Pre-studying, a bad idea?

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adamg

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So I mentioned a desire to pre-study before starting my first semester of med school, Ie, get your books ahead of time and start reading them to get a jump on the busy semester.

This is what I have done every semester in undergrad, (sometimes I think I did it just to calm down, stop freaking out, scarred that the professor would expect us to remember everything from the past and jumpt straight to something I had never seen before) this semester I am not because of studying for MCAT.

The replies I got where unanimous, pre-studying is a bad idea.

So I thought it worthy to set up a seperate thread on this subject so we could hear from more people.

Does anyone think pre-studying is a good idea? Does anyone do it, did in it the past?
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I am not pre-studying. It is like pre-studying for anything. You need the syllabus to know what you need to know. Spend your time relaxing and then hit it hard when school starts.
 
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enjoy your summer...don't study...it is of little value during the summer. You said you already received unanimous replies that it's a bad idea, so why are we posting this?

If you do a search, this topic has been covered endlessly.

You will not be behind because you didn't study in the summer.

You are about to enter a whole new world.

You will reach a point (residency) when you just want a day off or a full weekend, while waiting for your one of three/four weeks you get off a year.
You will be thinking fondly and often of those days when you just had a full summer to do whatever the heck you wanted, and then sink back into your world of gloom as you dictate yet another discharge summary awaiting the next H and P at 2 am praying that your pager doesn't go off to interrupt your attempts to catch up with your endless paperwor...BEEP! BEEP! BEEP!...but alas it did, and now you got to check on patient who has suddenly developed foot pain in the middle of the night.

Do us the favor and just live your few remaining summers with as much f***ing vigor as humanly possible completely devoid of med school texts.
 
adamg said:
Does anyone think pre-studying is a good idea? Does anyone do it, did in it the past?
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If you're the kind of person who just barely squeaked into med school, always had to work 300% harder than your classmates to get a good grade, and generally aren't the sharpest tool in the shed, then yes, it's a good idea.

If you're the average med school matriculant who was always the smartest kid in the class, has good reading comprehension and memory, and have had straight-A's since you were 4, then no, it's a bad idea.
 
Maybe you should prepare for residency while you are at it.
 
Tired said:
If you're the kind of person who just barely squeaked into med school, always had to work 300% harder than your classmates to get a good grade, and generally aren't the sharpest tool in the shed, then yes, it's a good idea.
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I disagree. In that case for sure you aren't going to be focusing on the right stuff anyhow and pre-studying would be even more of a waste. Enjoy your summer. Clear your head and show up ready to hit the ground running. There is nothing in med school that can't be learned after you start med school and very few things you could do before where the yield is actually going to be worth the effort.
 
I had a doctor tell me to read about 3 hours every day. When I asked him if I'd be able to retain enough for it to be useful, he told me that it didn't matter, and that the important thing was to get used to studying hard again.

I've been out of school for a couple years now though, and working full-time.

He also told me that, while medical texts like Robbins would be ideal for this, the important thing was just to be doing SOMETHING, and if there was something else I'd rather read, then it would be better than sitting around on my ass.
 
adamg said:
Does anyone think pre-studying is a good idea?
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Pre-studying at your stage is essentially a USELESS task. A much better use of the interim time is to try to have fun. Once school starts, you'll be jonesing for moments such as these. The first few weeks of medical school should knock you out of premed mode and you'll realize how precious your free time actually is.

Does anyone do it, did in it the past?
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Well, statistically speaking, I'm sure there are some who do this. However, I don't know anybody who has attempted to do this and has benefited significantly from the venture.
 
spicedmanna said:
I'm sure there are some who do this. However, I don't know anybody who has attempted to do this and has benefited significantly from the venture.
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Yeah. A lot of us ignored the naysayers and tried pre-studying. The consensus even amongst those who tried is that it was a total waste of time. Time that could have been better spend doing other things. But you will probably ignore us like we ignored our predecessors. Then you will be giving out the "don't bother" advice in a year. The cycle of life continues.
 
greg1184 said:
Maybe you should prepare for residency while you are at it.
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lol.

I think pre-studying is pretty worthless. The intensity of the material will far outweigh anything you can do on your own. If you want to learn some anatomy and maybe some biochemistry or something thats cool. You can't learn histology or neuroscience, or pathology on your own, its just too hard I would think.

If you really want to read anything, read house of god, or something on medical economics. Medicine is not the rosy field everyone thinks it is...it's cool, don't get me wrong...but you seem to be the overly optimistic, eager type and I see you running into a brick wall perhaps someday when you see the nastier sides of medicine. I'm not telling you to be jaded...I'm telling you to try to be aware.
 
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GZA said:
lol.

please, someone start a thread on this...
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truth is stranger than fiction. Somebody HAS. I forgot where it was...check out the General Residency section. A month ago or so a pre-med was staying up late nights to try to simulate residency hours. I think he was trying a Q3 or Q4 call schedule. He's not totally crazy, actually. A bit on the eager side, but not crazy.
 
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radslooking said:
truth is stranger than fiction. Somebody HAS. I forgot where it was...check out the General Residency section. A month ago or so a pre-med was staying up late nights to try to simulate residency hours. I think he was trying a Q3 or Q4 call schedule. He's not totally crazy, actually. A bit on the eager side, but not crazy.
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Well there you have it. Now we need to find an M0 who already bought his or her office space.
 
adamg said:
So I mentioned a desire to pre-study before starting my first semester of med school, Ie, get your books ahead of time and start reading them to get a jump on the busy semester.

This is what I have done every semester in undergrad, (sometimes I think I did it just to calm down, stop freaking out, scarred that the professor would expect us to remember everything from the past and jumpt straight to something I had never seen before) this semester I am not because of studying for MCAT.

The replies I got where unanimous, pre-studying is a bad idea.

So I thought it worthy to set up a seperate thread on this subject so we could hear from more people.

Does anyone think pre-studying is a good idea? Does anyone do it, did in it the past?
Click to expand...

As most SDNers will tell you, do NOT do it. I would say mainly because you will burn out before the semester starts. Also, you don't really know what to study, so you might just be wasting your time.
 
In May/June I read Costanzo's physiology cover to cover. But as has been said, that was just to reintroduce my brain to studying after taking a year off. I don't think I retained much. Plus Costanzo is really simple. If you tried to read Robbins I think you would just get frustrated and burn out that much sooner once school actually starts.
 
I have a somewhat different perspective on this than some of you. I personally wanted to study the summer before med school because I was so excited to start and learn the stuff I had dreamed of studying for so long... so really, because it was fun. Yeah, I'm kind of a nerd, but I had been out of school for a bit, so I didn't feel the need to hard-core relax or squeeze every last bit of fun out of the summer, I was already pretty relaxed from a few years of working a normal job like a normal person.

So, this is what I would do. Anatomy is pretty straightforward and also pretty cool. I would get a nice book like Gray's Anatomy for Students, which has not-too-complicated text and pretty pictures. I would just leaf through it, look at the pictures, and read what seems interesting. Maybe start learning some of the muscles of the upper & lower limbs or whatever. I might also get the BRS Anatomy book, which should give you an idea of what you will focus on in med school. Do not try to learn from the BRS books though, they're just meant as a review and will make your head hurt.

Anyway, if you feel like lolling around a cafe reading about cool human body stuff in your free time, I totally support you, and... shh... I actually do think it might be at least somewhat useful. Oh, and also, studying at a leisurely pace and really enjoying and digesting what you're learning is itself a luxury you won't have in med school! But don't stress out about it, it is SO not necessary to do this unless you're having fun.

Have a great summer in whatever way you choose! And if it doesn't turn out to be enjoyable, just stop and wait til next year.
 
If you're just hellbent on doing something, then get a subscription to NEJM and read articles that are interesting to you before bed. That's the extent of what I can consider sane.
 
Summer prestudying definitely won't be as good, since you won't know what to study necessarily. Not everything in a book will necessarily be covered. Whatever.

Prestudying IS good after you've started the class, have your syllabus, and are reviewing what will be covered prior to a lecture.
 
Don't waste your time. I can rattle off a massive list of college courses that med school covered in their entirety in a matter of days, and no prestudying is going to be as effective as an actual course.

You don't yet know what you need, and the amount of information you're going to go through would make your prestudying look like taking a beer can of water out of Lake Meade.
 
I'm in my first week of classes and could not be happier that I didn't study beforehand. It's a waste of good time - get in shape, play an instrument, etc. - do something that will keep you sane. Outside of neuro stuff, all I've had is introductory biology - it's all new to me. As someone that probably knows a lot less than you about topics like physio and is currently where you'll be in a few weeks, trust me - don't do it.
 
no, please don't. 1) won't know what to focus on, 2)you'll be setting up yourself to burn out quicker as the year goes on. Save some of that energy/drive and do something fun. you'll thank us later.
 
Even if pre-studying was effective, doesn't it train you to depend on time you won't have in med school? Unless you're going to pre-study the entire year anyway... 🙄
 
As someone who is preparing for MS1 this Fall, I'm glad the consensus is against pre-studying. At the same time, I feel like I'm standing in the ocean watching a gigantic wave approaching, and I feel a little awkward just waiting for it.

Of course, I haven't had the chance to really seize the day this summer and take my mind off it, as I'm still working and will continue to work until we find someone who can fill my shoes. I'm a little scared that I'll be working through orientation at this point. Which would suck.
 
Tired said:
If you're the kind of person who just barely squeaked into med school, always had to work 300% harder than your classmates to get a good grade, and generally aren't the sharpest tool in the shed, then yes, it's a good idea.
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well... f- it, i'm still not pre-studying. i have watched 2 episodes of hopkins though. its getting me pumped.
 
If you're a single guy the best thing you should do this summer is to get a girlfriend or go get laid. Once M1 year starts it may be a long dry drought. I'm being dead serious too.
 
While pre-studying w/o a syllabus probably won't do you any good, I definitely think reading BRS physio cover-to-cover is a good idea since almost all of that stuff is high yield. The anatomy, neuro & biochem of 1st year is so varied b/w schools but physio (at least in my talks w/ my friends from different schools) seems to be pretty consistent.

I give the same advice to 1st years wanting to know what to do b/w 1st & 2nd year. My answer is always memorise BRS physio since it will make path & pharm so much easier.

Pre-studying for one subject will give you a little more time to study the others during school.


 
Watch a bunch of House. Entertaining and you'll learn some diseases.
 
Well I think it's too late to think about studying anything now. That said though..

Over the summer I actually went ahead and worked through an entire general chemistry textbook then almost all of a biochemistry textbook, end-of-chapter exercises and everything. I graduated with my degree in biochemistry and philosophy last august, so it's not like I was feeling too far removed from academia, I just like the subjects and thats how I chose to relieve some boredom. If nothing else I won't be out of practice when it comes time to tackle some basic science again. I did give myself this whole month off though and did absolutely nothing.
 
PeepshowJohnny said:
Watch a bunch of House. Entertaining and you'll learn some diseases.
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yeah, the ones that you'll almost never see on a day to day basis.

Anyway, i'm opting for pre-reading. i understand those who advise against it, but the last time i took a class was 2 years ago for grad school and it took me while to get back in the swing of things cos i had been out of college for 4 years at that point.
I'm not letting it happen again.
 
PeepshowJohnny said:
Watch a bunch of House. Entertaining and you'll learn some diseases.
Click to expand...

Although it's not high yield at all, I have to say that you will see at least some of the more obscure things from House and ER on the boards. They pick out the zebras you never see in real life but do show up on tests. So yeah, if you like those shows, you can "call" it prestudying and watch those if it makes you feel better.
 
WellWornLad said:
As someone who is preparing for MS1 this Fall, I'm glad the consensus is against pre-studying. At the same time, I feel like I'm standing in the ocean watching a gigantic wave approaching, and I feel a little awkward just waiting for it.
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Pretty silly to have such a gunnerish attitude before you even start. Everyone in this thread is saying you will not benefit from prestudying yet you still think you know better.🙄
Using your gigantic wave example, you are facing a Tsunami and pre-studying is basically just moving your arms in swimming motions. You will get crushed against the beach like everyone else, but will have wasted more effort before that point, rather than showing up fresh when it hits.
 
OP, do not listen to law2Doc and his/her friends. Prestudying is the key to success in medschool. Rapidly review goljan Rapid review pathology, make sure you memorize the entire First Aid before orientation, and if you can, go ahead and finish the entire lipincott biochem textbook.

The only thing I am asking for in return for my advice is your girlfriends number. See, I am very lonely, and with your prestudy gig, I suspect she is in the same predicament.
 
The only sort of "pre-studying" worth doing is a pre-matriculation program designed by your school, where you actually take medical school coursework and simulated exams. Maryland has such a program. There are minimal participation requirments (you show up for 4-5 hours each day of the program), and you get paid for your troubles. I participated, and I actually found it to be very beneficial.

Had I been on my own to study, I would have had no idea where to start. Plus, the program was only 6 weeks, and I still had over a month afterwards to relax and go on vacation before orientation began.

Trying to pre-study on your own is pointless. It won't teach you anything about how to think/take exams/read/analyze lecture notes and material in medical school, and you're likely to forget everything you covered once the first day of class starts, anyway (which, for us, was a very sobering couple of embryology lectures).
 
Mr hawkings said:
yeah, the ones that you'll almost never see on a day to day basis.
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I have seen so many "House" cases on the wards!!! Really! Much more typical presentations... but definitely stuff like hemochromatosis, a bunch of the parasites, the vasculidites, etc. I guess it's not 'day to day' though.

Anyway, I don't think anything that is said here will sway the OP away from pre-studying! As a true gunner, I would encourage this person to tire himself out pre-studying so that his classmates would benefit as he would be burnt out by the time it really matters.
 
Pre-studying the right material, which as a medical student entails a lot, gives you an advantage as it makes you at least more familar with and in control of the lessons. Ultimately a consolidated understanding would be acquired as a result of the pre-studying advantage plus course.
 
My school posted a set of lectures/syllabi/ppt slides online that represent material we should already have a good understanding of prior to starting this fall. They cover topics that most MS0s should probably already be familiar with from their pre-req classes, especially if you've taken biochemistry (nucleic acids, amino acids, mitosis/meiosis, etc...). They provide a quick assessment (like 5 questions), and you can decide how in depth you need to review that topic (if at all).

So maybe, rather than pre-studying, go back and review material that schools would expect you to already know. You won't be ahead when the school year starts, but you won't be playing catch-up either. Just a thought.
 
drcouch said:
Pre-studying the right material, which as a medical student entails a lot, gives you an advantage as it makes you at least more familar with and in control of the lessons. Ultimately a consolidated understanding would be acquired as a result of the pre-studying advantage plus course.
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The problem is that as an incoming MS0, you have not yet developed the skills necessary to determine and study said "right material."
 
ZagDoc said:
The problem is that as an incoming MS0, you have not yet developed the skills necessary to determine and study said "right material."
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Pre-studying comes with pre-development of those skills. Are there any exclusive courses for the development of those skills?
 
drcouch said:
Pre-studying comes with pre-development of those skills. Are there any exclusive courses for the development of those skills?
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You develop these skills and abilities as you go through first year. It's the whole process. Studying prior to beginning MS-1 for the purpose of pre-studying is like trying to learn how to rock climb by reading Outside magazine. You may think you've benefitted yourself, but it'll be essentially a waste of your time and effort. You won't be able to truly learn how to climb a decent crag until you get out there and do it. I'm not saying you can't benefit at all from pre-studying; it's just that the benefit to effort ratio is likely going to be very low, as to make it not worth your while. That is to say, you are going to put in a lot of effort for very little benefit. There are much better ways to spend the summer. When you actually get out to the crag, you'll learn immensely faster and more efficiently how to climb it. You simply won't have a good idea of what you are up against and what you actually need to know, until you do. Such is with first year of medical school.
 
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drcouch said:
Pre-studying comes with pre-development of those skills. Are there any exclusive courses for the development of those skills?
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Pre-development of those skills does absolutely not come with pre-studying. There's no way you can figure out what material is high yield or what areas are emphasized until you start to be tested on it. Without the examinations, its all a big, ubiquitous bog of medical facts. It isn't until you are tested on the material that you begin to formulate how you are supposed to apply said material, connect concepts, etc.
 
radslooking said:
truth is stranger than fiction. Somebody HAS. I forgot where it was...check out the General Residency section. A month ago or so a pre-med was staying up late nights to try to simulate residency hours. I think he was trying a Q3 or Q4 call schedule. He's not totally crazy, actually. A bit on the eager side, but not crazy.
Click to expand...


That's pretty intense.:bang:
 
i'm kinda in the middle

if you ENJOY checking out medical stuff and getting a peek at what's in store for you, then i don't think it's a total waste of your last break for a long, long time. if you genuinely enjoy it, then it's obviously not a waste.

having said that, don't fool yourself into thinking that you're actually getting far ahead of everyone else just because you spent time memorizing the cranial nerves or the pentose phosphate pathway (or whatever) - you gotta learn stuff like that in a day anyway. like most of the people here have been saying, you haven't learned how to learn in med school yet. that means that you don't really know what to study, what to memorize, what to focus on, what the tests will require you in terms of organizing the material, etc. ad nauseum.

relaxation before you hit the ground sprinting should be your number one priority before school starts. but, again, IF you enjoy reading stuff that you have a likelihood of covering in med school, shoot, why not? just don't get all hardcore and kill yourself doing it - make sure it's fun and leisurely, or else it REALLY IS a huge waste of your precious rest time. the summer before i started, i leisurely spent a small amout of time here and there reading about some physio that i was pretty interested in and i enjoyed it - but in the grand scheme of things, that material was probably 1/2 of 1% of the physio that we had to cover over the course of the year... and that's being generous. i spent way more time reading some novels and other books that i had way less time for once school got rolling.

just my 2 centavos.
 
drcouch said:
Pre-studying comes with pre-development of those skills. Are there any exclusive courses for the development of those skills?
Click to expand...

Um no, you are missing the point. Trying to develop these skills without being in med school is like trying to learn how to swim without access to a pool. You can go through the right motions and still are likely to get nothing out of it. A total waste of time. Good luck with that.
 
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