I don't think I'm cut out for med school. Am I setting myself up for misery?

[medstudent87]

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I'm in my second year right now. I finished first year with only passes in all my courses (no honors) and I failed neuroscience, which I remediated over the summer. I was hoping that this year would go better, but so far I'm doing incredibly terribly. I'm failing pharmacology and after today's path exam, I think I might be failing that as well. I just can't do it. I sit down for hours and hours, days and days, trying to memorize the insane amount of material like everyone else, yet it seems to take me MUCH longer and I always forget everything come test day. I never had great work-ethic when it came to studying and didn't know what I was getting myself into with med school. Memorization is obviously not my thing either...instead I'm VERY VERY good at thinking, solving complex math problems, etc. I'm beginning to think that I should've went into engineering since I LOVE mechanical things and design in general.

Thing is, I'm $130k in debt already, so I CANNOT quit. Its not that I don't find medicine interesting, its simply the fact that I'm unable to memorize and study the way everyone else does. I'm so incredibly upset and don't know what to do....

I guess I should've taken a hint when I needed to take physics. I enjoyed the course very much while all the other med students struggled with it and hated it. Furthermore, they all hated Calc I, but I went on to take calc II, calc III, linear algebra, differential equations, etc. I love that stuff.

In the words of Gob Bluth, "I've made a huge mistake."

 

[turkeyjerky]

First of all, how the hell are you 130k in debt already? You're a year and a half (tuition wise) into med school--why are you borrowing $87,000 per year?

Also, get off that thought-train of, "I'm so good at reasoning, but I just don't like memorizing stuff like the rest of my classmates." Everyone believes that about themselves. The truth? You're sucking it up at school. If still want to be a doctor some day, you have to figure out how to stop sucking. You're not as smart as you think you are, and you don't work as hard as you think you do. Quit thinking you're better than everyone else because you took advanced math--nobody gives a flying f^ck.

This isn't about whether or not you're capable of memorizing a bunch of facts for a test. This is about whether or not you want to be a doctor.

Sorry for being so blunt.

 

[Ragman]

You can't quit. You signed a blood oath. If you quit they will find you.

 

[yakiea]

So I'm totally in your boat. And I think you do have to suck it up but I have to paint it in different terms...

So, I wasn't a fan of memorization because I felt (and perhaps still feel) that it is not as intellectual a feat as actual understanding, conceptualization or working out a problem you know...My grades were definitely not exceptional but I sat my ass down and studied the way that med students are supposed to and as a result, I aced Step 2.

So it's a transition in thought and mentality but you know, you have to decide if you want it and then make a decision to do what is necessary to do it. Because it is really more about the will. But the big part is that you need to know what it takes...and if you are willing to do it...

You can do it. 👍

 

[Quinone]

First of all, how the hell are you 130k in debt already? You're a year and a half (tuition wise) into med school--why are you borrowing $87,000 per year?

Some people have to borrow for undergrad too...?

Quit thinking you're better than everyone else because you took advanced math--nobody gives a flying f^ck.

Dude...this is unnecessarily harsh. The OP doesn't sound arrogant at all. If the OP is having trouble memorizing lots of stupid medical details but enjoys complex math then more power to him/her. Maybe you are simply a bit jealous that physics wasn't your strong suit?

OP...if you are in that much debt then you probably should keep at it as long as possible. Speak to your professors NOW and find out what you can do to change your studying (if that is where the problem lies - since you're already putting in the time, you should be seeing results). Find a tutor if you need one. Get your hands on previous exams and note what the profs like to ask. You CAN do this - your school wouldn't have let you in if they seriously thought you weren't going to make it.

 

[unsung]

I'm in my second year right now. I finished first year with only passes in all my courses (no honors) and I failed neuroscience, which I remediated over the summer. I was hoping that this year would go better, but so far I'm doing incredibly terribly. I'm failing pharmacology and after today's path exam, I think I might be failing that as well. I just can't do it. I sit down for hours and hours, days and days, trying to memorize the insane amount of material like everyone else, yet it seems to take me MUCH longer and I always forget everything come test day. I never had great work-ethic when it came to studying and didn't know what I was getting myself into with med school. Memorization is obviously not my thing either...instead I'm VERY VERY good at thinking, solving complex math problems, etc. I'm beginning to think that I should've went into engineering since I LOVE mechanical things and design in general.

Thing is, I'm $130k in debt already, so I CANNOT quit. Its not that I don't find medicine interesting, its simply the fact that I'm unable to memorize and study the way everyone else does. I'm so incredibly upset and don't know what to do....

I guess I should've taken a hint when I needed to take physics. I enjoyed the course very much while all the other med students struggled with it and hated it. Furthermore, they all hated Calc I, but I went on to take calc II, calc III, linear algebra, differential equations, etc. I love that stuff.

In the words of Gob Bluth, "I've made a huge mistake."

Hey, hey. I hear you. I liked physics too, and I also took some advanced math courses. (Wasn't GREAT at it like you probably were, but I did enjoy the process of learning how to do proofs, etc. I got a lot out of it.)

Med school is tedious. There's just no comparison between this type of drudgery ("difficult") and the "difficulty" of math/thinking type courses. The latter is tough but pleasurable and fulfilling.

The former is just mind-numbing, and soul-sucking. And even more soul-sucking when I see my peers apparently lapping this stuff up like it's oxygen. (It makes me wonder: What's wrong with me that I'm not finding this stuff half as scintillating as they apparently find it?)

All that said, I've mostly adapted/found my way to deal with the crap. Occasionally, I can do rather well, but it's hard to maintain that level across all subjects... so it ends up averaging out. Also, the material we're tested on at school & the way our courses are set up (no practice exams available, if you can believe) makes it that much more unlikely for me to do truly well... sooo I've kind of given up on that.

BUT, I have my sights set on Step 1. I mean, it actually asks reasonable questions, that are predictable enough for me to study for. I'm saying all this because there's still a lot of hope for you, even if you think you're not doing great in class. It might be that your classes just aren't that great.

Although, if you're failing it's probably more urgent right now for you to figure out a way to pass.

Speaking of pharm, I said this in another thread, but one thing that has worked great for me is making flowcharts. It organizes all that crap, and "chunking" the information in that logical manner makes it much more easy to retain. If you're at all like me, you probably would NOT benefit from the notecard method (which a lot of ppl seem to like). 'Cuz I just can't force myself to memorize each drug by rote, like that, one per notecard. All the drugs sound the same to me, when I tried to do that.

Take "drugs for asthma", what I'd do is take a blank white sheet of paper, split it by "drugs to tx symptoms" & "drugs to treat inflammation". Under "drugs to tx symptoms", I'd split it by (+) sympathetic and (-) parasympathetic, then further split it by SABAs (short-acting beta adrenergics), LABAs (Salmeterol), etc. It's also very logical, once you split it up like that, no?

For each drug lecture, I'd try to find a way to stick all the drugs into one framework, and I find that I retain info about each drug much better once I already have a framework for where the drug fits in my mind, how it relates to other drugs, what drugs belong to the same class/employ the same mech, etc.

There's still rote memorization involved, of course. But it's very very important for me to attempt to structure the onslaught of info in this way. Especially for subjects like pharm or microbiology (worked very well to split the pathogens by G+, G-, cat+/cat-, etc.). This was the solution I found to retain the info.

Because I am NOT a good memorizer at all. Little facts are like little trinkets I just can't seem to hold on to. But once I find some patterns and relate things together, I can hold on much better.

For path, are you using Goljan rapid review? I can't say enough about Goljan- book or lectures. Also recently purchased Robbins Review (Question Book)... very very worthwhile, as well. With these 2 resources, it's really really hard to do super poorly in path, unless your path class is just totally unreasonable. Another good resource is Webpath. I know sometimes it's tough to have too many resources, it's almost like you're overresourced with not enough time. Especially when the class material diverges from the "important stuff" in Goljan 😉. But... I do try to follow along in these resources, and try to make it through at least once before the test. It helps a ton. It doesn't help me with all the little nitpicky stuff some of my classes require... but it does definitely help me hurdle over that "passing" border.

So, long story short, if you're trying to memorize "like everyone else"... maybe it just won't work! I know if I were to use popular techniques I see my classmates doing- things like reading/re-reading (and just basically memorizing it that way) I would totally fail. I would fail if I used notecards to try to memorize pharm, like I see others do, too.

But there are ways to minimize the "rote" part of the memorization. Ways to make things a bit more "patterned"... and it makes it go down much less bitterly. Maybe you just haven't hit your stride yet?

 

[mac_kin]

É)

 

[coup de chance]

All good points above.

Besides, if you quit now and try to get in somewhere else, you might have a hard time... school is school, and quitting doesn't look good when applying somewhere else.

But then again, there are pockets of successful ppl who quit med school before doing something else.

[FYI, everyone else.... the OP posted on the Neuro Forum that OP has decreased sensation over a specific spot.]

Maybe you should just go to your school's urgent care clinic or ER. Get yourself checked out.

Maybe there is something medically wrong with you.

Whether or not you get a clean bill of health, you could use some de-stressing. You should talk to somebody you trust to get a load off your chest and to get some solid advice about your situation.

Likely you'll find somebody like that off SDN.

Try:
- family
- friends
- professors
- dean
- your doctor(s)

Good luck

 

[VoiceofReason]

Sorry, the line that people draw between memorization and conceptual thinking is extremely blurry. You might think you were sick at critical thinking by solving hard math problems, but in reality you just applied a finite list of manipulations of equations and operators that you memorized until trial and error yielded your answer. Mathematical thinking demystified.


The truth is med school is full of "critical thinking" but the amount of information you have to command is orders of magnitude larger. You aren't working hard enough.

 

[Lovenox]

To the above poster
I respectfully disagree with you. Math is not a prestigious field like medicine; however, math is more difficult. It demands more critical thinking and manipulating simple principles across all fields and dimensions. Studying math is like you are receiving a bunch of dots on a circle, you are supposed to connect all of the dots and draw lines through them. In the end, you have a solidly painted circle from those lines. Medicine is like knowing the solid circle and identify the geographical locations on that circle if you are given some information.

My background is a BS in Mathematics and MD.

To the op

Medicine is doable. Please ignore the money issue. Education expense is worth the investment. You need to decide if you want to become an MD or not. If you do then you need to work harder. There are ways to think mechanically in medicine and come out with decent performance. A lot of times, I did not know the answers on Step I and II, but I used concepts to figure the answers. Most of my classmates know the answer because they remember the information. I also had a very difficult time to remember the information, so I used a lot of memory tricks to help me. I used the peg system. For example, Topoisomerase is a strange word for me. The way I remember it is try to somehow retrieve that word if I want. The first thing comes to my mind is Top. That reminds me of a hat. So I think of a place that reminds me of hat and I tag everything in there with Quinolones. I also convert numbers into letters. FUSIL = Fibular nerve (peroneal) 4512 = L4L5S1S2; TUSILE = Tibia L4L5S1S2S3. There are many ways to remember the information. Yes, you have to work harder, but you can make it. If you can get a hold of the PASS program video, watch it. He teaches more conceptually. The information is nowhere close to being thorough, but it should serve as a good foundation.
If you want to become a mathematician, then you go for it. Even if you did well on Cal I, II, III, DEQ, Linear Algebra, etc, do not assume that you will do well in Math. I had As in all of those classes, but I barely maintained a 2.7 in Advanced Linear Algebra, Abstract Algebra, Complex Algebra, ..etc. Upper division math classes is like you are given a flashlight in a dark world and you are supposed to find something with it. It is fun and exciting, but your life can be miserable. Sometimes, you walk around with one problem in your head and you try to solve it all weekend. You may be on a date in a movie theater, but your mind is on the problem. That is why upper division math homework often involves only 3 or 4 problems not 20 problems that you usually get in lower division classes. Anyway, it is a good profession too. I did not like it because it consumed my life.
In medicine, CHF is CHF and DM is DM. Once you start practicing medicine, you only need to know what you see everyday. The diseases and their protocol treatments are boring. The exciting thing in medicine, IMO, are the interactions with patients, their family members, and the staff and the immediate satisfaction of bringing comfort to others.There are many intelligent medical students; there are also many "Joes." Those Joes can make it, you can too. If I made it, you will make it.

I do not come to this website often because I am studying for step III

 

[taratm]

hey medstudent87 just remember to tell me what you decided to do at last...me the same story

 

[Vacant]

Sorry, the line that people draw between memorization and conceptual thinking is extremely blurry. You might think you were sick at critical thinking by solving hard math problems, but in reality you just applied a finite list of manipulations of equations and operators that you memorized until trial and error yielded your answer. Mathematical thinking demystified.

Really? Then you have not really learned Math.

OP, I have felt the same way as you throughout my med school time. Enjoying my 4th year now. I'm not a math major but majored in Philosophy although I've always excelled in math, top in my native (Far East Asian) schools where Math skills are considered world #1 or 2, aced both SAT math and GRE math without studying, never studied for math, physics or chem. This is because all I had to do was understand the principles and then creatively interpret and apply. Memorization? It is the most primitive intellectual faculty which can be readily replaced by simple computers or hand-held devices. There is a general understanding in my motherland: Math and languages are true tests of intelligence.

During my second year I was appalled by the fact that many medical students who are great in memorizing could not do simple algebra. Such people are actually considered "stupid" in some Asian countries.

Unfortunately, medical education and, often, medical practice uphold memorization as the ultimate intellectual activity. No wonder we still don't have very few cures for anything, only more toxic drugs with side effects for which more drugs must be created. Why this pathetic reality in this 21st century? Greed is obviously there. But there is also lack of deep insight, creative and intuitive thinking in this field. Remember that biology fared the same plight until the disillusioned physicists after WWII turned their attention to biology as a means to atone their "sins" of creating deadly weapons. Only then came truly revolutionary leap of development in biology.

Now I can say with confidence that current western medicine does not have any understanding of how our body and cells operate. We may know how to artificially and mechanically prolong the life of each organs but that's about it. What intelligence is there really in these "thinking" if these can be considered thinking:

- Oh, you have Hyptertension? No prob. We give you these pills that dilate your blood vessels. Just keep taking these pills to keep your vessels dilated! What? The cause? We don't really know and who cares! Just keep dilating your vessels and you will be fine!

- Oh, you have cancer? No prob. We will cut it out and douse it with these chemicals and radiations which will kill it as well as everything around it. The good ones may turn cancerous due to these damages but, hey, at least we got rid of that ugly cancer out of sight for few months!

- Oh, you have IBD? We don't know what causes it just as we don't know the real causes of most other diseases. But hey, we will just cut all your gut out! Problem solved!

Does it really make you "stupid" if you didn't remember some pimping questions whose answers are plainly written in a little book in your pocket? Not at all. The stupidity is in the attendings that think such rote memory is what distinguish smart from stupidity.

So, OP, your math skill and thus your intelligence must be superior to mine. Do not fall into the trap set up my those who control medical education in this country: they overwhelm us with mindless memorization and promote pharm pills as the ultimate means of treating patients to force us to become another mindless, obedient sheep who can't think outside the box and who are afraid to venture into real cures. No. They want us to do what they tell us to do which is prolonging illnesses by "managing" with pills or sell deadly and ineffective but nevertheless utterly expensive chemo/radiation "treatments."

The reason why I tell you all this is so that you take courage and not give up, because we need more people like you in medicine. People like you will be the ones that will revolutionize this field out of this quagmire. Fail some tests? Fine. Repeat until you pass. Get that MD and get into a residency that will enable you to do what you wanted to do. Even if you don't actually end up finding anything revolutionary, just being a truly caring doc alone is a great gift to our materialistic and greed driven society.

So, take heart. Memorize the damn things just to pass. Always remember that you are very intelligent indeed and that we desperately need people like you.

 

[KeyzerSoze]

Really? Then you have not really learned Math.

OP, I have felt the same way as you throughout my med school time. Enjoying my 4th year now. I'm not a math major but majored in Philosophy although I've always excelled in math, top in my native (Far East Asian) schools where Math skills are considered world #1 or 2, aced both SAT math and GRE math without studying, never studied for math, physics or chem. This is because all I had to do was understand the principles and then creatively interpret and apply. Memorization? It is the most primitive intellectual faculty which can be readily replaced by simple computers or hand-held devices. There is a general understanding in my motherland: Math and languages are true tests of intelligence.

During my second year I was appalled by the fact that many medical students who are great in memorizing could not do simple algebra. Such people are actually considered "stupid" in some Asian countries.

Unfortunately, medical education and, often, medical practice uphold memorization as the ultimate intellectual activity. No wonder we still don't have very few cures for anything, only more toxic drugs with side effects for which more drugs must be created. Why this pathetic reality in this 21st century? Greed is obviously there. But there is also lack of deep insight, creative and intuitive thinking in this field. Remember that biology fared the same plight until the disillusioned physicists after WWII turned their attention to biology as a means to atone their "sins" of creating deadly weapons. Only then came truly revolutionary leap of development in biology.

Now I can say with confidence that current western medicine does not have any understanding of how our body and cells operate. We may know how to artificially and mechanically prolong the life of each organs but that's about it. What intelligence is there really in these "thinking" if these can be considered thinking:

- Oh, you have Hyptertension? No prob. We give you these pills that dilate your blood vessels. Just keep taking these pills to keep your vessels dilated! What? The cause? We don't really know and who cares! Just keep dilating your vessels and you will be fine!

- Oh, you have cancer? No prob. We will cut it out and douse it with these chemicals and radiations which will kill it as well as everything around it. The good ones may turn cancerous due to these damages but, hey, at least we got rid of that ugly cancer out of sight for few months!

- Oh, you have IBD? We don't know what causes it just as we don't know the real causes of most other diseases. But hey, we will just cut all your gut out! Problem solved!

Does it really make you "stupid" if you didn't remember some pimping questions whose answers are plainly written in a little book in your pocket? Not at all. The stupidity is in the attendings that think such rote memory is what distinguish smart from stupidity.

So, OP, your math skill and thus your intelligence must be superior to mine. Do not fall into the trap set up my those who control medical education in this country: they overwhelm us with mindless memorization and promote pharm pills as the ultimate means of treating patients to force us to become another mindless, obedient sheep who can't think outside the box and who are afraid to venture into real cures. No. They want us to do what they tell us to do which is prolonging illnesses by "managing" with pills or sell deadly and ineffective but nevertheless utterly expensive chemo/radiation "treatments."

The reason why I tell you all this is so that you take courage and not give up, because we need more people like you in medicine. People like you will be the ones that will revolutionize this field out of this quagmire. Fail some tests? Fine. Repeat until you pass. Get that MD and get into a residency that will enable you to do what you wanted to do. Even if you don't actually end up finding anything revolutionary, just being a truly caring doc alone is a great gift to our materialistic and greed driven society.

So, take heart. Memorize the damn things just to pass. Always remember that you are very intelligent indeed and that we desperately need people like you.

tl;dr

Also, wtf?

 

[Vacant]

tl;dr

Also, wtf?

Hehehe.

 

[medstudent87]

First of all, how the hell are you 130k in debt already? You're a year and a half (tuition wise) into med school--why are you borrowing $87,000 per year?

Also, get off that thought-train of, "I'm so good at reasoning, but I just don't like memorizing stuff like the rest of my classmates." Everyone believes that about themselves. The truth? You're sucking it up at school. If still want to be a doctor some day, you have to figure out how to stop sucking. You're not as smart as you think you are, and you don't work as hard as you think you do. Quit thinking you're better than everyone else because you took advanced math--nobody gives a flying f^ck.

This isn't about whether or not you're capable of memorizing a bunch of facts for a test. This is about whether or not you want to be a doctor.

Sorry for being so blunt.

well, i can't help but feel that i'm better than you if you can't even divide 130 by 2! hahahaha
douche.

 

[StIGMA]

Most schools charge on a per-semester basis. Assuming 130k was over 3 semesters, the poster's math is fine.

To your original post, I was in the same position as you many times. Just keep pushing forward as best you can... memorization flat out sucks, but if you can bear a few more months you will make it through it. If you still want it... stick with it!

 

[Quinone]

Do not fall into the trap set up my those who control medical education in this country: they overwhelm us with mindless memorization and promote pharm pills as the ultimate means of treating patients to force us to become another mindless, obedient sheep who can't think outside the box and who are afraid to venture into real cures. No. They want us to do what they tell us to do which is prolonging illnesses by "managing" with pills or sell deadly and ineffective but nevertheless utterly expensive chemo/radiation "treatments."

[blah blah blah...]

The reason why I tell you all this is so that you take courage and not give up, because we need more people like you in medicine. People like you will be the ones that will revolutionize this field out of this quagmire.

Wow, were you wearing your tinfoil hat while you wrote that? 🙄

I think a lot of people will agree that the main problem in American medicine is not that we don't have effective treatments for a lot of diseases but that the system itself is not as effective as it could be for actually delivering those interventions. Getting rid of drugs is not the solution. Sheesh.

What any of that has to do with the OP's dilemma is beyond me...

 

[Vacant]

Wow, were you wearing your tinfoil hat while you wrote that? 🙄

I think a lot of people will agree that the main problem in American medicine is not that we don't have effective treatments for a lot of diseases but that the system itself is not as effective as it could be for actually delivering those interventions. Getting rid of drugs is not the solution. Sheesh.

What any of that has to do with the OP's dilemma is beyond me...

Another mind-numbed sheep talking.
Can you tell a difference between a cure and a "management"? I gave you three examples to help you sort it out.

Yes, obviously it's beyond you. It is not people like you that will advance the future of medicine but people like OP with original, systematic and imaginative thinking that will venture into some real cures. You will just do what the "guidelines" tell you to do.

 

[KeyzerSoze]

Another mind-numbed sheep talking.
Can you tell a difference between a cure and a "management"? I gave you three examples to help you sort it out.

Yes, obviously it's beyond you. It is not people like you that will advance the future of medicine but people like OP with original, systematic and imaginative thinking that will venture into some real cures. You will just do what the "guidelines" tell you to do.

To increase your credibility, please use the term "sheeple".

 

[Dharma]

well, i can't help but feel that i'm better than you if you can't even divide 130 by 2! hahahaha
douche.

👍👍

 

[SeekerOfTheTree]

I'm in my second year right now. I finished first year with only passes in all my courses (no honors) and I failed neuroscience, which I remediated over the summer. I was hoping that this year would go better, but so far I'm doing incredibly terribly. I'm failing pharmacology and after today's path exam, I think I might be failing that as well. I just can't do it. I sit down for hours and hours, days and days, trying to memorize the insane amount of material like everyone else, yet it seems to take me MUCH longer and I always forget everything come test day. I never had great work-ethic when it came to studying and didn't know what I was getting myself into with med school. Memorization is obviously not my thing either...instead I'm VERY VERY good at thinking, solving complex math problems, etc. I'm beginning to think that I should've went into engineering since I LOVE mechanical things and design in general.

Thing is, I'm $130k in debt already, so I CANNOT quit. Its not that I don't find medicine interesting, its simply the fact that I'm unable to memorize and study the way everyone else does. I'm so incredibly upset and don't know what to do....

I guess I should've taken a hint when I needed to take physics. I enjoyed the course very much while all the other med students struggled with it and hated it. Furthermore, they all hated Calc I, but I went on to take calc II, calc III, linear algebra, differential equations, etc. I love that stuff.

In the words of Gob Bluth, "I've made a huge mistake."

My friend the grass is always greener on the other side. I graduated as a computer engineer, worked three years in the real world and hated what I did. At the end of the day the job wasn't satisfying. We don't get to sit around and use Calc III all day, they have MATLAB and PSpice which does it all for us. We don't draw out and analyze circuit designs, it's done all ofshore. We become nothing but managers and delegators here. I switched over because I wanted to do something where I felt like I might make some difference to a bottom line that isn't a stock portfolio. Think about why you do medicine and see if that reason is good for you. Don't switch into a career because you think you were good at a particular subject in school. I went up to diff eq and I never used a derivitave once in my life. Stay thirsty my friend.

 

[SeekerOfTheTree]

Another mind-numbed sheep talking.
Can you tell a difference between a cure and a "management"? I gave you three examples to help you sort it out.

Yes, obviously it's beyond you. It is not people like you that will advance the future of medicine but people like OP with original, systematic and imaginative thinking that will venture into some real cures. You will just do what the "guidelines" tell you to do.

I am sorry, but how does knowing how to do a Laplace transform differ from knowing what drug to prescribe to manage a patient. We all use the knowledge we have to figure out the problem at hand. Your view that without math medical students are "stupid" is ignorant. I am highly doubtful you went around quizzing all the med students on their fundemental knowledge of algebra around the U.S.

 

[Stixman28]

well, i can't help but feel that i'm better than you if you can't even divide 130 by 2! hahahaha
douche.

he was making the assumption that you are paying school by the semester. He also assumed you were 1.5 years into school, not two.

bc you gave him the number 130k, he said, 87k for the first year, and 87k/2 for the first semester of second year: 87 + 43.5 = ~130k

this is so off base though. sorry that you're struggling this year. but dont say you HAVE to do it. Im an MS2 also, we're looking down 6-7 more years before you can be done with the training. you could go get a masters in ME and be making 80k in 2 or 3 years. you can't see medicine only as a way to pay off debt, you will not enjoy yourself.

the quantity of this thread which has turn into med vs math is freaking ridiculous guys.

 

[GoodmanBrown]

This is so off base though. sorry that you're struggling this year. but dont say you HAVE to do it. Im an MS2 also, we're looking down 6-7 more years before you can be done with the training. you could go get a masters in ME and be making 80k in 2 or 3 years. you can't see medicine only as a way to pay off debt, you will not enjoy yourself.

I agree with this, and would even emphasize it moreso. If you hate med school and medicine, you're going to have a really, really terrible life sticking with it. In the brief 2 months I've been in med school, it's become pretty apparent that you'd better enjoy medicine if you're in it because your life is going to be consumed by medicine for many years to come. Just look at Medicinesux. That dude's one of the most unhappy people I've experienced. That could be you.

Now, I'd venture to say that what you're feeling is pretty typical. Many of us used to be superstars in college, and in med school, we're no great shakes. The real question is if you can still see yourself as a doctor or if the entire career is in doubt. If you still want to be a doctor, then push through and see how 3rd year goes.

If you're really serious about quitting, don't not do it because of the money. Check out the government's IBR calculator. The loans should be a non-issue because with IBR, you're paying back whatever your income allows. So, if you take a job earning $50K/yr., with your debt load, you'd only be paying a small amount north of $400. And if you work in a public service job or non-profit, you might be able to get your debt forgiven after 10 years. So, you're actually only paying a fraction of the loan cost.

That said, I would think long and hard about quitting. Talk to your academic dean, a counselor, and your family and friends before doing anything you'll later regret. The light at the end of the tunnel is pretty close now.

 

[Vacant]

I am sorry, but how does knowing how to do a Laplace transform differ from knowing what drug to prescribe to manage a patient. We all use the knowledge we have to figure out the problem at hand. Your view that without math medical students are "stupid" is ignorant. I am highly doubtful you went around quizzing all the med students on their fundemental knowledge of algebra around the U.S.

When you read something, read carefully. I didn't say medical students who suck at math are stupid. I said in certain countries such people are considered stupid in school and for their own good reasons.

Memorization can be done by anyone given enough time. Mathematical or systematic thinking can't be done by some no matter how much time you give them.

My point was that we need to redirect our mental power in medicine from making more pills that only prolong illnesses toward actually looking for cures. Now that cannot be done if we are all only good at memorizing what we are told. We certainly need people like OP to do so. Thus my encouragement to continue and pass through medical education to be able finally be a real doctor who actually tries to understand the dynamic network of human body that is and tries to cure instead of pumping 20+ pills and call it "treatment."

 

[Vacant]

http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/print/2010/11/lies-damned-lies-and-medical-science/8269


OP should read this article and take inspiration to persevere in this road to excellence. Don't give up. You had a noble reason when you applied to medicine.

And those of you that feel proud of current medical education and practice based on memorization of "guidelines" should also read the entire article very carefully.

There have been great breakthroughs in medicine. But not enough. We still have long long way to go. And it will be led by deep thinkers not memorizers. Memorizers will soon be replaced by NPs, DNPs and PAs and, perhaps, later by computers, and rightly so. Truly thinking and healing physicians will never be replaced.

Honestly, guys, someone with a photographic memory as the only intellectual faculty would breeze through all medical school exams, pimping questions, and board exams and will follow faithfully all "guidelines" to the last letter. Will he be able to advance medicine to the next level? Certainly not. That's why we need people like OP.

 

[morning]

If you're really serious about quitting, don't not do it because of the money. Check out the government's IBR calculator. The loans should be a non-issue because with IBR, you're paying back whatever your income allows. So, if you take a job earning $50K/yr., with your debt load, you'd only be paying a small amount north of $400. And if you work in a public service job or non-profit, you might be able to get your debt forgiven after 10 years. So, you're actually only paying a fraction of the loan cost.

That said, I would think long and hard about quitting. Talk to your academic dean, a counselor, and your family and friends before doing anything you'll later regret. The light at the end of the tunnel is pretty close now.

There's also this: http://www.finaid.org/loans/icr.phtml

Which is where you have 25 years to repay, and if you're still repaying after 25 years, they become discharged. I don't know the details, however, and the OP should discuss them with someone in a financial aid office. The important thing would be to figure out what path to take NOW, as in this semester. As soon as possible. Before any more debt accrues.

 

[Vacant]

Lastly, my attitude toward memory exams in med school was the same toward jeopardy TV show and gave the same importance. In 3rd year rotations, when attendings or residents pimped me I smirked and looked at them and thought, 'And you think you are asking a great insightful question when it's a matter of peeping at Pocket Medicine which you probably looked over last night or few minutes before the round?' I just smiled and said to them, "You tell me the answer."

"So, what are the Ranson criteria?" "Big deal. I will look it up If I need to." Not knowing that answer does not increase or decrease my intelligence.

Obviously I didn't "honor" anything. But I have had good life and enjoyed fully the process. Sad thing is I seriously feel that my mind has become dull and stupid after all that mind-numbing memorization. I see this when instead of thinking on my own I start searching for what the "guideline" said. Hopefully I can regain my intelligence during this 4th year vacation.

 

[Untraditional]

Find your school's counseling center ASAP. SDN is not where you need to be exploring these feelings right now.

 

[GoodmanBrown]

There's also this: http://www.finaid.org/loans/icr.phtml

Which is where you have 25 years to repay, and if you're still repaying after 25 years, they become discharged. I don't know the details, however, and the OP should discuss them with someone in a financial aid office. The important thing would be to figure out what path to take NOW, as in this semester. As soon as possible. Before any more debt accrues.

I disagree about having to do it right now. If you run some numbers in the calculator, the monthly payment is largely tied to your income, not your debt load. So, it's pretty important that the OP make a careful, deliberate decision, seeing as (s)he has already sunk 2 years into the process. The extra 25K in loans won't make much difference if the OP quits, but the extra semester (esp. a few rotations on 3rd year) may help clarify the decision such that the OP isn't always thinking, "What if..."

 

[turkeyjerky]

well, i can't help but feel that i'm better than you if you can't even divide 130 by 2! hahahaha
douche.

This is the thanks I get? You need to quit whining and suck it up, son.

Lastly, my attitude toward memory exams in med school was the same toward jeopardy TV show and gave the same importance. In 3rd year rotations, when attendings or residents pimped me I smirked and looked at them and thought, 'And you think you are asking a great insightful question when it's a matter of peeping at Pocket Medicine which you probably looked over last night or few minutes before the round?' I just smiled and said to them, "You tell me the answer."

"So, what are the Ranson criteria?" "Big deal. I will look it up If I need to." Not knowing that answer does not increase or decrease my intelligence.

Obviously I didn't "honor" anything. But I have had good life and enjoyed fully the process. Sad thing is I seriously feel that my mind has become dull and stupid after all that mind-numbing memorization. I see this when instead of thinking on my own I start searching for what the "guideline" said. Hopefully I can regain my intelligence during this 4th year vacation.

This is one of the oddest strings of posts I've seen in a while. I can't help but wonder how jealous you must be of those of us who honor rotations w/o memorizing bull$hit trivia.

 

[cartoondoc]

I was a math major in college and I hate memorizing ****. There's a huge amount of memorization in the first two years. You just gotta suck it up and put in the effort for another year. Things will get better in that respect after second year. If you made it to med school and through first year, I'm sure you are capable of doing it.

As an aside, I actually did great in pharm because there's more analytics than in, say, anatomy. I am always looking for tricks to reason out answers rather than just memorize, and that helped me out in a lot of my classes. (Even anatomy has thinking and reasoning involved in some parts, such as the brachial plexus.)

 

[SeekerOfTheTree]

When you read something, read carefully. I didn't say medical students who suck at math are stupid. I said in certain countries such people are considered stupid in school and for their own good reasons.

Memorization can be done by anyone given enough time. Mathematical or systematic thinking can't be done by some no matter how much time you give them.

My point was that we need to redirect our mental power in medicine from making more pills that only prolong illnesses toward actually looking for cures. Now that cannot be done if we are all only good at memorizing what we are told. We certainly need people like OP to do so. Thus my encouragement to continue and pass through medical education to be able finally be a real doctor who actually tries to understand the dynamic network of human body that is and tries to cure instead of pumping 20+ pills and call it "treatment."

Good luck on finding a cure for death. I am guessing in some of the other countries they must have already figured that one out, we are just too busy pushing pills here.

 

[avatarftw]

The OP said that their tuition was 50,000 or something crazy each year.
I thought he/she also had undergraduate debt...

First of all, how the hell are you 130k in debt already? You're a year and a half (tuition wise) into med school--why are you borrowing $87,000 per year?

Also, get off that thought-train of, "I'm so good at reasoning, but I just don't like memorizing stuff like the rest of my classmates." Everyone believes that about themselves. The truth? You're sucking it up at school. If still want to be a doctor some day, you have to figure out how to stop sucking. You're not as smart as you think you are, and you don't work as hard as you think you do. Quit thinking you're better than everyone else because you took advanced math--nobody gives a flying f^ck.

This isn't about whether or not you're capable of memorizing a bunch of facts for a test. This is about whether or not you want to be a doctor.

Sorry for being so blunt.

 

[maeday]

In 3rd year rotations, when attendings or residents pimped me I smirked and looked at them and thought, 'And you think you are asking a great insightful question when it's a matter of peeping at Pocket Medicine which you probably looked over last night or few minutes before the round?' I just smiled and said to them, "You tell me the answer."

LOL! I would love to know what the response was if you actually did that (which I don't believe you did). I think you are correct to not worry about honoring rotations....I think that's the least of your problems.

 

[seelee]

Vacant's last most makes me think that he never actually went to medical school.

 

[Vacant]

This is one of the oddest strings of posts I've seen in a while. I can't help but wonder how jealous you must be of those of us who honor rotations w/o memorizing bull$hit trivia.

Do you get jealous of people who win jeopardy TV game shows? I don't. There are real important things in life than worrying about "honor" grades, you know. I hope your honor grades do actually help you become a better physician treating patients.

 

[Vacant]

LOL! I would love to know what the response was if you actually did that (which I don't believe you did). I think you are correct to not worry about honoring rotations....I think that's the least of your problems.

What I told you was what I was thinking in my head. All that attendings saw was my smile and I telling them, "Tell me the answer." I enjoyed all rotations in 3rd year and I am having a blast as a 4th year now. I can't wait to be an intern and resident to actually have my own patients to work with.

OP, know that you are not alone in your feelings and struggles. Just as you passed the first year, you will pass the rest of med school huddles. Just don't give up.

 

[Perrotfish]

"So, what are the Ranson criteria?" "Big deal. I will look it up If I need to." Not knowing that answer does not increase or decrease my intelligence.

Medical school creates, I think, a false sense of secruity in terms of looking things up because you are almost never pressed for time on individual patiets. As a busy medicine student I was managing 3 patients, and a busy FM shift stil left me about 30 minutes per patient, so if you were intlligent and knew how to look things up you could usually look pretty good at rounds even if nothng was actually sticking in your head. The reason you ultimately need to know the diagnosis, though, is that eventually you will be working at a brutal pace and you won't have time to be DrWiki anymore. That's why they pimp us and subject us to shelf exams, because otherwise there would be no way to know if were were actually learning the skills we need or if we were just faking it.

 

[Vacant]

You will have a new patient coming into clinic every 15 minute (or whatever your chosen subspecialty's equivalent of that is) and if you're anything like the subpar residents and attendings I've seen so far you won't look up all the things you were supposed to have memorized because you' will be short of time. You will, instead, wing it based on a gut feeling that will often be wrong and you will, for example, discharge a patient who met the criteria for admission for actue pancreatitis.

Medical school creates, I think, a false sense of secruity in terms of looking things up because you are almost never pressed for time on individual patiets. As a busy medicine student I was managing 3 patients, and a busy FM shift stil left me about 30 minutes per patient, so if you were intlligent and knew how to look things up you could usually look pretty good at rounds even if nothng was actually sticking in your head. The reason you ultimately need to know the diagnosis, though, is that eventually you will be working at a brutal pace and you won't have time to be DrWiki anymore. That's why they pimp us and subject us to shelf exams, because otherwise there would be no way to know if were were actually learning the skills we need or if we were just faking it.

If you think that's beneath you, and the only true intelligence is analytical reasoning, fine, go be a researcher or engineer. I've done both and thought both lines of work sucked but if it's your thing by all means, we definitely need those peoplet to advance medicine as well as people to practice it. However deciding the skills you need to do your job are beneath you while still sticking with that job is sort of an odd choice, and may bite you in the rear come internship.

Good observation but wrong conclusion.
1. Much of what you do as a clinician will be repetition. Much of information you need remember will stick to your memory even if you don't want to unless you have a seriously clinical memory dysfunction. Maybe you will fumble through first two cases of a kind, but by the the third one, you will know exactly what to remember and what to look for and what to order.

2. The extra info that escapes your memory can be made quickly retrievable if you are resourceful even in that "15 min" time limit put on by this failed medical system which, by the way, can be avoided by how you set up your practice.

3. As mentioned, what can be covered by memory is and will increasingly be done by mid-levels. In fact, mid-levels who have better memory than you would do better job than you. That's the case with a PA I work with these days. During morning rounds he continually proves to "know" better than the attendings simply because he remembers more (names of drugs, side effects, drug interactions, labs to order, etc.), and that's because he worked longer in that unit.

4. What cannot simply be solved by memory and algorithm will be the task for physicians. And for that our positions will not be replaceable. And that means being clinical scientists always thinking about the causes and more effective ways of treatment that produce real results. This was the mentality of doctors of old worlds. So, now with the surge of mid-levels, we are forced to return to the old role by having to prove that we as physicians are actually better in treating patients. In this sense this "crisis" is a good thing.

So no, medicine is not "beneath" me. It has always been and always will be a great profession when I practice it as a thinking scientist and caring healer. The two aspects, art and science, combined make a true medical doctor like the two serpents in the emblem of medicine. If you are just following the much questionable "guidelines" - as indicated by the article linked above - let PA's and DNP's do it for you.

By the way, speaking of Shelf exams, I don't know about you but the shelf exams I took were separate beasts I had to tackle apart from the clinical rotations.

 

[2012mdc]

Medical school creates, I think, a false sense of secruity in terms of looking things up because you are almost never pressed for time on individual patiets. As a busy medicine student I was managing 3 patients, and a busy FM shift stil left me about 30 minutes per patient, so if you were intlligent and knew how to look things up you could usually look pretty good at rounds even if nothng was actually sticking in your head. The reason you ultimately need to know the diagnosis, though, is that eventually you will be working at a brutal pace and you won't have time to be DrWiki anymore. That's why they pimp us and subject us to shelf exams, because otherwise there would be no way to know if were were actually learning the skills we need or if we were just faking it.

At my school the pimping hasn't been useless mindless facts unless we kept getting questions right and they wanted us to get something wrong. Frequently I have been pimped on why/how. To me the pimping sessions seemed to have the objective of having us think on our feet w/o relying on books, retain stuff well enough to answer free/short answer vs multiple choice questions and be quick and confident in answers (often wrong, never in doubt)

Good observation but wrong conclusion.
1. Much of what you do as a clinician will be repetition. Much of information you need remember will stick to your memory even if you don't want to unless you have a seriously clinical memory dysfunction. Maybe you will fumble through first two cases of a kind, but by the the third one, you will know exactly what to remember and what to look for and what to order.

2. The extra info that escapes your memory can be made quickly retrievable if you are resourceful even in that "15 min" time limit put on by this failed medical system which, by the way, can be avoided by how you set up your practice.

3. As mentioned, what can be covered by memory is and will increasingly be done by mid-levels. In fact, mid-levels who have better memory than you would do better job than you. That's the case with a PA I work with these days. During morning rounds he continually proves to "know" better than the attendings simply because he remembers more (names of drugs, side effects, drug interactions, labs to order, etc.), and that's because he worked longer in that unit.

4. What cannot simply be solved by memory and algorithm will be the task for physicians. And for that our positions will not be replaceable. And that means being clinical scientists always thinking about the causes and more effective ways of treatment that produce real results. This was the mentality of doctors of old worlds. So, now with the surge of mid-levels, we are forced to return to the old role by having to prove that we as physicians are actually better in treating patients. In this sense this "crisis" is a good thing.

So no, medicine is not "beneath" me. It has always been and always will be a great profession when I practice it as a thinking scientist and caring healer. The two aspects, art and science, combined make a true medical doctor like the two serpents in the emblem of medicine. If you are just following the much questionable "guidelines" - as indicated by the article linked above - let PA's and DNP's do it for you.

By the way, speaking of Shelf exams, I don't know about you but the shelf exams I took were separate beasts I had to tackle apart from the clinical rotations.

What exactly do you mean? That clinical rotations and the shelf exams required different thinking? Or that shelf exams were not integral to clinical rotation grades?

For some rotations we cannot honor it without doing extremely well on the shelf. At least on my surgery rotation I found what I learned clinically was pretty relevant to the shelf

 

[Perrotfish]

Good observation but wrong conclusion.
1. Much of what you do as a clinician will be repetition. Much of information you need remember will stick to your memory even if you don't want to unless you have a seriously clinical memory dysfunction. Maybe you will fumble through first two cases of a kind, but by the the third one, you will know exactly what to remember and what to look for and what to order..

See, this just hasn't been what I've seen. In my experience subpar residents and attendings, the ones who don't study and memorize, tend to lag further behind with time rather than catching up over time.

It makes sense, when you think about it. Repetition only works when you're repeating the right things. That's why we study so much in medical school and residency, so that we can practice under the watchful eye of people who know what they're doing to make sure we're learning how to do things correctly. Faking your way through the management of a case won't teach you how to do it right even if you do it a hundred times. That's why midlevels largely don't handle complicated fields like Internal Medicine or surgery and instead consult for any problem that's the least bit complicated: because you can't memorize that volume of information while carrying a full patient load at the same time.

The two aspects, art and science, combined make a true medical doctor like the two serpents in the emblem of medicine. If you are just following the much questionable "guidelines" - as indicated by the article linked above - let PA's and DNP's do it for you.

This also seems strange to me. Why is your 'art' (gut instinct) better than guidelines developed based on statisical data based on large groups of patients? The whole idea of this being a scientific profession is that, if you're doing it right, there shouldn't be a lot of art to it. You should be able to KNOW whether what you're doing improves or hurts the patient's odds of survival. For that matter, I'm not really sure what you think you're going to do differently vs. the medical establishment. You've previously ranted against chemotherapy, hypertension medication, and surgical intervention for Crohn's. What exactly do you think you're going to do when patients with those disorders walk into your office?

The two aspects, art and science, combined make a true medical doctor like the two serpents in the emblem of medicine.

BTW, that's a symbol of merchants and thieves.

 

[Vacant]

See, this just hasn't been what I've seen. In my experience subpar residents and attendings, the ones who don't study and memorize, tend to lag further behind with time rather than catching up over time..... It makes sense, when you think about it. Repetition only works when you're repeating the right things.

Are you saying the first time they made a mistake of wrong diagnosis or wrong orders it was not pointed out and corrected by anyone even in hind-sight, thereby, residents ending up making the same mistakes over and over? Which academic residency is this?