failing anatomy and i need advice. have a meeting with professor

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lightheart2017

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Gonna keep it short and to the point,

I am a struggling MS1 at a US MD school. I think I have a serious issue with spatial memory that I have to work on.

On my first practical I got a 68. At my school you pass with 70 or more. My mistake there was that I feel I didn’t practice enough/went to lab. Shortly after I had my first lecture exam. Got a disappointing 50.... I was shocked but at the same time I realized if I failed the practical, well, what was I expecting. I expected to score similar to my practical, not almost 20 points below.

I am scheduled for a meeting with faculty in order to discuss my performance in the course. I’m scared. What can I expect from this?
 
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Gonna keep it short and to the point,

I am a struggling MS1 at a US MD school. I think I have a serious issue with spatial memory that I have to work on.

On my first practical I got a 68. At my school you pass with 70 or more. My mistake there was that I feel I didn’t practice enough/went to lab. Shortly after I had my first lecture exam. Got a disappointing 50.... I was shocked but at the same time I realized if I failed the practical, well, what was I expecting. I expected to score similar to my practical, not almost 20 points below.

I am scheduled for a meeting with faculty in order to discuss my performance in the course. I’m scared. What can I expect from this?
They will likely ask you how you are studying and suggest alterations to your plan. What is your method? How many more exams do you have for the class?
You can still salvage this! Anatomy pushes all of us, but it's doable.
 
Anatomy is hard and it sounds like you're doing the right thing about being proactive. Your professor likely just wants to discuss your study methods and see if you can come up with a plan to improve performance. How are you studying? I found my first anatomy practical extremely difficult (it was also MSK) but I thought it was helpful to make Anki occlusion cards from our class lectures and then spend as much time as possible in the lab on many different bodies identifying all the "taggable" structures.
 
They will likely ask you how you are studying and suggest alterations to your plan. What is your method? How many more exams do you have for the class?
You can still salvage this! Anatomy pushes all of us, but it's doable.

Thank you so much! I was starting to feel hopeless. I have 2 practicals and 2 lectures exam left. I have to kill them if I want to pass :/ And what I was doing was looking at Netter’s and doing Michigan questions. I feel like I can’t really retain anything in anatomy because nothing makes sense (IMO) it’s like here, drill these words into your brain and spit it out on the test (venting)
 
They will likely ask you how you are studying and suggest alterations to your plan. What is your method? How many more exams do you have for the class?
You can still salvage this! Anatomy pushes all of us, but it's doable.

Anatomy is hard and it sounds like you're doing the right thing about being proactive. Your professor likely just wants to discuss your study methods and see if you can come up with a plan to improve performance. How are you studying? I found my first anatomy practical extremely difficult (it was also MSK) but I thought it was helpful to make Anki occlusion cards from our class lectures and then spend as much time as possible in the lab on many different bodies identifying all the "taggable" structures.


An upperclassmen told me the way to study is do all michigan questions, all BRS questions, and Lippincott, and read the Big Moore clinicals. He said “what more coild they ask you?”

What do you all think of this method?
 
An upperclassmen told me the way to study is do all michigan questions, all BRS questions, and Lippincott, and read the Big Moore clinicals. He said “what more coild they ask you?”

What do you all think of this method?
I agree with talking with an upperclassman. Student Affairs should have a list of tutors who might be able to improve your study strategies. Hang in there, dig in and work harder. This is far from over.
 
Take my advice with a grain of salt, as my first anatomy practical is next Tuesday. But consider using the Netter anki deck, which you'll find with a quick google search. Suspend the cards you don't need, and consider editing the muscle cards to simplify the origins/insertions and/or conform them to your class notes, if there are discrepancies. Anki I find is better and less stressful for memorization than trying to write everything out on paper, and hoping you retain it. Of course you'll still need to recognize the structures in lab, so consider tutoring, Rohen's anatomy, or Downstate's anatomy dissector website.
 
Don't worry I'm an OMS-1 who failed his first practical as well 64%, and barely passed the first lecture exam 70%. I had to meet with my advisor, academic support, and the mental wellness director. On top of that I gotta get tutoring. All they want is to help you, and making sure you're doing the right thing. And to be honest, I'm doing much better this time around. The first time, I simply wasn't putting enough effort into it by not going to lab on my free time and procrastinated a little bit on studying till the last week of the exam. With anatomy, you just have to put in the effort, and you're gonna be fine.

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Try studying with someone else and talking it out. Work together to make visual representations of everything. I still remember the celiac trunk and superior/inferior mesenteric blood supply because I worked together to draw it out with my friend. I found reading anatomy by myself to be incredibly ineffective.
 
Gonna keep it short and to the point,

I am a struggling MS1 at a US MD school. I think I have a serious issue with spatial memory that I have to work on.

On my first practical I got a 68. At my school you pass with 70 or more. My mistake there was that I feel I didn’t practice enough/went to lab. Shortly after I had my first lecture exam. Got a disappointing 50.... I was shocked but at the same time I realized if I failed the practical, well, what was I expecting. I expected to score similar to my practical, not almost 20 points below.

I am scheduled for a meeting with faculty in order to discuss my performance in the course. I’m scared. What can I expect from this?
Advice on how to do better. You yourself have recognized one of your deficits.

Also, do not merely brute memorize. Think about how you would explain to a patient's family what trauma might do to a structure's function....or your Gramma how a particular structure works.
 
An upperclassmen told me the way to study is do all michigan questions, all BRS questions, and Lippincott, and read the Big Moore clinicals. He said “what more coild they ask you?”

What do you all think of this method?
I concur with the Anki/questions approach. It’s all about repetition and application
 
An upperclassmen told me the way to study is do all michigan questions, all BRS questions, and Lippincott, and read the Big Moore clinicals. He said “what more coild they ask you?”

What do you all think of this method?

That's what I did in med school and I crushed anatomy.

Then again, I liked anatomy in the first place, so that helped.
 
1.
Dumb question but what does MSK stand for?

doesnt-go-here.jpg



2. OP, I agree with the above advice. Try out some new strategies and see what works. Lots of people struggle(d) with anatomy (including myself). You can do it!
 
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