Med School Meanderings

[SD Hopeamine]

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8/21/18

Med School Meanderings

First Entry


3 weeks into medical school and we have completed our first course.


Molecular and Cellular Mechanisms (MCM)


Ingredients:


3 cups medical biochemistry

1 cup containing equal parts molecular and cellular biology

1 cup genetics

A splash of histology and physiology


Wow. That was quick. I’m not quite sure how to feel about it. Happy I got through it with a passing grade, but disappointed it wasn’t the grade I was hoping for. Regardless, I struggle to formulate words to express how thrilled I am to be done with (in my humble opinion) one of the dullest courses that the typical med student is force fed (I am so naïve).


As I am now approximately a month deep into medical school, I feel I can better assess some of the expectations vs. realities I personally experienced, and maybe in the process give an ignorant pre-med a clearer image into the genesis of medical school training. Allow me to chronologically unpack my time so far.


Day 1: In class from 8a-5p. Go home and cry because I’m a little confused about what just hit me in the face (although metaphorical, I imagine the feeling of literally being punched in the face is similar in many regards).


Day 3: Feeling better. More interested in what I am learning. More confident in what I am learning.


Day 5: Just bombed a quiz. Repeat day 1 but with the addition of a looming cloud that is our midterm taking place Monday morning (yes, you heard that right. One week into biochem and we have our midterm). Prior to this day, I was overwhelmed to the point of feeling as though a stop for gas was cutting into critical studying time. Now this feeling has exponentially compounded.


Day 6: Functioning on 3 hours of sleep. Cry. Study. Repeat.


Day 7: Functioning on 2 hours of sleep. Cry. Study. Repeat.


Day 8: Take the midterm. Pass. Move on. Feel much better knowing that I can pass the exams when I give 100%.


Week 2: Still riding the “I can do this” wave. Complain to psychologist about not feeling like I am bonding with friends. Crushed the end of week quiz. I got this. Who needs friends?


Week 3: Starts off good. Around Tuesday I realize I have a quiz on Thursday and a giant final the day following. Lose several nights of sleep. Cry. Study. Repeat. Pass the final. Move on.


When I was a premed, I remember thinking that medical students must be riding some high horse if they are under the impression that they can cover a semesters worth of material from undergrad in a measly 5 days. Or maybe they were just exaggerating the reality in order to give us this terrible perception, making the first weeks of med a little bit more manageable. I don’t know. Either way, it just wasn’t possible for a single human being to cover - let alone learn - all of that material so quickly.


As it turns out, I was wrong.


You do cover that volume of material in a week. It’s definitely enough to make a grown man who rarely sheds a tear burst into hysterics. I’m learning to deal with the volume of information. Slowly, but surely. Every day is still a race against the clock, but it’s becoming more manageable.


I am also quickly learning how easy it is to totally forget everything else that exists in the world and hone in on medical school day-in and day-out. There’s a thin line you walk as a med student between sane and insane. If you aren’t taking time out of each and every day to do something for yourself, then it could result in severe short and long-term consequences. I personally have decided to write. I have wanted to give someone a window into my life for a long time, but I haven’t done it. I’m starting that now.


Lastly, being here for a month has made me wonder how it is humanly possible for a med school to have 5-year graduation rates routinely above 95%. They take a massive number of students (200+ at many schools, including mine), and based on a short 15-30 minute interview, along with a passing glance at an application, determine that virtually all of the 200+ students they accept are going to graduate and move into residency training. I think the answer to this question goes hand-in-hand with inquiring why students sign up for this blunt-force trauma in the first place.


Pre-meds have no idea what they are signing up for. They see the knowledge, prestige, and power of a practicing physician and say “that looks like a nice life.” They only see the part of the iceberg that has broached the surface. They have no idea what is hiding beneath the water line. So they pay a ton of money to some undergrad to get a degree that will only serve them if they continue with a medical education, apply to a bazillion different schools, and show up on day 1 to the institution that accepted their poor soul.


The life of a med student is one that forces 70-80 hours of studying per week, minimum. Most people entering med school won’t know how to actively study for more than an hour without “taking a 5” at the 30-minute mark. Nobody entering medical school has a clue to what a med students life even looks like. Let me give you the best analogy I can think of. It’s basically a life of solitary confinement. You are by yourself virtually all day. You may be in the room with other students, but in order to cover the volume of information you need to get through, study groups (where students work through the material together) prove useless. This is a self-study game. You also don’t ever get to enjoy the sunshine or fresh air because a passing ambulance is enough to knock you off your groove for a long while. You’re confined. In a room. By yourself. Day-in and day-out.


The reason there are so many people successfully making it through is due to the simple fact that the moment you step into your first class of medical school, you’re locked into $30k+ worth of debt that even chapter 7 bankruptcy can’t make disappear. The debt has to be the biggest deterrent that is stopping med students from dropping out during the first several months. I once had a boss comment that he likes to try and convince his employees to get into some debt because that way they show up and perform.


I see where he was getting at now.


Until next time,


Student Dr. Hopeamine

 

[NOBO]

You sound like a nervous wreck. Try relaxing a little.

 

[Magus5454]

The life of a med student is one that forces 70-80 hours of studying per week, minimum.

I disagree, totally. If you are putting in that much study time. You're doing something wrong.

 

[HanSoloYolo]

This is a bit dramatic ... I mean I'm not in your position, but I wouldn't make broad generalizations about all medical students based off your first 3 weeks.

 

[Goro]

I know that during the first 1/3rs on OMSI or MS1, students come to grips with what worked in college doesn't work in med school, but reading the OP's missave make serious worry about him/her.

So, get thee to your school's learning or education center, and also your counseling center.

Agree 100% that pre-meds don't know what they're getting into. I once had a summer UG named Andy. I showed him a chart on a wall of all the biochemical pathways, and told him that "this is what you're going to learn in Biochem in med school".

He refused to believe me! The chart was right there, on the wall of a medical school classroom!

He's now an internist in the midwest. He later believed me.

 

[big_Z]

I know that during the first 1/3rs on OMSI or MS1, students come to grips with what worked in college doesn't work in med school, but reading the OP's missave make serious worry about him/her.

So, get thee to your school's learning or education center, and also your counseling center.

Agree 100% that pre-meds don't know what they're getting into. I once had a summer UG named Andy. I showed him a chart on a wall of all the biochemical pathways, and told him that "this is what you're going to learn in Biochem in med school".

He refused to believe me! The chart was right there, on the wall of a medical school classroom!

He's now an internist in the midwest. He later believed me.

Had to google missive which gave me an idea of a thread someone should make. Uncommon words a medical student should know

 

[Goro]

Had to google missive which gave me an idea of a thread someone should make. Uncommon words a medical student should know

 

[Magus5454]

I know that during the first 1/3rs on OMSI or MS1, students come to grips with what worked in college doesn't work in med school, but reading the OP's missave make serious worry about him/her.

So, get thee to your school's learning or education center, and also your counseling center.

Agree 100% that pre-meds don't know what they're getting into. I once had a summer UG named Andy. I showed him a chart on a wall of all the biochemical pathways, and told him that "this is what you're going to learn in Biochem in med school".

He refused to believe me! The chart was right there, on the wall of a medical school classroom!

He's now an internist in the midwest. He later believed me.

Not only going to learn it, but in a super accelerated fashion. My problem is that I've always had an amazing memory. Biochem wasn't bad, especially since my major was in molecular and cellular biology. I also TA'ed anatomy for years so musculoskeletal isn't bad so far.

 

[adrenocorticotropicana]

one of the dullest courses that the typical med student is force fed (I am so naïve).

??????????????????

why do a large chunk of future physicians hate intensive medical biochemistry?

then these students apply to psychiatry residencies because they didn't do well on their USMLE Step 1. They get in because the average psychiatry Step 1 score is still below the Step 1 average. They get a patient with PTSD who just loves every detail of cellular biochemistry and neurochemistry, every detail of apoptosis, every metabolic and cytochrome P450 pathway and brings in clinical literature to her appointment to discuss her medication and treatment options. (Because you know, psychiatry's primary mode of treatment involves medical biochemistry.) They then treat her horribly and shout at her, "you think you're smarter than your doctors, don't you??"

I guess I'm very unsympathetic because I just don't get it and you remind me too much of my past treatment providers. I would eat up this course.

To me as a patient with a biochemistry degree, if you hate medical biochemistry and find it dull and unexciting, you don't belong in medicine and you shouldn't be a physician. Your kind of people kill patients like us. Go to physician's assistant school instead, or something.

 

[adrenocorticotropicana]

Prior to this day, I was overwhelmed to the point of feeling as though a stop for gas was cutting into critical studying time. Now this feeling has exponentially compounded.

That's not how an exponential curve works. That's just a discontinuous slope change.

 

[Goro]

??????????????????

why do a large chunk of future physicians hate intensive medical biochemistry?

then these students apply to psychiatry residencies because they didn't do well on their USMLE Step 1. They get in because the average psychiatry Step 1 score is still below the Step 1 average. They get a patient with PTSD who just loves every detail of cellular biochemistry and neurochemistry, every detail of apoptosis, every metabolic and cytochrome P450 pathway and brings in clinical literature to her appointment to discuss her medication and treatment options. (Because you know, psychiatry's primary mode of treatment involves medical biochemistry.) They then treat her horribly and shout at her, "you think you're smarter than your doctors, don't you??"

I guess I'm very unsympathetic because I just don't get it and you remind me too much of my past treatment providers. I would eat up this course.

To me as a patient with a biochemistry degree, if you hate medical biochemistry and find it dull and unexciting, you don't belong in medicine and you shouldn't be a physician. Your kind of people kill patients like us. Go to physician's assistant school instead, or something.

Teaching moment: Burnett's Law in action.

 

[sunshinefl]

??????????????????

why do a large chunk of future physicians hate intensive medical biochemistry?

then these students apply to psychiatry residencies because they didn't do well on their USMLE Step 1. They get in because the average psychiatry Step 1 score is still below the Step 1 average. They get a patient with PTSD who just loves every detail of cellular biochemistry and neurochemistry, every detail of apoptosis, every metabolic and cytochrome P450 pathway and brings in clinical literature to her appointment to discuss her medication and treatment options. (Because you know, psychiatry's primary mode of treatment involves medical biochemistry.) They then treat her horribly and shout at her, "you think you're smarter than your doctors, don't you??"

I guess I'm very unsympathetic because I just don't get it and you remind me too much of my past treatment providers. I would eat up this course.

To me as a patient with a biochemistry degree, if you hate medical biochemistry and find it dull and unexciting, you don't belong in medicine and you shouldn't be a physician. Your kind of people kill patients like us. Go to physician's assistant school instead, or something.

What?! Lmao is this satire?

 

[Goro]

What?! Lmao is this satire?

I fear not.. I suspect "love me, love my scientific discipline of choice".

 

[sunshinefl]

I fear not.. I suspect "love me, love my scientific discipline of choice".

I don’t get it. At all. This person is a premed talking down on psychiatrists’ step scores ??? And also indicating that conducting an in-depth tutoring session about apoptosis during a psychiatry appt is a requisite skill. I’m simultaneously laughing, crying, and still in disbelief.

 

[I'mJustCurious]

Thank you, Jesus! I enjoyed that you added humor. Otherwise, it would have been just plain depressing.

 

[DrStephenStrange]

I'm guessing Jesus H Christ can't pull a miracle on this one.

Sent from my SM-G950U using SDN mobile

 

[adrenocorticotropicana]

I don’t get it. At all. This person is a premed talking down on psychiatrists’ step scores ??? And also indicating that conducting an in-depth tutoring session about apoptosis during a psychiatry appt is a requisite skill. I’m simultaneously laughing, crying, and still in disbelief.

No more like certain psychiatrists being frustrated when I would advocate for certain medications like buspirone because it would be a 5-HT1A full agonist (and not merely aripiprazole, a 5-HT1A partial agonist), or because most psychiatrists would be pretty reluctant to discuss clinical literature in our appointment or any sort of neurochemistry related to the medications I was taking.

And psychiatry residents have below-average step 1 scores on average and that's a statistically-significant fact.

as a patient whose PTSD was misdiagnosed for years by psychiatrists, I thought I would be allowed to harbor resentment for people in medical school who dislike biochemistry. i'll try to get rid of it before i upset my future peers.

(my last two psychiatrists have been pretty dandy; the last one graduated residency and my current one is awesome and both of them have given me space to discuss clinical literature in my appointment and accommodate my autism. however, I have been focused more on treating my PTSD with physical activity than medication recently lol.)

 

[Taddy Mason]

No more like certain psychiatrists being frustrated when I would advocate for certain medications like buspirone because it would be a 5-HT1A full agonist (and not merely aripiprazole, a 5-HT1A partial agonist), or because most psychiatrists would be pretty reluctant to discuss clinical literature in our appointment or any sort of neurochemistry related to the medications I was taking.

And psychiatry residents have below-average step 1 scores on average and that's a statistically-significant fact.

as a patient whose PTSD was misdiagnosed for years by psychiatrists, I thought I would be allowed to harbor resentment for people in medical school who dislike biochemistry. i'll try to get rid of it before i upset my future peers.

(my last two psychiatrists have been pretty dandy; the last one graduated residency and my current one is awesome and both of them have given me space to discuss clinical literature in my appointment and accommodate my autism. however, I have been focused more on treating my PTSD with physical activity than medication recently lol.)

Guess I’ll just start skipping weekly didactics and peruse pre-allo for psychopharm education.

 

[AnatomyGrey12]

To me as a patient with a biochemistry degree, if you hate medical biochemistry and find it dull and unexciting, you don't belong in medicine and you shouldn't be a physician. Your kind of people kill patients like us. Go to physician's assistant school instead, or something.

lol.... I'm predicting it now that you will quit medical school. Your vision of what it should be and reality aren't even on the same planet.

And psychiatry residents have below-average step 1 scores on average and that's a statistically-significant fact.

Yeah no. You know that's not how the board exams works right? The average is meaningless. The test is designed to determine a basic level of competence that designates a student as ready to move forward in their medical training... essentially it's is meant more as a P/F exam... The use of the score to compare students is only a thing because medical students are extremely similar across the board and residency PD's have used the test as a way to separate candidates based on the fact that it is the only objective piece in a residency application.

 

[adrenocorticotropicana]

The average is meaningless.

This sounds more like an opinion, as opposed to a fact.

 

[gensurghopeful]

It's a grind but manageable to some degree.

I go to mandatory class (can skip maybe a day a week and stay within code of conduct).
I study week days 5-10. I play soccer every few days. I get lunch and dinner with friends every other day.
I talk to my parents every week or so. I study on weeknds pretty much all day with breaks to watch soccer and go walking.
I cook and bump techno. I go out drinking once every two weeks.

I'm a med student.

BALANCE.

 

[AnatomyGrey12]

This sounds more like an opinion, as opposed to a fact.

Why don't you tell us what you think it means? I'm sorry facts hurt your opinions.

 

[adrenocorticotropicana]

What's a fact? Ignorance of antihistamines' anticholinergic properties, sharply increased in potential when said antihistamines are combined with their appropriate CYPP450 inhibitor, will lead to misdiagnosis. (This is probably not covered in core medical biochemistry per se, but uses some key paradigms drawn from it.)

I say this because I actually had to point this out to my treatment team at Tufts ER once, who somehow completely missed I had acute anticholinergic delirium and had diagnosed me with something very different. With slurred speech and definitively not AAOx3, I literally had to spell out the mechanism to my resident. The lightbulb went off and my resident seemed very excited and he dashed back into the treatment room. lol

pretty sure all of this was covered somewhere in the step 1 exam

you say it's just an exam. medical students have to pass it to prove basic competency. why is the average even meaningful? yet my resident had forgotten about this property of antihistamines until I reminded him. as a patient who was delirious.

tl;dr medical biochemistry should hardly be considered a "dry" subject when ignorance of it will lead to definitive patient harm

 

[sunshinefl]

This sounds more like an opinion, as opposed to a fact.

In contrast, not realizing that antihistamines have anticholinergic properties which are then sharply increased in potential when said antihistamines are combined with another drug that inhibits the liver enzyme which metabolizes it, can lead to misdiagnosis. (This is probably not covered in core medical biochemistry per se, but uses some key paradigms drawn from it.)

I say this because I actually had to point this out to my treatment team at Tufts ER once, who somehow completely missed I had acute anticholinergic delirium and had diagnosed me with something very different. With slurred speech and definitively not AAOx3, I literally had to spell out the mechanism to my resident. The lightbulb went off and my resident seemed very excited and he dashed back into the treatment room. lol

tl;dr medical biochemistry should hardly be considered a "dry" subject when ignorance of it will lead to definitive patient harm

This is just clinical understanding. No one is against that. And at my school was covered in neuroanatomy and psychopharm btw, not biochem.

 

[adrenocorticotropicana]

yes, but one discipline informs the other, just like organic chemistry informs biochemistry. it's kind of disconcerting when I as a patient have to remind my doctors to wash their hands and that topamax interacts with my estradiol injections because topamax activates the pregnane X receptor which then induces CYP3A4, and that thus I need higher doses of estradiol injections to maintain suitable blood levels of estradiol compared to a patient who does not experience as much CYP3A4 induction. It's almost like... shouldn't doctors know that??

someone who sees medical biochemistry as dry and as an annoyance is bound to see their patients' individual complexities as an annoyance.

 

[AnatomyGrey12]

tl;dr medical biochemistry should hardly be considered a "dry" subject when ignorance of it will lead to definitive patient harm

none of the things you have talked about are medical biochemistry....

I am also skeptical of your story, as you say you were in acute cholinergic delirium (slurred speech and everything) but were able to explicitly explain, in detail, pharmacological pathways...

because shouldn't doctors know that??

Actually no, it's a very specific scenario related to your very specific situation. That is why we have so many specialized fields of medicine. It's like walking into the ER and being upset that the neurosurgeon doesn't know how to handle your Crohn's disease medications.

I'm standing by my bet that you will leave medical school when you get there because your view of medicine and what the reality is are strikingly different..

 

[adrenocorticotropicana]

I am also skeptical of your story, as you say you were in acute cholinergic delirium (slurred speech and everything) but were able to explicitly explain, in detail, pharmacological pathways...

??? this is just something that comes naturally to me.

i can explain pharmacological pathways while black out drunk

(i'm also autistic)

I literally had to shout out "anticholinergic" and "CYP450" over 3 different occasions to three different people over the course of two hours. The third time, resident who checked on me understood. I wasn't using full sentences. They were accusing me of having intentionally overdosed on a much larger dose than I actually took (I was using high doses of antihistamines plus an alpha-1 blocker to reduce the anxiety from having taken way too much caffeine, and I fainted on the street. Back then I wasn't as self-aware about my trauma, and much more willing to use my body as a science experiment.)

 

[sunshinefl]

??? this is just something that comes naturally to me.

i can explain pharmacological pathways while black out drunk

(i'm also autistic)

I literally had to shout out "anticholinergic" over 3 different occasions to three different people over the course of two hours. The third time, resident who checked on me understood. I wasn't using full sentences

You might be happier in a PhD Biochem program.

 

[AnatomyGrey12]

I wasn't using full sentences

So to clarify, you weren't able to actually give any sort of a history, were shouting random words, and are mad that the ER resident didn't know what was going on? Yeah.....

 

[adrenocorticotropicana]

So to clarify, you weren't able to actually give any sort of a history, were shouting random words, and are mad that the ER resident didn't know what was going on? Yeah.....

I wasn't shouting random words, I was shouting out concepts.

 

[AnatomyGrey12]

I wasn't shouting random words, I was shouting out concepts.

No you weren't. You were literally shouting out random words. No doctor in the world is going to catch that at first. Your expectations are fantasy.

 

[adrenocorticotropicana]

Actually no, it's a very specific scenario related to your very specific situation

CYP450 interactions are hardly "very specific."

The side effect and interaction profile of alpha-1 receptor antagonists are on the Step 1 exam

 

[AnatomyGrey12]

The side effect and interaction profile of alpha-1 receptor antagonists are on the Step 1 exam

Yes they are, and so is Crohn's disease but you don't expect the neurosurgeon to know about how to manage the medications for it. Again, your expectations are fantastical.

 

[adrenocorticotropicana]

It's not that hard to keep your memory sharp

 

[AnatomyGrey12]

It's not that hard to keep your memory sharp

You have no idea what you are talking about lol

 

[Magus5454]

*eats popcorn*

 

[adrenocorticotropicana]

As a tutor, I teach students how to internalize vast amounts of information in a short amount of time for a living -- at the application/synthesis level. I helped a student cover an entire semester of cognitive neuroscience and ace his exam in one night when it was a subject I never took (I just took neurobiology, but I taught him how to use both a problem-centered approach and a dialectic approach to taking notes, and I had to constantly read ahead of him while teaching material I had just learned 15 minutes prior).

(it's sad that in undergrad I didn't have the skills I know five years later, but that's why I'm doing a DIY postbac.)

in a way, i've been pretty bored because in the last five years and i've been itching to cover material that actually pushes me to the limit. i love that feeling -- the information pouring in, the adrenaline racing, the heart pumping as you teach yourself, and maybe teach others, how to practically apply newly acquired information. i could breathe it every day.

when you have to learn to teach yourself and teach others just to survive and feed yourself, and pay the bills, you learn a lot of things 🙂 maybe i don't know what i'm talking about. but I have teach myself graduate-level and clinical-level science fairly frequently only because I have to go into that territory to answer students' garden path questions.

 

[Osminog]

someone who sees medical biochemistry as dry and as an annoyance is bound to see their patients' individual complexities as an annoyance.

This is one of the most outlandish things I've ever read on SDN. You're conflating attitudes toward academic topics with attitudes toward human beings.

Also, you're probably super smart, but I don't think that going into this with the strong belief that you're going to be God's gift to medicine is going to do you any favors. There's idealism, but then there's also modesty... and modesty probably goes a long way in a somewhat conservative professional field like medicine.

 

[adrenocorticotropicana]

i’m sorry you see it as an academic topic but for me it activates raw and visceral emotions

 

[Goro]

i’m sorry you see it as an academic topic but for me it activates raw and visceral emotions

This is not healthy, nor normal. I'm worried about you, AC

 

[adrenocorticotropicana]

some of it is derived from how i process my personal traumas yes (intellectualization is my favorite defense mechanism) but it also does that because I have some very strong synesthesias as an autistic person and visualizing/feeling pathways as a tactile-visual construct activates one of these synesthesias really strongly. that’s why i’m able to hold them in my head even when i’m not AAOx3.

i guess i wanted to think every med student could do that, in some visceral way [not necessarily the same kind of synesthesia]

 

[kelminak]

8/21/18

Med School Meanderings

First Entry


3 weeks into medical school and we have completed our first course.


Molecular and Cellular Mechanisms (MCM)


Ingredients:


3 cups medical biochemistry

1 cup containing equal parts molecular and cellular biology

1 cup genetics

A splash of histology and physiology


Wow. That was quick. I’m not quite sure how to feel about it. Happy I got through it with a passing grade, but disappointed it wasn’t the grade I was hoping for. Regardless, I struggle to formulate words to express how thrilled I am to be done with (in my humble opinion) one of the dullest courses that the typical med student is force fed (I am so naïve).


As I am now approximately a month deep into medical school, I feel I can better assess some of the expectations vs. realities I personally experienced, and maybe in the process give an ignorant pre-med a clearer image into the genesis of medical school training. Allow me to chronologically unpack my time so far.


Day 1: In class from 8a-5p. Go home and cry because I’m a little confused about what just hit me in the face (although metaphorical, I imagine the feeling of literally being punched in the face is similar in many regards).


Day 3: Feeling better. More interested in what I am learning. More confident in what I am learning.


Day 5: Just bombed a quiz. Repeat day 1 but with the addition of a looming cloud that is our midterm taking place Monday morning (yes, you heard that right. One week into biochem and we have our midterm). Prior to this day, I was overwhelmed to the point of feeling as though a stop for gas was cutting into critical studying time. Now this feeling has exponentially compounded.


Day 6: Functioning on 3 hours of sleep. Cry. Study. Repeat.


Day 7: Functioning on 2 hours of sleep. Cry. Study. Repeat.


Day 8: Take the midterm. Pass. Move on. Feel much better knowing that I can pass the exams when I give 100%.


Week 2: Still riding the “I can do this” wave. Complain to psychologist about not feeling like I am bonding with friends. Crushed the end of week quiz. I got this. Who needs friends?


Week 3: Starts off good. Around Tuesday I realize I have a quiz on Thursday and a giant final the day following. Lose several nights of sleep. Cry. Study. Repeat. Pass the final. Move on.


When I was a premed, I remember thinking that medical students must be riding some high horse if they are under the impression that they can cover a semesters worth of material from undergrad in a measly 5 days. Or maybe they were just exaggerating the reality in order to give us this terrible perception, making the first weeks of med a little bit more manageable. I don’t know. Either way, it just wasn’t possible for a single human being to cover - let alone learn - all of that material so quickly.


As it turns out, I was wrong.


You do cover that volume of material in a week. It’s definitely enough to make a grown man who rarely sheds a tear burst into hysterics. I’m learning to deal with the volume of information. Slowly, but surely. Every day is still a race against the clock, but it’s becoming more manageable.


I am also quickly learning how easy it is to totally forget everything else that exists in the world and hone in on medical school day-in and day-out. There’s a thin line you walk as a med student between sane and insane. If you aren’t taking time out of each and every day to do something for yourself, then it could result in severe short and long-term consequences. I personally have decided to write. I have wanted to give someone a window into my life for a long time, but I haven’t done it. I’m starting that now.


Lastly, being here for a month has made me wonder how it is humanly possible for a med school to have 5-year graduation rates routinely above 95%. They take a massive number of students (200+ at many schools, including mine), and based on a short 15-30 minute interview, along with a passing glance at an application, determine that virtually all of the 200+ students they accept are going to graduate and move into residency training. I think the answer to this question goes hand-in-hand with inquiring why students sign up for this blunt-force trauma in the first place.


Pre-meds have no idea what they are signing up for. They see the knowledge, prestige, and power of a practicing physician and say “that looks like a nice life.” They only see the part of the iceberg that has broached the surface. They have no idea what is hiding beneath the water line. So they pay a ton of money to some undergrad to get a degree that will only serve them if they continue with a medical education, apply to a bazillion different schools, and show up on day 1 to the institution that accepted their poor soul.


The life of a med student is one that forces 70-80 hours of studying per week, minimum. Most people entering med school won’t know how to actively study for more than an hour without “taking a 5” at the 30-minute mark. Nobody entering medical school has a clue to what a med students life even looks like. Let me give you the best analogy I can think of. It’s basically a life of solitary confinement. You are by yourself virtually all day. You may be in the room with other students, but in order to cover the volume of information you need to get through, study groups (where students work through the material together) prove useless. This is a self-study game. You also don’t ever get to enjoy the sunshine or fresh air because a passing ambulance is enough to knock you off your groove for a long while. You’re confined. In a room. By yourself. Day-in and day-out.


The reason there are so many people successfully making it through is due to the simple fact that the moment you step into your first class of medical school, you’re locked into $30k+ worth of debt that even chapter 7 bankruptcy can’t make disappear. The debt has to be the biggest deterrent that is stopping med students from dropping out during the first several months. I once had a boss comment that he likes to try and convince his employees to get into some debt because that way they show up and perform.


I see where he was getting at now.


Until next time,


Student Dr. Hopeamine

Yikes dude. I was very fortunate to a post-bacc w/ my school before starting and the fact that you think it takes 70-80 hours to study is ridiculous. I had 3 tests this week and have 2 more the next week. I'm super drunk right now because I finished 5 lectures of studying by 3 pm, got a bunch of chores done, and had enough time to drink and play some video games with friends. Is it the only time I'll get to until maybe next Saturday? Probably. But there should be a lot of free time available to you. I go to a mandatory attendance school too but I'm straight up ignoring lecturers, making every powerpoint into an anki deck, then studying 4-6 of those depending on how many of tests are coming up. It's not exhilerating, but it's definitely no where near 70-80 hours a week.

It's not about the debt locking you in. Your study methods clearly aren't working if you are so bogged down you can't function. A lot of people flounder at first if you've read enough here, but most people fall into a pattern that lets them succeed in both school and in their personal life. I'm worried about you and you need to start doing some research here about better ways to utilize your time. If you're going to all of your classes, listening like you'll remember something, then having to study everything when you get home, I can't imagine how you'd have any sanity left afterward. There are better ways to play this game and people have paved the way for you. Do the research so you can get your life under control and nail med school.

 

[Magus5454]

Yikes dude. I was very fortunate to a post-bacc w/ my school before starting and the fact that you think it takes 70-80 hours to study is ridiculous. I had 3 tests this week and have 2 more the next week. I'm super drunk right now because I finished 5 lectures of studying by 3 pm, got a bunch of chores done, and had enough time to drink and play some video games with friends. Is it the only time I'll get to until maybe next Saturday? Probably. But there should be a lot of free time available to you. I go to a mandatory attendance school too but I'm straight up ignoring lecturers, making every powerpoint into an anki deck, then studying 4-6 of those depending on how many of tests are coming up. It's not exhilerating, but it's definitely no where near 70-80 hours a week.

It's not about the debt locking you in. Your study methods clearly aren't working if you are so bogged down you can't function. A lot of people flounder at first if you've read enough here, but most people fall into a pattern that lets them succeed in both school and in their personal life. I'm worried about you and you need to start doing some research here about better ways to utilize your time. If you're going to all of your classes, listening like you'll remember something, then having to study everything when you get home, I can't imagine how you'd have any sanity left afterward. There are better ways to play this game and people have paved the way for you. Do the research so you can get your life under control and nail med school.

OP goes to KCU, so he doesn't even have mandatory lectures.

 

[kelminak]

OP goes to KCU, so he doesn't even have mandatory lectures.

Yeah it's not the lectures that is the issue. OP doesn't know how to study the right way for med school. AKA blow off lectures and study **** in an active learning format. I'm confident they could get it figured out but they're obviously struggling to make a post like this.

I'm not claiming to be some magician either. I score within 1-3 questions below average sometimes on tests and had a rough week doing even worse due to really bad IBS flareups. But my methods leave me with a ****load more free time than my classmates. They're pulling all nighters up until 5 AM to make it through a 3 test week when I was in bed by 11. We'll see how many of them keep up that momentum a couple months from now.

 

[Magus5454]

Yeah it's not the lectures that is the issue. OP doesn't know how to study the right way for med school. AKA blow off lectures and study **** in an active learning format. I'm confident they could get it figured out but they're obviously struggling to make a post like this.

I'm not claiming to be some magician either. I score within 1-3 questions below average sometimes on tests and had a rough week doing even worse due to really bad IBS flareups. But my methods leave me with a ****load more free time than my classmates. They're pulling all nighters up until 5 AM to make it through a 3 test week when I was in bed by 11. We'll see how many of them keep up that momentum a couple months from now.

Honestly , for me , doing what I did in undergrad is working, so far. I know at some point I might actually have to change, but I still have a fairly good grasp on all the material. I don't think I've been to a lecture(besides required/not recorded) in about two weeks.

 

[kelminak]

Honestly , for me , doing what I did in undergrad is working, so far. I know at some point I might actually have to change, but I still have a fairly good grasp on all the material. I don't think I've been to a lecture(besides required/not recorded) in about two weeks.

Definitely depends on what you're doing. I thought mandatory attendance was gonna be a death sentence. Instead it just gets me out of bed and I do what I would have done anyway (Anki nonstop). There are days where if I'm motivated enough, I'll have 50-75% of my studying finished before we even get done with lectures (not just making the Anki decks, but then opening up and finishing over half of what I wanted to study that day). I wrap up the rest before dinner at 5 and then relax the rest of the evening. There are really efficient methods out there and other people have figured that out already. If OP is struggling, they need to emulate someone more successful or go to their academic advising center to get 1-on-1 help.

 

[Magus5454]

Definitely depends on what you're doing. I thought mandatory attendance was gonna be a death sentence. Instead it just gets me out of bed and I do what I would have done anyway (Anki nonstop). There are days where if I'm motivated enough, I'll have 50-75% of my studying finished before we even get done with lectures (not just making the Anki decks, but then opening up and finishing over half of what I wanted to study that day). I wrap up the rest before dinner at 5 and then relax the rest of the evening. There are really efficient methods out there and other people have figured that out already. If OP is struggling, they need to emulate someone more successful or go to their academic advising center to get 1-on-1 help.

I wake up around 8 or 9 still, I watch the previous days lectures(mostly on 1.4x or 1.6x unless whoever already talks fast). It helps that I'm finally having repeat lecturers so you know how they emphasize material.

 

[kelminak]

I wake up around 8 or 9 still, I watch the previous days lectures(mostly on 1.4x or 1.6x unless whoever already talks fast). It helps that I'm finally having repeat lecturers so you know how they emphasize material.

Sped up lectures are definitely a must if you plan on listening at all. I recognized very quickly I hated listening and didn't remember anything within a couple hours, which is why Anki flashcards work so much better for me. Having to force myself through the content has worked great. I have to wonder what OP's approach has been so far. Hopefully they'll come back.

 

[I'd Rather Be Camping]

??????????????????

why do a large chunk of future physicians hate intensive medical biochemistry?

then these students apply to psychiatry residencies because they didn't do well on their USMLE Step 1. They get in because the average psychiatry Step 1 score is still below the Step 1 average. They get a patient with PTSD who just loves every detail of cellular biochemistry and neurochemistry, every detail of apoptosis, every metabolic and cytochrome P450 pathway and brings in clinical literature to her appointment to discuss her medication and treatment options. (Because you know, psychiatry's primary mode of treatment involves medical biochemistry.) They then treat her horribly and shout at her, "you think you're smarter than your doctors, don't you??"

I guess I'm very unsympathetic because I just don't get it and you remind me too much of my past treatment providers. I would eat up this course.

To me as a patient with a biochemistry degree, if you hate medical biochemistry and find it dull and unexciting, you don't belong in medicine and you shouldn't be a physician. Your kind of people kill patients like us. Go to physician's assistant school instead, or something.

And this, my friends, is why medical school interviews exist.

 

[I'd Rather Be Camping]

Teaching moment: Burnett's Law in action.

I'd say it's a good example of the Dunning-Kruger effect too.