Med School Difficulty Compared to Engineering, Lit etc

[FlyLite]

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First time posting...

In mineral science there is an easy to understand scale for the hardness of
minerals compared to each other called the Moh scale (See here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mohs_scale_of_mineral_hardness ). I wonder if people, especially those with an engineering background and some yours of med school, could give me an idea of their meaning when they say med school is hard.

Hard:

Like Advanced Differential Equations/Vector Calculus/Thermodynamics/Numerical Modeling etc
Or
Like writing a summary of "In Search of Lost Time" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In_Search_of_Lost_Time) in a week/Tracing a dominant theme through all of Shakespeare’s work/Being able to quote the bible from memory.
Or
Running a marathon/Iron man
Or
(Feel free to add your own apt analogies)

I have an engineering background; I am 34; trying to get back to the first choice of three choices I put on my college application back when I was 18. I went the engineering route because it was paid for all the way.

 

[Gavanshir]

I would say this is the closest:

Like writing a summary of "In Search of Lost Time" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In_Search_of_Lost_Time) in a week/Tracing a dominant theme through all of Shakespeare’s work/Being able to quote the bible from memory.

 

[FlyLite]

I would say this is the closest:

Like writing a summary of "In Search of Lost Time" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In_Search_of_Lost_Time) in a week/Tracing a dominant theme through all of Shakespeare’s work/Being able to quote the bible from memory.

Thanks Gavanshir... that tells me there is lots of information to assimilate in a limited amount of time. Would I be correct to think students that excel in Med school have exceptional memories and an ability to sort through lots of information ?

 

[lsu hopeful]

Thanks Gavanshir... that tells me there is lots of information to assimilate in a limited amount of time. Would I be correct to think students that excel in Med school have exceptional memories and an ability to sort through lots of information ?

From my understanding, they have an incredible ability to go to class 8 hours a day, then go home and study for another 6-8, sleep a few hours, and start it all over again. 😱

 

[QofQuimica]

Of your analogies, I would say that going to med school is most like running a marathon. You're in it for the long haul, and you're going to have to sustain a fairly high level of performance over quite a long time. It's also not nearly as intellectually challenging as diffeq is, and it's not as abstruse as Proust is.

You would be partially correct to say that students who excel in med school have excellent memories and organizational skills. The reality is that everyone is different. Some people are great memorizers and go through gross anatomy without much effort. I'm not much of a memorizer, but I did pretty well in anatomy anyway just because I know this limitation of mine and used mnemonics of various types to help me overcome it. On the other hand, pharm was a breeze for me. (I have a PhD in pharmaceutical chemistry.)

Then you should consider that the skills needed to do well in the clinical years are different than the skills needed to do well in the preclinical years. Some people have to work harder at doing well on the wards, either because they are too shy, or they don't read enough and get pimped mercilessly, or they don't build good rapport with patients, etc. I found the communication aspect of working with patients to be one of my greatest strengths. On the other hand, memorizing all the potential pimp questions from Surgical Recall was something I really had to force myself to do.

In the end, you do well in medical school the same way that you do well when faced with any challenge: you identify the problem, go through a period of trial and error until you find a solution that works, and keep tweaking your plan as necessary when new situations arise. A strong work ethic sure won't hurt your cause any, either. 🙂

 

[Scottish Chap]

Agree with the above.

I felt that getting accepted to medical school was difficult, but staying in medical school was also a marathon and required a strong work ethic. Intellectually, the work is not that hard (I did a Ph.D. in pharmacology and found graduate school much harder), but medical school will bury you mercilessly if you get behind and don't give it the respect it deserves every moment of every day.

I am not great at memorizing as it sharply contrasts that educational style I was raised with (in another country), but I found I had no choice in medical school. I remember in one anatomy exam having 8 days to memorize >800 structures in the head and neck exam (which includes around 90 depressions and grooves in the cranial fossa--all with impossible names), but I lost just a few points on that exam. Why? I had no choice, and it's amazing what you'll be capable of when you have no choice. This contrasts to reaching the pass mark bang on with my first anatomy exam (that was a scary wake up call).

Bottom line: it's not impossible, and you don't have to be a genius to make it through medical school. You do, however, need tenacity and shrewdness--especially in the clinical years which can be rather political. If you are the sort that naturally rubs people the wrong way, you are so screwed beyond belief (I once heard a residency director say that they are very wary of hiring older residents for this reason; they conform less and can be more outspoken in a an environment that punishes this sort of behavior). A quote from a fifty-year-old student in my medical school class when I asked him if he was comfortable with the way medical school assesses us: "it's not a case of being comfortable or not comfortable; this is the way the game is played".

 

[FlyLite]

Of your analogies, I would say that going to med school is most like running a marathon. You're in it for the long haul, and you're going to have to sustain a fairly high level of performance over quite a long time. It's also not nearly as intellectually challenging as diffeq is, and it's not as abstruse as Proust is.

You would be partially correct to say that students who excel in med school have excellent memories and organizational skills. The reality is that everyone is different. Some people are great memorizers and go through gross anatomy without much effort. I'm not much of a memorizer, but I did pretty well in anatomy anyway just because I know this limitation of mine and used mnemonics of various types to help me overcome it. On the other hand, pharm was a breeze for me. (I have a PhD in pharmaceutical chemistry.)

Then you should consider that the skills needed to do well in the clinical years are different than the skills needed to do well in the preclinical years. Some people have to work harder at doing well on the wards, either because they are too shy, or they don't read enough and get pimped mercilessly, or they don't build good rapport with patients, etc. I found the communication aspect of working with patients to be one of my greatest strengths. On the other hand, memorizing all the potential pimp questions from Surgical Recall was something I really had to force myself to do.

In the end, you do well in medical school the same way that you do well when faced with any challenge: you identify the problem, go through a period of trial and error until you find a solution that works, and keep tweaking your plan as necessary when new situations arise. A strong work ethic sure won't hurt your cause any, either. 🙂

Great feedback thanks...

Pardon my "newbieness", but by pimped I take it you mean being asked questions that make you look unprepared/ignorant of the things you need to be aware of ?

 

[FlyLite]

Scottish Chap ... If your name means the way I take it, which is that you are from the British Iles, then you may know about 'A' levels. I took Cambridge 'A' levels at a center in a different country and got all B's in Chemistry, Physics and Math. I had the option go to Imperial College in London and I would have got in because they asked for two B's and a C. I chose the USA because I was told school would be somewhat easier and there would be opportunity to party. Party I did, and now I regret it because my undergraduate transcript looks like nothing I would be proud of cGPA 2.94. But I think I could get a relatively high score on the MCAT because of the A levels I had, and perhaps bump my cGPA above a 3.0 by taking the pre-requisites and doing well... Hopefully I am not deluding myself. Any opinion on that?

 

[gschl1234]

Thanks Gavanshir... that tells me there is lots of information to assimilate in a limited amount of time. Would I be correct to think students that excel in Med school have exceptional memories and an ability to sort through lots of information ?

As someone else said in another thread, any ****** can acquire the knowledge-base needed to practice medicine. None of the bits of information are difficult to grasp but there's a lot of it. And, it can be tricky to upload the right pieces of information at the right time, making the right connections.

And it's like a marathon because depending on specialty, it is a long road (4 or 4+ years medical school, up to 10+ year residency/fellowship(s)).

 

[FlyLite]

As someone else said in another thread, any ****** can acquire the knowledge-base needed to practice medicine. None of the bits of information are difficult to grasp but there's a lot of it. And, it can be tricky to upload the right pieces of information at the right time, making the right connections.

And it's like a marathon because depending on specialty, it is a long road (4 or 4+ years medical school, up to 10+ year residency/fellowship(s)).

Point taken.... knowing my strengths/weaknesses, I am using what I know to gauge how difficulty medicine would be for me and I am not comparing the smartness of people in different fields. My analogies are things I have attempted in one form or
other with varying levels of success.

 

[thes_hunter]

I'll second what Q and Scottishdude said.

I'm in my second year now, and the way our cirriculum is set up, is that we have a new patho-physiology subject every 12 days or so (on top of doing clinical stuff 2 mornings a week for Physical Diagnosis). So we generally are given ~450-500 pages a week to get through. Some course directors expect us to memorize all of those pages, others give us extra background to aid in our understanding of the big picture.

I being a non-memorizing big picture person love the latter circumstance.

So with the large amount of information you need to read, synthesize, and be able to recall within a short time period, it is like 'Being able to quote the bible from memory', it is also a marathon because it doesn't end. At least in 2nd year, we may get an occasional weekend when we don't have to worry about patho-phys, but there is always the stuff for Physical Diagnosis, and Step Prep that I should be doing that keeps me feeling like it should be a free weekend.

(Note, I take the free weekend anyways.. because sometime you just gotta relax. 😀 )

 

[FlyLite]

I'll second what Q and Scottishdude said.

I'm in my second year now, and the way our cirriculum is set up, is that we have a new patho-physiology subject every 12 days or so (on top of doing clinical stuff 2 mornings a week for Physical Diagnosis). So we generally are given ~450-500 pages a week to get through. Some course directors expect us to memorize all of those pages, others give us extra background to aid in our understanding of the big picture.

I being a non-memorizing big picture person love the latter circumstance.

So with the large amount of information you need to read, synthesize, and be able to recall within a short time period, it is like 'Being able to quote the bible from memory', it is also a marathon because it doesn't end. At least in 2nd year, we may get an occasional weekend when we don't have to worry about patho-phys, but there is always the stuff for Physical Diagnosis, and Step Prep that I should be doing that keeps me feeling like it should be a free weekend.

(Note, I take the free weekend anyways.. because sometime you just gotta relax. 😀 )

Yeah... that drives it home in a way I can relate.

 

[eablackwell]

Of your analogies, I would say that going to med school is most like running a marathon. You're in it for the long haul, and you're going to have to sustain a fairly high level of performance over quite a long time. It's also not nearly as intellectually challenging as diffeq is, and it's not as abstruse as Proust is.

You would be partially correct to say that students who excel in med school have excellent memories and organizational skills. The reality is that everyone is different. Some people are great memorizers and go through gross anatomy without much effort. I'm not much of a memorizer, but I did pretty well in anatomy anyway just because I know this limitation of mine and used mnemonics of various types to help me overcome it. On the other hand, pharm was a breeze for me. (I have a PhD in pharmaceutical chemistry.)

Then you should consider that the skills needed to do well in the clinical years are different than the skills needed to do well in the preclinical years. Some people have to work harder at doing well on the wards, either because they are too shy, or they don't read enough and get pimped mercilessly, or they don't build good rapport with patients, etc. I found the communication aspect of working with patients to be one of my greatest strengths. On the other hand, memorizing all the potential pimp questions from Surgical Recall was something I really had to force myself to do.

In the end, you do well in medical school the same way that you do well when faced with any challenge: you identify the problem, go through a period of trial and error until you find a solution that works, and keep tweaking your plan as necessary when new situations arise. A strong work ethic sure won't hurt your cause any, either. 🙂

This post was really helpful, but it scares me a bit. I'm great at memorization, but I'm not very organized. I'm good with study habits for instance, but no matter how often I clean my desk at work, by 3rd period it's an obvious example of positive entropy 😛

 

[QofQuimica]

Great feedback thanks...

Pardon my "newbieness", but by pimped I take it you mean being asked questions that make you look unprepared/ignorant of the things you need to be aware of ?

Ah, my friend, thank you for giving me this opportunity to introduce yet another generation of future physicians to The Art of Pimping, a true classic of medical literature.

This post was really helpful, but it scares me a bit. I'm great at memorization, but I'm not very organized. I'm good with study habits for instance, but no matter how often I clean my desk at work, by 3rd period it's an obvious example of positive entropy 😛

You will get more organized in spite of yourself. Like SC said, it's amazing what you can do when you have to. Besides, you should be more afraid of the activities described in The Art of Pimping. That ostensibly tongue-in-cheek "manual" has more verisimilitude than you can possibly imagine right now....

 

[Mtnbiker]

Ah, my friend, thank you for giving me this opportunity to introduce yet another generation of future physicians to The Art of Pimping, a true classic of medical literature.

Awesome article! Thanks for posting it.

 

[FlyLite]

Ah, my friend, thank you for giving me this opportunity to introduce yet another generation of future physicians to The Art of Pimping, a true classic of medical literature.


You will get more organized in spite of yourself. Like SC said, it's amazing what you can do when you have to. Besides, you should be more afraid of the activities described in The Art of Pimping. That ostensibly tongue-in-cheek "manual" has more verisimilitude than you can possibly imagine right now....

It's witty from one on the outside looking in, but probably not so much for those on the business end of the pimping. I suppose like most rites, if everyone knows how to play their part, everyone goes home pretty satisfied. Thanks...

 

[shadowfox87]

lol, so someone finally made a thread like this. I'm a former EE/BME, so speaking from experience, it's like comparing apples to oranges. Med school is hard not because the concepts are hard. In eng, all of our tests were not multiple choice, our profs gave us access to old exams that they wrote, and then they CHALLENGED us to score an A. The average would always be 50-70 and this is normal, if the avg was any higher, then the prof. would know something went wrong and he made his test too easy. At least this is what it was in our school.

In med school, it's all about memorization and recall. Every test is multiple choice and almost all questions you will have will have to do with some degree of memorization (until you get to path, physio, neuro that is, that's when the fun begins and you start using your brain again). Remember all those formula sheets we used to get and we didn't have to waste our brain space memorizing numbers? That's not the case here. You have to memorize, memorize, memorize. Think of it this way - if someone told you you have an exam tmr, you have to study the dictionary in one day. The words in the dictionary are not difficult, even a elementary school kid after reading the pages in a dictionary can understand. The hard part is remembering all of those words and complete reading the book.

So, I wouldn't say eng. is harder than med school, it's more like a different kind of hard or vice versa. Going to med school is basically learning to follow specific algorithms in a certain way, you're being programmed like a robot. The creative stuff doesn't come until later.

 

[FlyLite]

lol, so someone finally made a thread like this. I'm a former EE/BME, so speaking from experience, it's like comparing apples to oranges. Med school is hard not because the concepts are hard. In eng, all of our tests were not multiple choice, our profs gave us access to old exams that they wrote, and then they CHALLENGED us to score an A. The average would always be 50-70 and this is normal, if the avg was any higher, then the prof. would know something went wrong and he made his test too easy. At least this is what it was in our school.

In med school, it's all about memorization and recall. Every test is multiple choice and almost all questions you will have will have to do with some degree of memorization (until you get to path, physio, neuro that is, that's when the fun begins and you start using your brain again). Remember all those formula sheets we used to get and we didn't have to waste our brain space memorizing numbers? That's not the case here. You have to memorize, memorize, memorize. Think of it this way - if someone told you you have an exam tmr, you have to study the dictionary in one day. The words in the dictionary are not difficult, even a elementary school kid after reading the pages in a dictionary can understand. The hard part is remembering all of those words and complete reading the book.

So, I wouldn't say eng. is harder than med school, it's more like a different kind of hard or vice versa. Going to med school is basically learning to follow specific algorithms in a certain way, you're being programmed like a robot. The creative stuff doesn't come until later.

No, I am not saying engineering is harder than medicine. I wanted people to answer the question in way that helps me, which is in their opinion, what makes it hard and given three other hard things, what does it come closest to. From your post, you are telling me its closer to knowing the bible by heart in a short time, say a week or two, and it's an endurance contest. This drives the point home for me. And if you note the title of the thread ends with ... Lit etc...

 

[gschl1234]

In med school, it's all about memorization and recall....The words in the dictionary are not difficult, even a elementary school kid after reading the pages in a dictionary can understand. The hard part is remembering all of those words and complete reading the book.

That's what I meant by "any ******" can acquire the information. Each individual concept on its ownis simple but there are a lot of little concpets to learn and integrate. While you're going thru the first 2 years it may seem like mindless recall. But the purpose behind all that mindless recall is to learn the language of medicine as a foundation to practice medicine and to communicate with other physicians for the rest of your life. Your engineering background may not be helpful in acquiring the background knowledge (MS1-2) but may be helpful later on in synthesizing the information (on the wards MS3-4, in residency, in practice).

 

[Holderlin]

I'm unpimpable. Bring it on dorky attending.

 

[FlyLite]

That's what I meant by "any ******" can acquire the information. Each individual concept on its ownis simple but there are a lot of little concpets to learn and integrate. While you're going thru the first 2 years it may seem like mindless recall. But the purpose behind all that mindless recall is to learn the language of medicine as a foundation to practice medicine and to communicate with other physicians for the rest of your life. Your engineering background may not be helpful in acquiring the background knowledge (MS1-2) but may be helpful later on in synthesizing the information (on the wards MS3-4, in residency, in practice).

Ah, got you...🙂 Though when I took the SAT and the GRE my verbal scores where highest and actually I feel my strength is reading up and remembering and drawing conclusions. I have not got anything less than a B in my science and social science, although i thought then that social sciences were an inconvenience. But I had to retake Intro to EE and was rewarded with a "whopping" improvement from a D+ to C+.

 

[shadowfox87]

No, I am not saying engineering is harder than medicine. I wanted people to answer the question in way that helps me, which is in their opinion, what makes it hard and given three other hard things, what does it come closest to. From your post, you are telling me its closer to knowing the bible by heart in a short time, say a week or two, and it's an endurance contest. This drives the point home for me. And if you note the title of the thread ends with ... Lit etc...

I never implied you said that, I was simply stating an opinion and answering your question. I see no connection with literature in medicine other than the fact that you will have to read countless case studies and the hardest course for most engineers including me is - ethics.

 

[FlyLite]

I never implied you said that, I was simply stating an opinion and answering your question. I see no connection with literature in medicine other than the fact that you will have to read countless case studies and the hardest course for most engineers including me is - ethics.

Appreciate you taking the time to chime in. I am getting a consensus in opinions which is encouraging to me.