"You will be, you will be"
I know, I'm a nerd
.
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plainolerichie said:For all those saying they aren't afraid about starting medical school, it just makes me think of this quote...
Luke:
"I am not afraid"
Yoda:
"You will be, you will be"
I know, I'm a nerd
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I'm about to start MS1 like you. What's keeping me calm about med school is the fact that 17000+ other students are facing the same situation this summer. If they can do it, so can I and so can everyone here. good luck.
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as a freshly minted MS3, here's my advice:potato51 said:
- the first quarter/semester/whatever is the toughest. anatomy is a tough class, but is crucial for later coursework.
- once over the hump of anatomy then relax until micro, and then again until pharm. then start sweating profusely.
- enjoy yourself as much as you can, whenever you can! don't feel guilty in taking weekends off to blow off steam. i found practicing and performing music, skiing, sailing, and car racing (!) of all things to be key in maintaining sanity throughout the many moons of classroom time.
- freak out mildly but not overly about step 1. take it seriously as it WILL affect your residency chances but don't let it gnaw on you all of 2nd year. just try to keep up in your coursework, and don't learn towards the tests for individual classes, but learn towards the boards.
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potato51 said:
You mean 17,000?
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For those who are anxious, here are some things I learned during my first week of medical school:
- Anatomy is a hit or miss class for a lot of people. It will be a lot of memorization of nerves, arteries, muscle insertions/attachments and a lot more stuff, but it is extremely rewarding when you're going over it with someone else and magically you know what you're talking about.
- Try to get a schedule as early as possible. I heard this from a lot of people, and it was absolutley correct. There are a lot of different ways to try and stay on top of everything, just know that your first few days/weeks will be spent trying to figure this out and don't freak out if you're a little behind. Finding out the right way to study early on will make for better chances by the end of the class
- Know how many credits each class is worth. Our anatomy class is worth 4 credits, while ethics is worth 0.4....take a guess which class I'm studying now?
- Find a study group who you feel comfortable studying with.
- Spend extra time in lab, this will only reinforce all the material that you're learning in the text.
- Sleep as much as possible whenever it fits into the schedule. Some people study till 2am, some people wake up and study at 5am. Just make sure you're not sacrificing your sleep. I tried to do both for a couple days earlier in the week, and this just completley backfired. I ended up spacing out in class
and becoming even further behind.
hth
- Anatomy is a hit or miss class for a lot of people. It will be a lot of memorization of nerves, arteries, muscle insertions/attachments and a lot more stuff, but it is extremely rewarding when you're going over it with someone else and magically you know what you're talking about.
- Try to get a schedule as early as possible. I heard this from a lot of people, and it was absolutley correct. There are a lot of different ways to try and stay on top of everything, just know that your first few days/weeks will be spent trying to figure this out and don't freak out if you're a little behind. Finding out the right way to study early on will make for better chances by the end of the class
- Know how many credits each class is worth. Our anatomy class is worth 4 credits, while ethics is worth 0.4....take a guess which class I'm studying now?
- Find a study group who you feel comfortable studying with.
- Spend extra time in lab, this will only reinforce all the material that you're learning in the text.
- Sleep as much as possible whenever it fits into the schedule. Some people study till 2am, some people wake up and study at 5am. Just make sure you're not sacrificing your sleep. I tried to do both for a couple days earlier in the week, and this just completley backfired. I ended up spacing out in class
and becoming even further behind.
hth
