So how much neuro do you do at your school?

[Doctor Bagel]

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I've heard my school has a larger neuro class than most schools, but I was just curious to see if that's true. Our neuro class is worth actually slightly more hours than physiology and has 10 hours of lecture a week for a whole semester. 😱 We're expected to memorize just an insane amount of detail, and it's seeming like way overkill to me right now. Is this normal? Will this be remotely useful to me for boards?

 

[tacrum43]

I've heard my school has a larger neuro class than most schools, but I was just curious to see if that's true. Our neuro class is worth actually slightly more hours than physiology and has 10 hours of lecture a week for a whole semester. 😱 We're expected to memorize just an insane amount of detail, and it's seeming like way overkill to me right now. Is this normal? Will this be remotely useful to me for boards?

That does seem a bit excessive, and I have heard that it's not heavily tested on the boards.

I know here at GW, we certainly had a lot less neuro than that. While I was doing Georgetown's SMP, I took their Neuro class, and it was heavy duty, so I guess it just depends on the school.

 

[Doctor Bagel]

Interesting. Our class director mentioned something to the effect that people around 10 years ago decided neuro would be super important for physicians in the future, so the really amped up the course at that point. Maybe people at Georgetown had the same idea. I feel like I'm paying for some silly educational trend in the 90s. 😉

 

[Pianoboe01]

I've heard my school has a larger neuro class than most schools, but I was just curious to see if that's true. Our neuro class is worth actually slightly more hours than physiology and has 10 hours of lecture a week for a whole semester. 😱 We're expected to memorize just an insane amount of detail, and it's seeming like way overkill to me right now. Is this normal? Will this be remotely useful to me for boards?

What we had at my school I think would add up to about the same number of hours that you have, although I don't know how long your semesters are. We had neuro 7 hours a day, 5 days a week, for 4 weeks = 140 hours total and it was mostly PBL 👎 . So maybe this is a little less than what you have??

 

[Sophie]

My school has 9 weeks of neuro (systems based) with around 20-25 hours of lecture and lab per week. There are lots of self-studies and weekly quizzes in addition to the class time. We're only on the 3rd day, and it's already insanely intimidating, and seems to be going WAY too fast. I have no idea how that compares to your schedule, though.

 

[Doctor Bagel]

Wow, so you guys appear to both have more hours than us. We have a total of 115 hours -- it includes lab, but lab is a really minor component for us (practicals make up 15% of our total grade).

Yeah, neuro feels really overwhelming. We're through one test block, and I can say that it does click somewhat once you get closer to an exam. I think feeling totally lost when you start is the norm. 🙂

So I'm getting irritated about wasting my whole first year learning stuff that will only be a minor part of the boards.

 

[psipsina]

So I'm getting irritated about wasting my whole first year learning stuff that will only be a minor part of the boards.

We have about 6 hours of neuro per week for a semester. The pace is insane, it was my undergrad major so I'm comfortable but I'd be peeing my pants if that wasn't the case.

I'm actually happy that all the courses that are really boards heavy are in second year because I really don't think I'll still have a strong grasp on first year material by the time boards rolls around. I've already forgotten most of head and neck anatomy, can you imagine if you had to really really know that stuff more than a year and a half after you last studied it, blech.

 

[Instatewaiter]

We have about 100 hours spread over 5 weeks.

I have heard that anatomy (neuro, gross and histo) together makes up around 1/7 of the boards. I'm not sure how accurate it is but i have heard it from several sources.

 

[Doctor Bagel]

I'm actually happy that all the courses that are really boards heavy are in second year because I really don't think I'll still have a strong grasp on first year material by the time boards rolls around. I've already forgotten most of head and neck anatomy, can you imagine if you had to really really know that stuff more than a year and a half after you last studied it, blech.

Yeah, that's true. I just can't help but feel like I'm wasting my time right now learning things I know I'm going to forgot and that I actually won't have to know.

 

[Droopy Snoopy]

If I remember right our neuro course counted as 90 credit hours, about the same as histo. Physiology and Gross were both somewhere around 150, biochem was like 120. I don't know how many actual hours we spent in lecture/lab, but that's the way the weighting broke down. We had two 4-week neuro blocks consisting of neuro, neurophys, neurobiochem, and head/neck anatomy, and was easily the roughest section of the schedule.

 

[Critical Mass]

If I remember right our neuro course counted as 90 credit hours, about the same as histo. Physiology and Gross were both somewhere around 150, biochem was like 120. I don't know how many actual hours we spent in lecture/lab, but that's the way the weighting broke down. We had two 4-week neuro blocks consisting of neuro, neurophys, neurobiochem, and head/neck anatomy, and was easily the roughest section of the schedule.

Is your curriculum systems-based?

 

[Hurricane95]

We have about 20-25 hours per week, for 8 weeks (organ systems based). This includes both neuroscience (anatomy, lesions, pharm, etc.) and behavioral science.

 

[Droopy Snoopy]

Is your curriculum systems-based?

First year was. They haven't gotten around to converting second year yet, although they've snuck plenty of PBL and small group garbage in.

 

[McMD]

My school has 8 weeks of neuro (systems based) with around 20-25 hours of lecture and lab per week. There are lots of self-studies and weekly quizzes in addition to the class time. We're only on the 3rd day, and it's already insanely intimidating, and seems to be going WAY too fast. I have no idea how that compares to your schedule, though.

We are also systems based, 9 weeks of Neuro; about 20-30 hours of lecture each week, 2 exams altogether. The first exam went pretty well, though I think everyone felt completely intimidated by the neuro content by the start of the exam, but it does come together eventually-the more information you learn, the more it "fits" together. We haven't taken the 2nd exam yet-so we'll see.

Edit: at the same school as Hurricane 95, sorry for the double info.

 

[bjackrian]

That does seem a bit excessive, and I have heard that it's not heavily tested on the boards.

I know here at GW, we certainly had a lot less neuro than that. While I was doing Georgetown's SMP, I took their Neuro class, and it was heavy duty, so I guess it just depends on the school.

GW guy/girl, don't forget that in second year, you have another 20-30 hours of lecture as part of path and intro to clinical medicine. You're not done with neuro yet!

 

[tacrum43]

GW guy/girl, don't forget that in second year, you have another 20-30 hours of lecture as part of path and intro to clinical medicine. You're not done with neuro yet!

Oh no, it comes back to haunt you? Eh, it's okay, I kinda like Neuro.

 

[Doctor Bagel]

Oh no, it comes back to haunt you? Eh, it's okay, I kinda like Neuro.

Just wait. I thought I'd really like neuro and actually do like it sometimes. However, the level of just boring, boring pointless detail that we're expected to memorize is starting to be such a huge drag. 😡 Maybe it's better at your school.

 

[DoctorFunk]

My school takes a semester of neuro (so somewhere around 16 weeks with 8-10 hours of lecture/week) and the course is openly geared by the PhD course director towards neuro grad students, despite the MD students outnumbering them something like 204-6. This results in all sorts of detail and too many lectures dedicated to possible research avenues and stuff that is entirely irrelevant to clinical neuro. In fact, the board relevant material (spinal cord tracts and various lesions) were probably covered in a grand total of about 2 hours of class time.

Needless to say, the students at my school are pretty intimidated by neuro because we feel like we didn't learn it well at all, and the match lists in recent years have reflected this fact with very few students matching into neurology.

 

[jones173]

we are in systems over here. the way our school does it is we get 2.5 weeks neuroanatomy and then 4 weeks for neurology, 7 hours of class per day, very clinically focused.

 

[Critical Mass]

we are in systems over here. the way our school does it is we get 2.5 weeks neuroanatomy and then 4 weeks for neurology, 7 hours of class per day, very clinically focused.

😱 7 hours a day? Is class required?

(and this is a general systems-based question--are you more likely to be required to go to class in the newer curricula?)

 

[Doctor Bagel]

😱 7 hours a day? Is class required?

Yeah, geez. I don't think schools should ever have more than 4 hours of lecture/day.

 

[enanareina]

My school takes a semester of neuro (so somewhere around 16 weeks with 8-10 hours of lecture/week) and the course is openly geared by the PhD course director towards neuro grad students, despite the MD students outnumbering them something like 204-6. This results in all sorts of detail and too many lectures dedicated to possible research avenues and stuff that is entirely irrelevant to clinical neuro. In fact, the board relevant material (spinal cord tracts and various lesions) were probably covered in a grand total of about 2 hours of class time.

Needless to say, the students at my school are pretty intimidated by neuro because we feel like we didn't learn it well at all, and the match lists in recent years have reflected this fact with very few students matching into neurology.

This sounds almost exactly like my school. We probably had 6-7 hours of neuro per week plus 4 hours of lab per week for a whole semester. Around 20 grad students took the class with us. The level of detail was INSANE, definitely more geared toward PhD students in neuroscience than medical students who will practice any kind of medicine, including neurology.

4 students from my school matched into neurology last year out of 200.

I have heard that anatomy (neuro, gross and histo) together makes up around 1/7 of the boards. I'm not sure how accurate it is but i have heard it from several sources.

I'd say it's pretty close. First year courses were definitely poorly represented on the Step 1. Probably the most useful was physiology, close in use was microbiology (covered in pathology).

In other words, neuro was a HUGE waste of my time. You'll get through it, OP.