How hard is medical school?

[ElJamo17]

Technical standards for my school:

i think that is doable for me... what I can't do is hours on my feet and a lot of running around. But a sedentary specialty with occasional moving around and examining things would be doable

---

Members don't see this ad.

 

[slowthai]

what's integrated?

Integrated refers to the integrated pathway to a specialty, like integrated plastic surgery, integrated cardiothoracic surgery, or integrated vascular surgery. The traditional pathway for these fields is 5-7 years of general surgery residency + 2-3 years of subspecialty fellowship. The integrated pathways vary in the amount of general surgery time, but I believe more time is spent in the surgical subspecialty. So it's 6 years total for plastics, 6 years for cardiothoracic, and 5 years for vascular. It's considerably more competitive to match into these integrated spots straight out of med school, as there are so few spots available. I will say that in at least one of these specialties (plastics), the traditional pathway is getting phased out, so that route is becoming more competitive as well.

 

[xffan624]

What residency are you in? I have back problems so I can't do any specialties that require a lot of time on your feet.

Besides the surgical ones and probably ob-gyn, none will require you to be primarily on your feet, but there are rounds for IM, peds, and FM (during inpatient months). If they are bedside rounds then you will be standing for a couple hours. The difference is I felt as as resident more comfortable just taking a rolling chair with me if it was a bad day for my knees. Also unlike in medical school instead of shadowing in some subspecialty clinic and standing during the patient encounters because there's only two chairs (or more, but family present) you will be the one interviewing the patient so you will have chair. Higher up the totem pole means more opportunity to sit down.

 

[THEBACKANDFORTH]

If you get in, you should go.

I'm a third year who's planning on applying psych. I'm fairly certain my future life will be rewarding.

Med students love to humble brag about how hard they work, but in all honesty, nothing is that intellectually challenging. It just is a lot sometimes, especially if you're a bit of a procrastinator, because then you will inevitably end up with week-long non stop study binges. But there are a lot worse things in life.

FYI--You can certainly can get by with 4-6 hours of work per day on down weeks as long as you're okay with getting 80% average on the tests (hint--you should be). People who study for 12+ hours a day are killing themselves with dubious perfection.

 

[Dr. Basketball]

M2 here. Just wanted to second the student specific part. I study 6.5 days a week(by choice) but have a couple braniac classmates that take weekends off. Could I pass if I cut my studying down? Maybe, not willing to find out though. Also, this is not a humble brag. The fear of failure drives me and that's just how I do things. I enjoy the sense of urgency. Everyone gets their own rhythm of how they choose to study and what works for them. Also note that for me, and a lot of my classmates, how I studied in undergrad is not at all how I study now. I think you have a valid question, it's just hard to gauge. But I think it might be better going in with the grind mentality and overstudying at first until you find what works for you. Best of luck!

*Edited to fix a typo

 

[Angus Avagadro]

How much you study is a very individual thing. My wife, an elite student, went to class to socialize at an east coast university. She graduated in the top 10%. I had to take a more blue collar approach and studied 4 - 6 hrs a day, we had mandatory attendance, and 8 hrs a day on the weekends. It's doable, but is very time consuming. Where I taught, our first semester of med school was like 32 credit hrs to give some perspective.

 

[TwoHighways]

At first it sucks. Then you get used to it. Then you are astounded by how little you know about anything lulz.

 

[frenchyn]

what's integrated?

Integrated plastic or CT. Those are very competitive

 

[slowthai]

In his heyday, @Foot Fetish would jump in this thread posting paragraphs about how he pulls straight 100s on all his exams with 10-12 hour days. Miss him. Wonder what field he ended up in. I know he was originally DR, then derm, but he ended up switching to something else I think

Edit: He was actually still derm but with a "start a cosmetic boutique and make beaucoup bucks" backup LOL

 

[altblue]

In his heyday, @Foot Fetish would jump in this thread posting paragraphs about how he pulls straight 100s on all his exams with 10-12 hour days. Miss him. Wonder what field he ended up in. I know he was originally DR, then derm, but he ended up switching to something else I think

He's probably lamenting the fact he never went to pod school

 

[drducky.]

My personal experience: med school is not difficult to just pass...but if you aim for competitive specialties (neurosurgery, integrated...etc) or to rank among the top 10 of your class...it is hard.

If all you have to show for your 12hr/day grind is remembering random garbage from phd’s to get top 10, then it’s def not worth when that time could’ve been spent on boards or even research.

 

[THEBACKANDFORTH]

If all you have to show for your 12hr/day grind is remembering random garbage from phd’s to get top 10, then it’s def not worth when that time could’ve been spent on boards or even research.

or spent enjoying life..

 

[frenchyn]

If all you have to show for your 12hr/day grind is remembering random garbage from phd’s to get top 10, then it’s def not worth when that time could’ve been spent on boards or even research.

Or you can do well on all lmao...

 

[frenchyn]

or spent enjoying life..

Definitely...obviously it depends on your goal and specialty of choice too...lol...

 

[ciestar]

I prioritized my relationship over a lot and didn’t do super great in school. I passed everything, but didnt do great on step 1. Still got a lot of interviews and comfortably matched.

Studying for med school is really as much as you want to get out of it. You do not have to get 100s on every exam. If you’re true pass/fail you definitely don't.

 

[Damson]

Seems unranked pass/fail schools are less stressful, less competitive between peers, and allows more time dedicated to board prep.

 

[THEBACKANDFORTH]

Seems unranked pass/fail schools are less stressful, less competitive between peers, and allows more time dedicated to board prep.

I did didactic at an unranked pass/fail and N=1 this was true. I would call the environment largely collaborative and supportive. Some people humbly did incredibly well, everybody pulled for our few struggling peers, and we shared resources on an open access google drive. I was able to be a comfortably bottom half student that didn't worry about memorizing the stupid details of some guest lecturer's 217 slide powerpoint, then turn around and get a decent Step with decent effort. This is how all schools should be and inevitably will.

 

[altblue]

If all you have to show for your 12hr/day grind is remembering random garbage from phd’s to get top 10, then it’s def not worth when that time could’ve been spent on boards or even research.

That's my philosophy. Do modest board prep in advance, do research I enjoy, triage out PhD infodumps or MD clinical minutiae, pass comfortably, and enjoy life

 

[altblue]

Definitely...obviously it depends on your goal and specialty of choice too...lol...

If you can rule out things like derm and ortho, not much of a point in grinding that hard

 

[ohmanwaddup]

Definitely, but I still feel there are still aspects of medical school that can be challenging. Like, I felt wrapping my head around sodium/water balance and their Tx were as challenging as some aspects of organic chemistry. Heart physiology can be hard to grasp for some if they don't have a solid physio or physics background too

Struggle super hard with cardio phys and im a third year.

 

[ElJamo17]

thanks for the responses everyone. I'm more motivated to study hard for the MCAT and apply to med school now

 

[altblue]

thanks for the responses everyone. I'm more motivated to study hard for the MCAT and apply to med school now

Best of luck...! and don't let us all scare you. As long as you're decently smart and willing to work hard, med school is very doable

 

[JJonak]

Hi everyone,
I was pre-med and have been thinking about getting my **** together in order to apply to med school but I do struggle with stress a bit. So, I wanted to ask, how hard is medical school anyways?
I didn't study much in college, but I did study for 5-6 hours a day 5-6 times a week in my post-bacc and I did well, got all A's. I think I did get one A- but that's a long story that I don't want to get into here. I didn't study much for a genetics exam and that is why I got an A- in that class.
How much of a jump is it from college if you are taking like 13-15 credits/semester at a state school? Honestly, my post-bacc was challenging. I'm not sure if I could go at a much higher pace for very long without burning out.
Please help because I am considering a couple of other careers and would like to know people's experience with med school.
Thanks!

So, the problem with medical school is that, if you don't study consistently, the material piles up and it's essentially impossible to catch up.
But honestly, if you study, actively learning for 3 hours every day, you should be fine.
Of course, some days you might need to study some more and some other days even less, but yeah, that's the idea.

Also, I think the difficulty in medical school also has to do with your own personal goals. What I mean by this, if you're a student who is dead-set ona residency such as derm, plastics, ent, ortho, etc, then you might have a lot of pressure to "be in the top".

 

[jmtbekm]

So, the problem with medical school is that, if you don't study consistently, the material piles up and it's essentially impossible to catch up.
But honestly, if you study, actively learning for 3 hours every day, you should be fine.
Of course, some days you might need to study some more and some other days even less, but yeah, that's the idea.

Also, I think the difficulty in medical school also has to do with your own personal goals. What I mean by this, if you're a student who is dead-set ona residency such as derm, plastics, ent, ortho, etc, then you might have a lot of pressure to "be in the top".

This! A few hours of active studying a day is so much more efficient than being in a chair 12 hrs a day studying passively or inefficiently.

Also, I hate the pancake analogy they use to describe medical school, but it’s true. You have to stay on top of each day’s work, or it will quickly become an insurmountable mountain before exams.

 

[GoSpursGo]

Moving to pre-med

 

[DNAJB6]

First two years will destroy you mentally, third year will destroy you physically and 4th year is the light at the end of the tunnel.

Discipline is more important than motivation.

I guess residency is Dante's inferno.