Future in Medicine for Below Average Med Students

[BTR41]

Hello,

I was doing pretty well in medical school untilI I got to the second semester. This semester I have definitely been below average. I usually am 1-2 points above average for the final grade, exactly at the mean, or 1-2 points below. My first semester my grades were averaging 82-87 %. My first grade in gastroenteriology and reproductive, I got a 78 which was 5 points below average. We are starting on Neurology and I legit failed a quiz. Its only a four week class so that is a pretty big deal. I don't know if I could change my study habits or what to do.

I am wondering what specilaities are out there for average and maybe if my pattern continues below average medical students at unranked MD programs especially with Step being P/F.

Any support or insight would be very appreiciated. I am not interested in family medicine or neurology (that class is literally hell). I just feel demoralized and many of my friends at my medical school or other medical school are above average so there advice has not been super relevant.

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[Chibucks15]

I was a little below average and am going into neuro and have had like a 60% return on interviews at pretty good places as a DO. You don’t have to be top of the class or anything. Get good letters and try to find research. Preclinical years mean nothing unless you want the big ivory tower places. Don’t worry about it

 

[Banco]

Bro pre-clinical doesn't matter at all, do not draw any lines to future residency possibilities based a few inconsequential exams where you got a couple point below the mean. About half of medical students are "below average" and no specialties are closed off for them. You will be fine.


I was very average in pre-clinical, did really well in clinical and steps - for some people certain things click better than others. Just work hard and you will be fine.

 

[Lucca]

literally every metric in med school is worthless, dont sweat it just do well on your boards, figure out what you love, and focus on learning as much as you can wrt taking care of patients. Residency is on the other side, med school is mostly hazing. Nobody really knows what the post S1 P/F meta is gonna be like, but likely Step 2 CK >= clinical grades > research >> everything else so think about those as the bars you have to meet and apply into whatever speaks to you, dont worry about what you "can" or "cant" match into until you've done some M3 and CK

 

[FlowRate]

Being below average on preclin won't sink you. But make sure you're learning stuff, basic sci is variably important depending on what field you're talking about but it will help make a lot of clinical medicine make more sense. And, depending on the culture where you rotate, plenty of attendings like to ask basic sci questions. Like other people said, the more important metrics for residency choice are clinical and step score. There are some residencies that require near perfection (the usual derm, ortho etc. tier) but most of them are doable as long as you get good clinically and impress your local folks. If you don't have a home residency that may make things slightly more difficult but still doable.

We had P/F preclin. I had a friend who had low clinical grades, 188 step 1 (when that was still passing), and matched anesthesia at our name-brand institution because she was good at anesthesia and they liked her.

 

[Captain_Falcon]

Only 4 weeks for neuro?! Its like 13 weeks at my school

 

[Dral]

I was in the middle of the pack, maybe just above average overall.

I failed an exam in med school.

I got into Derm.

You're fine. If anything, just change study habits to learn the material so you know it if needed down the line, but don't stress about your grade/rank too much. Some things are just tough for some people. I'm very visual so anatomy clicked but Pharm was hellish. Again, don't stress about it too much.

 

[Lem0nz]

Bottom quartile first two years - actually had a study group that I put together with other people who were borderline failing or actually failing. Failed one exam entirely in path and got put on academic probation for that year. Couple passes in clinicals, high pass in surgery (had an intern who hated me), I think only one honors. Got into surgery and jumped to 80+ percentile on ABSITE because I just hated everything not surgery and my personality takes awhile to warm up to.

Now?

#surgoncfellow

You'll be fine.

 

[Frazier]

what happens to below average med students in the future?

Jk, they will become physicians and be fine.

 

[BTR41]

Thanks for the responses. Do you all have any advice on how to learn neruo in 4 weeks or like what you would do? I thought 4 weeks was really weird as well and don't think alot of medical schools do it this way.

 

[Frogger27]

I was in the 4th quartile in pre-clinicals, applied a surgical subspecialty and got >20 IIs.

Don’t let pre clinicals play a factor in what specialty you want to pursue

 

[Zen Arcade]

Thanks for the responses. Do you all have any advice on how to learn neruo in 4 weeks or like what you would do? I thought 4 weeks was really weird as well and don't think alot of medical schools do it this way.

We did neuro in 5 weeks as part of a 1.5 year pre clinical curriculum. Honestly, I think the shorter preclinicals really shows in this unit in particular - you just fly through the info to the point that you barely learn it and some concepts just aren't fully explained - so I feel your pain. Usually they design it so you will see this info again in clinicals. Maybe I'll change my mind after I make it through clinicals, but I can't imagine taking a couple extra electives in 4th year being better than properly learning the pre clinical material. This is just my opinion, I'm sure others see it differently. Anyway, my recommendation is to draw things out. Neuro pathways require you to set up a visual schema in your mind so putting it all on paper goes a long way.

 

[Chibucks15]

Thanks for the responses. Do you all have any advice on how to learn neruo in 4 weeks or like what you would do? I thought 4 weeks was really weird as well and don't think alot of medical schools do it this way.

Just learn the basics. If it’s neuroanatomy just learn where things cross and logic your way through it. Other than that most of it is just the rule of 4s, clinical management like every other class, and certain basic syndromes. Just push through there’s no magic secret formula. It’s so easy to get lost in the minutiae and preclinical neuro really isn’t the same as actual neuro.

 

[operaman]

My read of your post is that aside from a neuro quiz, you’ve done pretty well and are probably right around the average. Adding to the others that pre clinicals don’t necessarily foretell your career and I would argue that pretty much everything remains open to you.

What ultimately matters is the pattern. If you continue being average throughout medical school and boards and are a generally likable person then you should have no trouble matching into most fields, though realistically the odds of hyper competitive fields would be lower. That’s the path for the majority of students, hence why it’s the average. As to career after that, most options are in play. Medicine is an odd field where prestige tends to pay a lot less in the end. Young faculty at top schools make a LOT (2-3x) less than small town docs in private practice.

For truly well below average students things aren’t quite as rosy. I suspect these students are the focus of much effort by administrators to ensure they graduate and match. These are more outliers than below average - the people a couple standard deviations below the class average. Their careers are probably more limited in terms of specialty and practice type, but they will still end up as some of the highest paid professionals in the world.

 

[slowthai]

@operaman, how feasible is it to make a salary comparable to that of private practice as an academician if you're not a chair or coming up with patents? I know some people do consulting and speaking engagements, but I can't imagine that actually amounts to that much.