Second Year vs first year

[jngo2]

Hey everyone,

Almost every second year I've talked to said second year is way worse than first year. Apparently the material is much harder and there's more of it. I knwo it's different from school to school but I wanted to ask anyone who had a significantly tougher second year a question:

Is there anything I could do as a first year to make my second year more bareable? I don't mind spending more time studying now or changing things for the sake of a more comfortable second year.

any advice would be greatly appreciated.

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[OddNath]

This totally depends on the school. For us, actually, I'm having a much easier time in 2nd year than I did last year. No weekends spent in gross lab, no histo(!), everything is more relevant. Like, I actually care about how some drugs work.

Granted, studying for boards next semester will suck, but it's going well now!

 

[SLPI]

remember even if you prestudy the material for second year during first year, you may remember the basic framework but you will need to relearn the details - alot of details. think of it as trying to study for anatomy (if you did anatomy first year) during the last year of your undergrad. not a complete waste of time, you will pick up things easier later on but you still gonna have to go over all the details.

if you still wanna get something to check out i would get robbins pathologic basis of disease and skim through it if your school uses it. but i would just enjoy the free time you have during first year.

 

[FenderHM]

at NYMC everyone says first block of first year is hardest, which is anatomy/histology. maybe the 2nd years werre just trying to be nice tho

 

[Law2Doc]

Hey everyone,

Almost every second year I've talked to said second year is way worse than first year. Apparently the material is much harder and there's more of it. I knwo it's different from school to school but I wanted to ask anyone who had a significantly tougher second year a question:

Is there anything I could do as a first year to make my second year more bareable? I don't mind spending more time studying now or changing things for the sake of a more comfortable second year.

any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Disagree. First year is the worst because the material is the least interesting, and you are ill prepared to know how to best assimilate it. The further along you go, the more clinically relevant it gets, and the more you know what to do with the material being thrown your way. But the further along you go, the faster they throw the material at you.
FYI, I think you mean "bearable". "Bareable" suggests you are an exhibitionist.

 

[71263]

While I agree that the material is more interesting this year, I cant say that makes it any easier. Ive always thought conceptually, and 1st year at least had some elements of that. 2nd year is pure, up the a$$ memorization for EVERY class. From January to June is the worst 6 months of med school at my school. All our finals become cumulative over the whole year, and then we have to take boards. If I ever thought my life sucked last year, I would look next to me to the M2s who were going through this ordeal, and I would thank God that I wasnt one of them. Now I AM one of them, and black January will be here before I know it...

 

[jocg27]

My experience is that first year is definitely way more material, way harder material, and the courses move way faster...

But I like it a lot more, too...

I'm working much harder than I ever did last year...But even though I didn't find last year especially hard, per se, I hated it. I don't know what to say about the cause and effect of that --- do I like this year better because I'm working harder and am more up to date, am I working harder because I like this year more, is there a third variable somewhere making me both work harder and like it more? Is it actually more material, or does it just seem that way because I'm actually, you know, reading it as we go along and not just wasting ridiculous amounts of time every day and learning everything via cramming? I have no idea...

But I know last year I really had a lot of adjusting to do, and definitely began to question what on earth I was doing in medical school anyways. I really started feeling like I had made a mistake and it just wasn't for me. I realized how little I actually knew about the field of medicine and what doctors actually do, and the new stuff I was learning about it I simply didn't like -- I got so sick of histo and biochem, and memorizing what seemed like basically random chemicals and proteins named by a couple apparently random letters.

And don't get me wrong, memorizing that kind of stuff doesn't end...

But I don't know...for some reason, the stuff has changed or I've changed, and I'm into it now...It sucks and it's hard sometimes, but it's also very cool to be learning clinical stuff, bugs and drugs and diseases and the thought process real doctors are actually going through as they see real patients, not dead people or microscope slides. Pathophys has been by far my favorite class of med school so far. I dunno, maybe I'm getting back in touch with the inner nerd I lost somewhere around high school, who knows...

But I can say that for me at least, first year and second year are vastly different...Don't worry about studying ahead, just do well at what you're doing at the time. If you have time enough free time now to study for second year, my suggestion would be don't do it anyway...If you really want more studying, work harder on the classes you're in. If you're honoring everything and still have time to study ahead for second year then, I dunno, go on a date or something.

 

[Law2Doc]

Don't worry about studying ahead, just do well at what you're doing at the time. If you have time enough free time now to study for second year, my suggestion would be don't do it anyway...If you really want more studying, work harder on the classes you're in. If you're honoring everything and still have time to study ahead for second year then, I dunno, go on a date or something.

Couldn't agree more. Other than figuring out what kind of study regimen and gameplan works best for you in med school, you should not be doing anything to prepare for second year beyong mastering first year.

 

[Scottish Chap]

Disagree. First year is the worst because the material is the least interesting, and you are ill prepared to know how to best assimilate it. The further along you go, the more clinically relevant it gets, and the more you know what to do with the material being thrown your way. But the further along you go, the faster they throw the material at you.
FYI, I think you mean "bearable". "Bareable" suggests you are an exhibitionist.

Agreed. The information in MSII is folds more interesting. It also invloves less memorization, and more understanding and thinking. Also, there is substantial overlap between courses. To the OP: take one day at a time. MSII will fall into place when it needs to.

 

[Scottish Chap]

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[Dookter]

Duke eliminated that problem by combining the first two years into one long year. So you don't get to compare which year is worse....you just drink, drink, drink from the firehose.

And then we get a second year that is listed on the financial aid sheet as being 13 months long....

 

[AmoryBlaine]

I never understood the idea that 2nd year is better because it's more "clinically relevant."

Ok, I guess, but you can hardly describe learning the fermenation patterns of gram negative rods as being clinical. Second year was way worse for me, there is 2x the material and all through the year the spectre of step1 looms over you.

The worst part was the feeling of being a hampster on a wheel - Path is a long class and as you trudge through organ systems I felt like it was just "study, study, test, rinse, repeat" for about 8 months.

I can tell you this though - 3rd year is way better!

 

[t33sg1rl]

At my school second year is LOT harder than first year. And, I think there's definitely stuff you can do first year to make second year easier. With every subject, there's three things you can do.
1. when you have 'systems' like renal or endo, think about the consequences of every kind of disturbance to the system.
2. open First Aid and look over what kinds of drugs are available-don't memorize them, but just be aware of what the different classes of drugs are. For example, don't learn all the different beta blockers-just think about them as a class. That way, second year you'll have a general framework to stuff with details.
3. and finally, consider what would happen WITHOUT the organ you're learning about? This is a good approach for GI. What would happen if your liver suddenly gave up the ghost?
If you do these things, you'll be looking at the material from the perspective of a 2nd year student, and 2nd year won't be so much like being tossed into a bathtub of ice water.

 

[bjackrian]

At my school second year is LOT harder than first year. And, I think there's definitely stuff you can do first year to make second year easier. With every subject, there's three things you can do.
1. when you have 'systems' like renal or endo, think about the consequences of every kind of disturbance to the system.
2. open First Aid and look over what kinds of drugs are available-don't memorize them, but just be aware of what the different classes of drugs are. For example, don't learn all the different beta blockers-just think about them as a class. That way, second year you'll have a general framework to stuff with details.
3. and finally, consider what would happen WITHOUT the organ you're learning about? This is a good approach for GI. What would happen if your liver suddenly gave up the ghost?
If you do these things, you'll be looking at the material from the perspective of a 2nd year student, and 2nd year won't be so much like being tossed into a bathtub of ice water.

Agree with this, and would also add
4) Do your best to study histo. I keep wishing I remember histo better whenever we're doing histopathology--I keep having to drag my histo book out to compare to normal cells.
5) Ditto for physiology.

My experience would indicate that the most important classes from first year for second year are histo and physio.

Just my .02.

 

[logos]

Here (Ohio State) I would say that second year is a little harder than first, but much more interesting and relevant. We've done cardiology, pulmonology and are working on renal right now. We will do musculoskeletal, GI, and endocrine/nutrition soon. There is more stuff to learn, but its a bit easier to learn knowing that there is some purpose other than the boards for learning it. Last year we had anatomy biochem genetics cell (basically histo) and neuro (the bain of my medical school existance...).

Whats funny is that during anatomy it seems like its the hardest thing you've ever done. Now, I think it would be quite easy. Its just part of the process of aclimatizing to medical school. Whereas in undergrad I had to review something several time to memorize it, now one strong exposure is enough to get it down. Med school just brings about changes in the way many people study. Practice makes perfect and we get a lot of practice at studying.

 

[jocg27]

My experience would indicate that the most important classes from first year for second year are histo and physio.

Just my .02.

I don't know...I absolutely hated histo first year...looking back it was probably a combination of still adjusting and the organization of the class, professors, etc, rather than the stuff itself, but it was definitely my worst class of the year in terms of interest, enjoyment, grades, you name it...

I've picked up more normal histo as we move along in pathology than I did the entire course last year, and I'm doing well in it...Personally, in my experience it didn't rank with the important classes of first year...

I do totally agree about the importance of physiology though...the more physio you can learn now, first year, the better.

 

[Dunce]

Find the study methods that work best for you and perfect them during 1st year.

 

[bjackrian]

I don't know...I absolutely hated histo first year...looking back it was probably a combination of still adjusting and the organization of the class, professors, etc, rather than the stuff itself, but it was definitely my worst class of the year in terms of interest, enjoyment, grades, you name it...

I've picked up more normal histo as we move along in pathology than I did the entire course last year, and I'm doing well in it...Personally, in my experience it didn't rank with the important classes of first year...

I do totally agree about the importance of physiology though...the more physio you can learn now, first year, the better.

I feel that it would make studying for path easier. I don't think that it's particularly useful in the long run, but I do think I could spend less time staring at path slides if I had learned histo better the first time around. And less time staring at slides means more time memorizing the diseases and so forth that are the bread and butter of path.

 

[jngo2]

Thanks for the Responses everyone,

Let me give you some background...I'm a MSI at UCI and I'll be honest, I really like first year right now. I studied biochem as a undergrad so I didn't find memorizing the cycles too terrible, largely because several portions of our tests were clinically oriented...ie. patient comes in with x, y, and z, what's the most likely diagnosis...what pathway is defective...what drug would you use to treat this...of course I'm sure it's very basic stuff like treating gout with xanthine oxidase inhibitors like allopurinol...but I thought that was super cool. The molecular biology portion wasn't super interesting...I think largely because it wasn't very clinically oriented, but I still managed to honor that section...weird.

I'm not doing too hot in histo but I've heard mixed things from people. Personally, I'd think Histo is important for patho...how would you know its pathological if you didn't know what the normal histo looks like? But I've never taken patho before so I'm only hearing this from second years.

Genetics is sorta blah...I think partially because the professors aren't super great. I mean some of the diseases were really interesting...we got to meet a patient with Osteogenesis imperfecta, but a lot of our genetics tests were sorta like what mutation causes what disease...when should you do an amnio..etc. There was only one section which was clinically oriented but that was it.

Physio is super cool, we're learning about blood right now and the professor teaching is really good. He's actually a physician so we get questions like a patient's blood smear looks like this...what's the differential diagnosis (again this is all at a very basic level...nothing super complicated). How would you treat the patient...etc.

Immuno was pretty cool...I think partly because I took this as a undergrad, and my undergrad course was WAYYYY harder than what I'm doing now. I'm guessing this might just be because of the professor...but in undergrad, I had to memorize EVERYTHING the professors said...all the interleukins, all the ligands, all the cells that secreted the cytokines...that was probably my second hardest class as an undergrad next to anatomy.

So anyway, we've finished two classes (Biochemistry/molecular bio, biostats/epidemiology), we're half way done with two others (genetics and immuno) and we've yet to start Anatomy...we start at the end of the november. So pretty much the bulk of the year, or at least the remainder, is just physio, anatomy, and histo. Everyone tells me Histo gets pushed to the back and you spend most of your time on anatomy. And you study physio when you can because its interesting.

Sometime later on the year, we'll take behavioral sciences.

So any thoughts on the classes I'm going to take or already took?

 

[randhail]

at NYMC everyone says first block of first year is hardest, which is anatomy/histology. maybe the 2nd years werre just trying to be nice tho

Here's hoping that's true, I've had quite enough histo thank you very much - as had much of our class I would say.