How compelling is science?

[graciegreen]

---

Members don't see this ad.

So I'm back in school knocking out my pre-reqs (it's my first semester, back to school after years out) and I was talking to someone last week about how at UCSF they recommend you study about 12-14 hours a day the month before the boards and how intimidating that is, and HE said (he's got scholarships to some top 10s for this fall, very knowledgeable, and is just a very awesome person all around) by then you are studying stuff you should find interesting and in your field and if it's not you should really rethink your field/career choice (or something like that).
I'm someone who has lived and worked in various humanities based environments, writing, music, literature, that sort of thing. I have pretty much no science background and find that learning about organelles in bio and orbitals in chem is actually far more interesting than I would have thought I'd find it, and I'm doing well, (A's thus far--I work hard for them, don't get me wrong), but the question is (god sorry this is sooo long!)

I definitely don't find the Krebb's cycle or the solubility rules or anything as exciting as I found Foucault when I first read Discipline and Punish and suddenly had to read everything he'd written, or when I read the Odyssey, and had to read a few translations because it was just so stunningly beautiful. These things captured me. Science is interesting, but I'm one of those people who finds damn near everything interesting. I just love learning about stuff. Some of the other returning people with more science backgrounds pick the stuff up faster, don't seem to have to work as hard, and seem to be more excited by the stuff.
Is this going to hinder me as a doctor? MD is a science based degree, and I'm guessing one really has to LOVE it to endure this process and the studying of biochem and crap those first 2 years. I don't know, I guess I'm just suddenly nervous and questioning etc. Any ideas/experiences? I already know how much these forums and all you guys rock!

 

[Febrifuge]

I'm in a similar boat, except my prereqs start in June, when I begin my postbac. I think science is cool, and as I recall, I used to do really well in it... in 9th grade. I recently took a Bio 101 course and that was pretty much as you describe: fascinating, but only to a point. Not something I can stay up all night discussing with classmates, as I did through my BA.

But here's the thing: medicine is not science. Medicine is built on science. I've spent a lot of time working and observing in real clinical situations, and working with people well and working hard matter as much as having a databank in your head. So no, a lack of passion for minutiae like the Krebs Cycle will not hinder you as a physician, as long as you're conversant in the information. A lack of passion for the day-to-day practice of medicine, regardless of how obscure or complex the problem, might be a big obstacle, and presumably that's one that you don't need to worry about.

I'll appreciate having the science knowledge to explain to myself and others what's up with the processes happening in patients. But the ability to ask the right questions is as important as knowing the answers, and us liberal arts types usually have a big head start on the former skill.

 

[efex101]

the bottom line is that the first two years of medical school IS learning minutae ad nauseum! do you have to love it? no but you do have to be able to study a lot although you may not like it...

 

[Skialta]

I will admit there is a lot of science that is really pretty boring and not all that exciting to learn. You won't be finding me reading some basic science textbook in my free time (at least not very often). There is a lot of minutae that you have to learn in medical school, especially first year. It that seems pretty much like a bunch of BS, but there will come a day when some of that seemingly useless information will be helpful. The difference between being a midlevel provider and being a physician is when it comes down to some of that science and BS you learned. For example, when a patient comes and asks you why there medication label on their cyclosporine says they can't eat grapefruit, you know the exact reason why they can't and what the consequences of that would be. You now the enzyme inhibited, the general pathway and what the effect would be. That is a basic example.

The real reason why having had so much science begins to become more interesting is when it comes down to looking at medical problems and thinking about how you might direct future research or treatment in the future. The general perspective by the public is that most things in medicine have been somehow figured out, especially since the human genome project. I even had fallen into this trap somewhat before starting medical school even though I had a lot of medical experience before school. Having been involved in research for the past two years it is amazing just how much out there remains unknown! People become physicians for all reasons and we need all types of physicians, but I feel we have an obligation to future generations to help further the base of medical knowledge. That doesn't mean that all physicians should be doing basic science, but we should be involved in the process through clinical research, supporting research through memberships and following evidence based practices. Seeing patients is great, but I think for all practitioners on some level your specialty will one day become a job, continuing to learn through innovation and research is what is stimulating. I think having that kind of desire to further our knowledge is what separates physicians as a whole apart from the other providers.

Skialta MS2

 

[brotherbloat]

I thought I might add some thoughts here. I majored in art history in college, got a master's in art, then worked as an artist, then took my pre-reqs for the first time as a post-bacc. That was after having been severely intimidated by science in high school (and not doing particularly well in it either, I got C's in physics and Bs in the others in high school.) I took bio in college frosh year and got B-. Anyhow, so you can see that I thought science was intimidating and as a result I always had the opinion that science was boring and not for me.

Fast forward to post-bacc. I am 26 when I start. I take all my pre-reqs in one year. I find a motivation within myself that I never knew I had. Discipline kicked into gear, and I ended up with a 3.7 post-bacc average of 35 credit hours. I'm pretty proud of the fact that this is way higher than my undergrad GPA or my grad GPA, because I found--as a non-science person--that I truly loved the science. Okay, so I hated organic chemistry with a passion--I found it useless and pointless--but I enjoyed everything else. I truly feel that I have a brain for science--and I am very, very excited to take some upper level bios this year--cell and biochem and advanced physio as I wait for the admissions game to play out.

So take it from someone who thought science would never be for them--when you're motivated to do something you love, the inner joys and fasicnating of science may come out and surprise you. I even enjoyed re-studying for the MCAT the second time around (this April test.)

Cheers!

-BB

 

[Law2Doc]

I thought I might add some thoughts here. I majored in art history in college, got a master's in art, then worked as an artist, then took my pre-reqs for the first time as a post-bacc. That was after having been severely intimidated by science in high school (and not doing particularly well in it either, I got C's in physics and Bs in the others in high school.) I took bio in college frosh year and got B-. Anyhow, so you can see that I thought science was intimidating and as a result I always had the opinion that science was boring and not for me.

Fast forward to post-bacc. I am 26 when I start. I take all my pre-reqs in one year. I find a motivation within myself that I never knew I had. Discipline kicked into gear, and I ended up with a 3.7 post-bacc average of 35 credit hours. I'm pretty proud of the fact that this is way higher than my undergrad GPA or my grad GPA, because I found--as a non-science person--that I truly loved the science. Okay, so I hated organic chemistry with a passion--I found it useless and pointless--but I enjoyed everything else. I truly feel that I have a brain for science--and I am very, very excited to take some upper level bios this year--cell and biochem and advanced physio as I wait for the admissions game to play out.

So take it from someone who thought science would never be for them--when you're motivated to do something you love, the inner joys and fasicnating of science may come out and surprise you. I even enjoyed re-studying for the MCAT the second time around (this April test.)

Cheers!

-BB

I also think science clicks for different people at different times. It's as much about mindset as it is about interest. I too was a liberal arts major with a fear of sciences who, many years after college, decided to tackle them in a postbac and did quite well.
Bear in mind that not everybody who succeeds in medical school is a "scientist" by nature. The reason med schools are admitting so many non-science majors these days is that medicine is only partly about science, and in a big way is also about interpersonal "people" skills. (This is also the reason that the interview plays a big role in admissions, unlike in other graduate programs).

 

[QofQuimica]

I agree with the posters who've said that you can't know now whether you'll enjoy the sciences in medical school. I started out as a math major in college, switched to biology and Spanish, and then took organic my junior year. I loved it so much that my senior year I took almost all chemistry classes and I ended up going to graduate school in organic chemistry. But if you'd asked me my sophomore year whether I'd even have considered majoring in chemistry, much less gone to grad school, there's no way I'd have even considered it. I found physics and gen chem to both be ridiculously boring and repetitive, merely mathematical manipulation and not related to much in the "real world." Big deal, so I could do the math. But even there, I was wrong, because when I took physical chemistry as a grad student, I found that fascinating as well. Quantum chemistry in particular just blew my mind.

I'm not feeling terribly excited about learning anatomy, but I'd love to be proven wrong. 😛

 

[Skialta]

Surprisingly the most used science to this point in medical school is physics. You deal with physics far more than you do anything else although you can't forget acid/base.

 

[IUgrad]

I completely agree with Law2Doc & brotherbloat! I also think it clicks for different people at different times in their life. I remember that I didn't have much interest in science in high school (as evidenced by my medicore science grades). I ended up majoring in journalism and business because I enjoyed the "liberal arts" type of subjects.
When I started back to school last fall, I was terrified at the prospect of starting chemistry and biology after not having had them for almost 10 years. I thought it would be really boring and that I'd have to push myself to be interested and study. As it turns out, I really LOVED both general chemistry and biology classes! In fact, I got a 3.9 in the fall and 4.0 in the spring, without really working much harder than I did in undergrad.
I think that you'll find that you won't hate it all - give yourself a chance. I bet there will be things that you'll really enjoy in the pre-requisite classes. Good luck!

 

[dry dre]

Science is interesting, but I'm one of those people who finds damn near everything interesting. I just love learning about stuff. Some of the other returning people with more science backgrounds pick the stuff up faster, don't seem to have to work as hard, and seem to be more excited by the stuff.

Note that it's easier to be excited about something when you aren't killing yourself trying to understand it in the first place.

I'm not calling you out when I say this: if you REALLY like learning about stuff, and learning how things work, you will never regret going into medicine. There are endless things to learn and keep track of. In medicine you are limited of course to human physiology, but if you like integrating knowledge, again medicine in the place to be. The body has a gazillion things going on at any given moment, a lot of which is hard to keep track of without referencing books (on stuff you previously studied).

Regarding 14 hour board study etc: When you are studying for boards you are generally doing nothing but review of things you've already studied, and frankly knew at some point but forgot. While it can be tough to get motivated to study, it's not because of the subject matter, it's more because you're tired of studying, or have other things going on. At the same time, if you're at all OCD (like 99% of docs), you'll end up studying because you know you need to because what you are studying/reviewing is knowledge necessary for your work.

I entered med school with a social science degree, though I've always been intrigued by science (I used to and still read on subjects of quantum physics, non-human biology, other technologies). Don't be worried about "not picking stuff up so quickly." I was the same way in the first two years of med school, averaging in the middle of my class and working 2-3x as hard to get where I was. I studied things way too far in depth, because I found it interesting. In the clinical years this really paid off and I graduated near the top of my class.

 

[NY Musicologist]

I majored in art history in college, got a master's in art, then worked as an artist, then took my pre-reqs for the first time as a post-bacc. That was after having been severely intimidated by science in high school (and not doing particularly well in it either, I got C's in physics and Bs in the others in high school.) I took bio in college frosh year and got B-. Anyhow, so you can see that I thought science was intimidating and as a result I always had the opinion that science was boring and not for me.

Glad to read the postings by graciegreen, brotherbloat, and others. My boat is comparable to gracie's in that I'm slogging through a degree program (musicology--could hardly be further from medicine), enjoying some but definitely not all of my studies, seeing folks around me who seem to be WAY more passionate about it, and wondering if the fact that I have no problem going to bed at a decent time without reading "just one more page" means that I'm not a great fit in the field. As someone else mentioned in this forum, however, I've been told that the actual career I end up with (if I stay in this area) will be differently configured in terms of what knowledge I use, when, and why. It's a dilemma for sure--don't want to force myself to pursue this if it's not something that really gets me up every morning, but also don't want to "waste" all my training up to this point without giving it a fair chance. But on the other hand, by giving it a "fair chance" (i.e., finishing my PhD, getting a professorship, and teaching for at least a couple of years), I'll push the medical timeline further and further down the road (i.e., starting postbacc in the early/mid-30s). ANd then if I start postbacc, or even med school, and find out that I don't feel that much different about science/medicine than I did about musicology?! 😱

Which brings me to the reason I quoted brotherbloat above: I forged my identity as a musician and a verbally-oriented person very early in life, and never tried too hard to pursue anything else. I got this idea in my head that math was "hard" and science was "hard" and I was a "verbal person" who was "too stupid for math/science." Never even gave myself a chance to succeed--just drowned in negative self-talk. Of course, it probably didn't help that my dad is a chemistry prof--I think I was (am!) afraid of doing poorly in that territory. Anyway, I'm sure I could be moderately successful and moderately happy doing what I'm doing now, but there's a part of me that wants to go back and open doors that I closed for the wrong reasons. Thanks, brotherbloat, for confirming that it's possible.

Best of luck to all! 🙂

Which

 

[mshheaddoc]

So I'm back in school knocking out my pre-reqs (it's my first semester, back to school after years out) and I was talking to someone last week about how at UCSF they recommend you study about 12-14 hours a day the month before the boards and how intimidating that is, and HE said (he's got scholarships to some top 10s for this fall, very knowledgeable, and is just a very awesome person all around) by then you are studying stuff you should find interesting and in your field and if it's not you should really rethink your field/career choice (or something like that).

Ok, some insight from what I have observed. My boyfriend is studying for Step 1 right now, he hates it. But remember for the most part it is all review. He is reading a bunch of review books before his school's "review" program starts but he doesn't enjoy it. He knows what specialty he wants. But still, I can guarantee you, its pulling teeth with him and he finds ways to distract himself other than studying. I want him to get to the point of studying for 2 years straight. I know about 6 people who are studying for step 1 right now and all of them are so sick of school right now. They don't want to study but know they need to. Yes you will be studying alot, but most of the stuff you will forget (that is why there are reference books) but you will understand how medicine works. That is the most important part.

Is this going to hinder me as a doctor? MD is a science based degree, and I'm guessing one really has to LOVE it to endure this process and the studying of biochem and crap those first 2 years. I don't know, I guess I'm just suddenly nervous and questioning etc. Any ideas/experiences? I already know how much these forums and all you guys rock!

And no, i do not know ONE person that loved their first two years of medical school. I know what I'm getting into from observing others. Yes its scary but then I see how many of my friends are getting through it. Its nice to have their insight to help me so I don't make the same mistakes. And you are right, these boards do rawk!