Average hours of sleep per night for medical student during the first year?

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crieka

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Hi, I was wondering about on the average, how many hours do you (medical students) generally sleep per night when you were in your first year? Just curious.

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considering i do alot in a day (i.e. go to class from 8am-3pm most days, lift/exercise, be active in couple organizations, study, and always make time for drinking). i'd say you can easily look foward to 6.5-7 hrs a night. :thumbup: of course it varies around test time.
 
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I only get less than 8 if I'm doing something I want (staying up to watch a movie, going out with friends, on internet late). I like sleep and so I make it a priority. Third year and residency will probably prove difficult for that reason, but theres no reason not to sleep first and second year.
 
went to bed at 2am (wife got home from work at 1:15, and I wanted to see her). got up at 11:30 today. Came to school and started studying. Until exam week, I can usually sleep as much as I want, but I usually feel guilty if I really sleep a ton. Plus, I try to keep on a similar sleep schedule as my wife.
 
7-8 pretty much every night, unless I stay up watching TV or wasting time some other way.
 
Hi, I was wondering about on the average, how many hours do you (medical students) generally sleep per night when you were in your first year? Just curious.

As with anything else in first year, it's about trade offs. You can get all your studying done and get plenty of sleep. Or you can get your studying done, work out, goof off a little, BS with friends, and get not enough sleep. Or various other permutations. Your choice.
 
Probably about 8 hours, but it varies a lot depending on the schedule. It's like 4 hours sometimes before a test, but maybe that's just me. You do have time to sleep for the most part.
 
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As much sleep as you want. Really don't stress about first year. You will find that most of the stories you here of people sleeping 4 hrs a night and having to study from 4am-Mid everyday just to pass are tails told to scare premeds. I got at least 8-9-10hrs depending on how much I felt I needed. Anytime I didn't was for my own personal needs not school. Honestly, you will get done with first year and say, "what was all the hype about?" Now third year...that is a much different story.
 
You will find that most of the stories you here of people sleeping 4 hrs a night and having to study from 4am-Mid everyday just to pass are tails told to scare premeds.

They aren't "tails" (or even tales:) ). Just perhaps not representative of the experience of the majority. There will be a small handful of people in many med schools who have to retake things over the summer or repeat a course. (As much as 10% of the class has been heard of on this board in the past). Most gave it a decent try, but came up short -- perhaps spinning their wheels inefficiently. And there will be another small handful who by the skin of their teeth avoided being in this first group. And then there will be a small group at the top of the class who are working those hours to try and lock down a certain residency goal. But you are right, these aren't the experiences of the majority.
 
I averaged about 8 hrs of sleep per night in the MS1 and MS2 years. However, 90% of my waking hours were spent studying for 2-3 exams per week. Hated those two years!
 
Never below 6 hours, and those are the days before an exam when I get up early to get to the last few lectures, lol.
 
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went to bed at 2am (wife got home from work at 1:15, and I wanted to see her). got up at 11:30 today. Came to school and started studying. Until exam week, I can usually sleep as much as I want, but I usually feel guilty if I really sleep a ton. Plus, I try to keep on a similar sleep schedule as my wife.

You are fortunate to have a great woman who is working until 1 am supporting your butt. Take care of her in the future. I am sure that you will. You seem to have your head on straight.
 
5/weeknight...maybe 10 per weekend night..i'm proabably an anomaly though
 
About 7 hrs/night, a little more on the weekend, a little less just before an exam....
 
1st year - about 7, somewhat efficient
2nd year - 6, sometimes 5, once a month 4

if you don't take anything extra (research, etc.) 8 nightly is very doable first year, and probably about 7 second year IF you stay efficient.

the best way to sum it up is the following:
people are what they are. the orthopedic and chest surgeons aren't sleeping 9 hrs a night and scraping by now; theyre getting high grades, lots of activities, and little sleep, just like the next ten years
the peds, IM, FP are foreshadowing their future "lighter" schedules by taking an easy road now

of course, some ortho's got in cuz daddy was director, and some extremely talented people go to peds because they love children, but i think the above is a pretty good generalization.
 
1st year - about 7, somewhat efficient
2nd year - 6, sometimes 5, once a month 4

if you don't take anything extra (research, etc.) 8 nightly is very doable first year, and probably about 7 second year IF you stay efficient.

the best way to sum it up is the following:
people are what they are. the orthopedic and chest surgeons aren't sleeping 9 hrs a night and scraping by now; theyre getting high grades, lots of activities, and little sleep, just like the next ten years
the peds, IM, FP are foreshadowing their future "lighter" schedules by taking an easy road now

of course, some ortho's got in cuz daddy was director, and some extremely talented people go to peds because they love children, but i think the above is a pretty good generalization.

that's silly. what do you think the future derms and rad oncs are doing now, napping?

besides, there's plenty of time to go around. I get a good 8-9 of sleep a night, do quite well in class and have a good research project going. it's not like there aren't a LOT of hours in the day, and studying really shouldn't eat up more than 5 (at MOST) of them if you're efficient.
 
7, and 5 the day before/morning of a test.
 
that's silly. what do you think the future derms and rad oncs are doing now, napping?

besides, there's plenty of time to go around. I get a good 8-9 of sleep a night, do quite well in class and have a good research project going. it's not like there aren't a LOT of hours in the day, and studying really shouldn't eat up more than 5 (at MOST) of them if you're efficient.

agree, but in the grand scheme of things, the hard workers who end up in ortho, nsurg, and other demanding fields usually outnumber the dermatologists and rad onc's IMO.

9 hrs of sleep, 5 hrs studying, 6 hrs class, 1 hr gym, 2 hrs eating/showering/etc. 2 hrs research puts you at 24 hrs/day. sounds good, but this is a good day for me. examtime its a lot more than 5 hrs studying, less gym, and less sleep.
 
Yes, naegleria brain, we've heard all about your drive to be the best and how all great people have the same drive. Maybe you can start a thread asking us about our work ethics when we were 4.
 
6 if I go to class the next day.

6 if I don't. stupid terminal insomnia >;-O
 
Normally it's 7 hours for me, before exams or on exam weeks about 6 hours.

Lectures in my school are time-consuming and worthless and on the top of it, they're mandatory. Still I waste a lot of time usually and goof around too much but my grades are good (above average = good for me). I struggle with anatomy though, I dread for the final exam at the end of this semester. The last two weeks before the exam will be like hell itself and I'll like sleep nothing those days.
 
1st year - about 7, somewhat efficient
2nd year - 6, sometimes 5, once a month 4

if you don't take anything extra (research, etc.) 8 nightly is very doable first year, and probably about 7 second year IF you stay efficient.

the best way to sum it up is the following:
people are what they are. the orthopedic and chest surgeons aren't sleeping 9 hrs a night and scraping by now; theyre getting high grades, lots of activities, and little sleep, just like the next ten years
the peds, IM, FP are foreshadowing their future "lighter" schedules by taking an easy road now

of course, some ortho's got in cuz daddy was director, and some extremely talented people go to peds because they love children, but i think the above is a pretty good generalization.

This is the biggest load of BS I've heard on SDN in a long time. :rolleyes:
 
Yes, naegleria brain, we've heard all about your drive to be the best and how all great people have the same drive. Maybe you can start a thread asking us about our work ethics when we were 4.

already did :cool:
 
I sleep about 6-7hrs a night and I have a wife and 2 kids so that'll tell you there's more than enough time in a day to study and sleep.

I make it a rule never to pull an all-nighter and never to stay up past midnight studying and it's been working quite well for me both in terms of grades and overall happiness.
 
just because you fit into the generalization doesn't mean you have to fight it

Dude, you don't even know what specialty I'm going into, so how can you say what generalization I fall into. You haven't even reached your clinical rotations yet, until you do, you have no clue who the hard workers in your class are and who is going to slack. I've seen slacker surgery residents, and hard-core IM residents. It's pretty evenly distributed. To get into the top programs in any specialty, you need to be a hard worker.

I should know better than to feed a troll.
 
trolls instigate; i contribute

once a hard worker, always a hard worker. this is true in the majority which, last i checked, means greater than 50%. same for slacker mentality.

that being said, people on this board yap all the time how theyll turn it around in clinical rotations and thats where theyll shine. the smarties were too booksmart and lacked people skills so theyll fail years 3 and 4. i've yet to see a live example of that.
the successful preclinicals tend to do well clinically years 3 and 4. the successful students get into great residencies and specialties.

i'm willing to bet you're a middle of the road type of person, which is why you don't agree. and the fact that youre arguing this means i'm dead wrong, or its true and you dont want to accept it. if i was dead wrong, you would have given your specific example, so i'm going to say your going into a middle-of-the-road type specialty. not ortho, but probably not FP either.

i just watched house and am feeling all diagnostician-y.

either way, stop feeding people this mentality that slackers become orthopods and step 1 > 270 becomes rural ambulatory care workers. the exceptions are so few that if your putting all your eggs in being that one, you'll likely come out disappointed. don't fight me when you know this is true, try to explain this to others
slackers at ucsf neurosurgery who don't cut the cheese get thrown into the dumpster, whereas the overly ambitious hard working doctor in rural peds will be doing quite well, regardless.
 
trolls instigate; i contribute

once a hard worker, always a hard worker. this is true in the majority which, last i checked, means greater than 50%. same for slacker mentality.

that being said, people on this board yap all the time how theyll turn it around in clinical rotations and thats where theyll shine. the smarties were too booksmart and lacked people skills so theyll fail years 3 and 4. i've yet to see a live example of that.
the successful preclinicals tend to do well clinically years 3 and 4. the successful students get into great residencies and specialties.

i'm willing to bet you're a middle of the road type of person, which is why you don't agree. and the fact that youre arguing this means i'm dead wrong, or its true and you dont want to accept it. if i was dead wrong, you would have given your specific example, so i'm going to say your going into a middle-of-the-road type specialty. not ortho, but probably not FP either.

i just watched house and am feeling all diagnostician-y.

either way, stop feeding people this mentality that slackers become orthopods and step 1 > 270 becomes rural ambulatory care workers. the exceptions are so few that if your putting all your eggs in being that one, you'll likely come out disappointed. don't fight me when you know this is true, try to explain this to others
slackers at ucsf neurosurgery who don't cut the cheese get thrown into the dumpster, whereas the overly ambitious hard working doctor in rural peds will be doing quite well, regardless.

You call this pile of garbage contributing. Awww how cute, you have no clue that you are a troll. :laugh: See, the reason why I didn't go spouting off my stats, is because I'm not an insecure prestige ***** who wants everyone to tell me how wonderful I am for working hard. I work hard, because I care about my education and want to learn as much as possible.

I haven't yet decided on a specialty (currently between Path or Neuro) but I'm competitive enough to get into any of the surgical subspecialities, if I had an interest in them. The difference between you and I, is that I don't make my future career decisions based on what others think is "cool" or "prestigious". I actually make my decisions based on what interests me. And if you don't think that IM residents or Peds residents work hard, you are in for a rude awakening during your clerkships.

Now I know you'll come back with some more garbage, because the troll in you just wants some more attention. Good luck on Step 1.
 
This is the biggest load of BS I've heard on SDN in a long time. :rolleyes:


It's certainly true that you don't NEED to sleep very little and study all the time but it is true that a lot of my classmates do. I can think of a number of people whose usual course of action is to pull pre-exam all nighters (and that's just from it coming up in random discussion, I don't ask). There is a very strong distinction between how you "need" to live and how many people in med school do.
 
During the week, I usually get 7-8 hours. Sometimes there will be a stretch where I just can't get it together and get 6 hours of sleep for a couple nights in a row -- usually this is my own stupidity in wasting too much time on the internet, etc. Sometimes the night before an exam I'll stay up a bit later studying, but you won't catch me pulling an all nighter. I just don't function well that way. About the lowest I've gotten is 5 hours. I generally catch up on the weekend with 10 hours a night or so. In my experience, there's really no good reason to compromise sleep during the basic science years. If you're not getting enough sleep because you're studying so much, you're probably doing something wrong. (if you're not getting enough sleep because of other parts of your life, that's another issue entirely..) But then, I'm not aiming for a super competitive residency or anything.
 
trolls instigate; i contribute

once a hard worker, always a hard worker. this is true in the majority which, last i checked, means greater than 50%. same for slacker mentality.

that being said, people on this board yap all the time how theyll turn it around in clinical rotations and thats where theyll shine. the smarties were too booksmart and lacked people skills so theyll fail years 3 and 4. i've yet to see a live example of that.
the successful preclinicals tend to do well clinically years 3 and 4. the successful students get into great residencies and specialties.

i'm willing to bet you're a middle of the road type of person, which is why you don't agree. and the fact that youre arguing this means i'm dead wrong, or its true and you dont want to accept it. if i was dead wrong, you would have given your specific example, so i'm going to say your going into a middle-of-the-road type specialty. not ortho, but probably not FP either.

i just watched house and am feeling all diagnostician-y.

either way, stop feeding people this mentality that slackers become orthopods and step 1 > 270 becomes rural ambulatory care workers. the exceptions are so few that if your putting all your eggs in being that one, you'll likely come out disappointed. don't fight me when you know this is true, try to explain this to others
slackers at ucsf neurosurgery who don't cut the cheese get thrown into the dumpster, whereas the overly ambitious hard working doctor in rural peds will be doing quite well, regardless.

I find your posts so far to be terribly interesting in light of you avatar. :rolleyes:

I have to say that most of it is non sequitur. There of course is something to be said for hard work but there is also something to be said for stupid work. Only serious linear thinking equates working longer with working smarter IMO. I have scrubbed on some long surgeries but it took getting enough under my belt to tell that sometimes they were long because the guy had no damn clue what the hell he was doing? That's when a 2 hour procedure becomes 7. Working longer = harder? Bulls**t :idea:

I never had to interrupt sleep 1st-2nd year for anything. Not because I am a slacker but because I am efficient with my time and smart with my work. Even on test weeks...also because I believe that a tired brain does worse on tests anyhow. During this time I conducted research, was a delegate for the AMA, and sat on the Board for Governors for my state medical society. All the while I still had a wife and kids at home to take care of. Nevertheless, I have been extremely successful in both my classes and my boards. Now 3-4 year yeah you get less sleep because you have to. I find that the majority of students I have met had a similar experience. Is that universal? Well I am not stupid enough to make that claim without a well designed study.

I have met people who make ridiculous statements like those in previous posts and they wonder why they don't match like they hope, if they match at all. Well, it's because they make statements like that and the Director is thinking "Wait I got plenty of sleep when I was in school is he saying I am a slacker?"

To the future MS1's don't worry most of the "scary" stories you have heard about med school are just fictional exaggerations.
 
and so it begins again...

the average medical student is up at night studying due to his/her own inefficiency. the vast majority are inefficient, and it catches up to them. unlike their collegiate buddies, theyll sacrifice sleep to pull through. just because a few people on this board have it together doesn't mean 95% of med students will. the only proof i need is: walk into the library at 2am. i guarantee you're not alone.

i didn't mention efficiency because i thought it was at this point it's obvious. fortunately, or unfortunately, depending on the viewpoint, i don't have a wife or kids, and my focus is career, and am able to sacrifice sleep and "family time" for things like AMSA, research (at three different institutions, not including my own), etc. my personal philosophy is if you're not pushing yourself to the edge, you're just wasting time. most students however have a full plate with classes alone.

tiki: ahh, path and neuro, both very middle of the road, exactly as i predicted. as to your competitiveness for the surgical subspecialties, i guess we'll never know unless you do a 180 and go for it; you guessing your own competitiveness in plastics is as bad as me guessing your competitiveness, and i know nothing about you
winter break i took a full week's call with orthopedics, starting the week before, going thru till its end in the new year. i logged 122 hrs each week. pediatrics is a walk in the park (9-5 is heavenly).

i'm trying to get across what dilated is saying: you don't need to, but the majority invariably do.

in summation, you have people like yourselves who balance and take it easy. you have people like me, who balance and take on more until the brink of spilling, and then you have the rest, who make up the biggest part, who don't exactly balance, and forego sleep to recover.

incoming students should expect to be the third until things fall into place; it takes everyone about a month to adjust, regardless of who you are
 
To the future MS1's don't worry most of the "scary" stories you have heard about med school are just fictional exaggerations.

:thumbup:

Advice to in-coming med students:
1) work hard
2) sleep 8 hours nightly
3) ignore older medical students' advice. (Yes, this includes mine. But especially those insane ones who feel the need to self-inflate their ego by telling you "how much they've been through")
 
Uhmm, not following finger pointing detour here. To quote Adam Sandler, "go on Proffessor, I'm here to learn." First year I was on the C=MD program. I am completely conversant in House, 24, whatever. We were on four or five week blocks and I wasted a LOT of time. I also still got 6-7 a night, wished for more.

Second year (three weeks in), still watch a lot of tv, although waste a lot less time, study six hours outside class, which I attend, usually to figure what in the world they were trying to convey with the powerpoint slide. Now we test every two weeks, and I am seeing the TV time going down and the studying going up. But that is just due to the difference in how you approach the material. Still will get 6-7.

Now, after the shameless fingerpointing above, yes, I ended up on the C=MD first year. I also want to go either Medicine or Fam Med. Guess what, you pretty much only have to pass step 1 and you are in. I have no interest being a cutter, I want to talk to people, so rads is out (mostly because my grades suck), don't want to hang around asleep people (there goes anesth), had Lasik, and that is pretty much all I ever want to know about the eye, and don't want to treat skin conditions for the rest of my life. True goal, GI, scope up and down, prescribe PPI. Favorite block of gross, thorax and abdomen. Plus you gotta love the pelvis, where else can you find a sewage line running through an amusement park?

Bottom line, if you want an A, you may have to put in a lot of time, especially depending or your undergrad, I'm an engineer, not a lot of biochem in my background. Plus it's diminishing returns. Let's say 20 hours gets you a C, 40 gets you a B, it's like 80 in my world to get an A. Sleep is mandatory, so I have to adjust the rest of my schedule around that.
 
Thanks, you've just written my newest pick-up line.

:thumbup:

Yeah, well its in trade off for your Avatar. I'm no sexist, but it sucks me in every time. Stupid caveman brainstem!
 
I only get less than 8 if I'm doing something I want (staying up to watch a movie, going out with friends, on internet late). I like sleep and so I make it a priority. Third year and residency will probably prove difficult for that reason, but theres no reason not to sleep first and second year.
12345. 3rd year has seen many a sleepless night on call :( , but there's no reason outside of your own doings and personal drama that you shouldn't be sleeping during 1st or 2nd year.
 
i don't have a wife or kids, and my focus is career, and am able to sacrifice sleep and "family time" for things like AMSA, research (at three different institutions, not including my own), etc. my personal philosophy is if you're not pushing yourself to the edge, you're just wasting time. most students however have a full plate with classes alone.

Translation: People really don't like me so I focus on my career to make up for what I lack socially.

winter break i took a full week's call with orthopedics, starting the week before, going thru till its end in the new year. i logged 122 hrs each week.

You know I think you are trying to impress us but really it just makes me laugh that you worked 18 hours per day everyday during your winter break.

You really are that guy
 
a) you must be a budding psychiatrist. a bad one at that. you'll be glad to know that i'm loved by one and all. how? i spill the negative energy and thrive from the inane idiocies that arise here, and take all the positive energy to friends and family

instatewaiter - translation, you weren't up to the standard of finding a real research job, or don't care to work where you're required to think more than needed, and pay via waiting on tables. and your mcat score wasn't good enough to teach kaplan either

see, i can do it too! how true is it tho? probably not at all.

b) not 18. weekend call was 36 hrs straight, so mondays were light. they let me do a TKA (they talked me through the whole thing) by the second week; it was sweet
 
huge amount of sleep if you skip class. i average at least 9
 
Well I'm a pretty busy first year...I have all the M1 classes, my research for my Ph.D. and I'm an adjunct professor at another college and teach 2 science course.

With all this, I still try to get my 8 hrs worth of sleep otherwise I'm not at my best. It varies during testing weeks or deadlines that must be reached but never for an extended period of time. I can't function if I only get 5 hrs a sleep on daily basis.
 
sounds like most people get enough sleep. you simply cannot cram for tests all through med school... 'it's not a sprint, it's a marathon'.

good luck
 
i slept ~7 because that's how long i sleep... but could have easily slept 10 or 11. Class is rarely > 1/2 day & having them recorded @ posted online was an added bonus
 
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