Soliciting Advice Re: Biochem

[muncher]

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I am a soon-to-be first year and my med school recommends all of its students take a biochem class over the summer to refresh. I don't have that luxury and was wondering how I can best prepare myself for med school level biochem.

Are the tests going to focus on memorization or will they put equal emphasis on learning concepts and ideas? In other words, will I benefit from a superficial reading of a biochem text book or do I really need to start cramming stuff in order for it to be useful in a few months.

Any input will be appreciated =)

 

[Tiger26]

Here the best recommendation I heard that took me from failing the first biochem exam to honoring the rest (had the bare minimum science prereqs in college)

1) Take each lecture and condense it down onto 1 page
2) Get a white board, draw out pathways and that page many times a day
3) Remember that glucagon phosphorylates things

 

[muncher]

Thanks!


will some self study help or will anything i learn over the summer become useless come test time

 

[WhoisJohnGalt]

Thanks!


will some self study help or will anything i learn over the summer become useless come test time

While I'm generally not a fan of pre-MSI studying, biochem is one of the few classes where it probably wouldn't hurt (not saying it necessarily will help, but if you don't have anything else to do, it won't hurt). Anyway, a good book is Lippincott's Illustrated Review Biochemistry. (Don't let "review" fool you-- it's 500 pgs.) Memorizing enzymes and whatnot probably won't help, but you can get a good idea of some of the major pathways and what their role is at least. I think that the previous poster's suggestions were really on point; it can be really easy to get so lost in all the minutiae that you lose the big picture. Don't get me wrong, you need to know the minutiae (you WILL be tested on it), but the bigger picture is definitely more important, and that you may actually be able to begin to get a handle on over the summer.

All that said, if you're going to be busy this summer, don't stress about it. There's a huge learning curve the first few weeks for everyone, so you'll be just fine if you don't touch a book all summer.

 

[Tired Pigeon]

Agree with the recommendation on Lippincott's. Focus on the big picture in each section -- i.e., how would you summarize each section to your grandmother in 2 sentences or less. Look at how the contents are structured for each section and formulate your own general questions, for example, "Why do we have the urea cycle?" or "Why do some diabetics need to take insulin?" Then look at your Lippincott's, or whatever biochem resource, and try to come up with a basic answer.

Ignore all the details -- you WON'T retain the minutiae at this point, and memorizing enzyme names, etc., is a poor use of your time. Try to pick up big picture concepts. You don't need to know all the steps of the TCA cycle, or what enzymes catalyze each step, at this point -- but it would be great if you could answer questions like, "What is the main function of the TCA cycle?" or "What would happen to a person if the TCA cycle stopped working?" If you start biochem with a good conceptual grounding, you will be way ahead of the curve.

Good luck to you!

By the way, you don't need to take an actual biochem course this summer; if you're sufficiently self-motivated, save your $$.

 

[shantster]

My undergrad biochem this semester was taught be an organic professor, and so it heavily focused in on the structures and mechanisms. Obviously for now you won't need to know as much detail nor will you need to know the structures (at least as I understand it - correct me if wrong), but I found that learning from a structural perspective really helped me learn the names and the flow of the reaction. I remembered things a lot better if I could draw out portions and then figure out where things were added/subtracted. Generally I did not know the pathway off the top of my head, but I'd remember names and structures of intermediate molecules that might be a few steps away. If I wrote it down, I could think through what was the next intermediate, and the next, etc.

Now, I did say that you probably won't need to know the structures, but they definitely helped me with remembering names when needed. Obviously glucose-6-phosphate will just have a phosphate attached to C6 on a normal glucose molecule, etc. Enzyme names will also start coming to you if you notice how they relate to the names of the molecules. And look for patterns - generally kinase means phosphorylate something and phosphatase means dephosphorylate something.

But again, this is probably all too detailed for the summer base learning, but could come in handy when you are studying it in class. For now, if you really want to start learning this stuff, I agree with the above posters that you should get a good book and just learn the basics. Find one that has the pathways drawn out clearly, look over those, and try to make sense out of why things are going from one to the next, and how that particular step relates to the larger goal of the overall reaction. If you do this consistently, you'll be amazed at how much of this you actually remember when it comes time for class. I personally find it to be a much better way of learning the pathways as compared with straight rote memorization, but it can be more time consuming.

 

[megadon]

I hate biochem, I hate it, I hate it, I hate it. Fortunately for me, it was integrated into a class of five blocks, so you could punt it. (I could have learned it, but there was no way at that point to bring up my grade, but I could punt 8.5%). At some point you do have to learn it though. It's not that bad till you get to purine/pyramidine metabolism/catabolism.

So I'm an MS2, what have I vowed to do this summer (besides research), learn biochem. This is no time during second year to learn it, so this is my best shot before boards. Whatever you learn this summer will free up time later. You'll want that time if you are anything like me.

So, yeah, learn the big picture. Then get a stupid whiteboard and dry erase markers. Start just writing the cycles and structures. If you do this, you will be lightyears ahead just based on remembering 1% of the info. It will be a really crappy way to spend the summer, so temper it, but it will be worth it.

Or you could just hang out on this forum.

 

[DarlynVMD]

I also recommend Lippincott's Biochemistry. You don't have to start studying now in order to do well.... Not that I would recommend my strategy, but I would study 1-2 days before each exam and I walked out with an A in the class... but my main focus was on what was board relavent... Make sure you really understand what's going on with each pathway this will make it easier to memorize. And like one of the previous posters said, make sure you draw out pathways daily.... know what inhibits what, etc. I would also recommend Rapid Review Biochemistry, this book is awesome, it has millions of intergrations with other subjects. Now it all depends on how your school works... most have lecture notes printed out for students and these usally suffice, however, some students can't do with just the lecture notes and they need a textbook for reference.... I never really studied off the lecture notes, I need a textbook to really understand everything, I like things systematically. It's all on how you learn best and retain information the best. I usually did 50 q's each night after I went over the material to make sure that I understood.... I mainly used Kaplan Qbank q's, old exams, and Rapid Review Biochemistry q's,.... the explanations for each answers are golden and it fills you in with the tadbit of minutia that you won't find in review books like Lippincotts, but no other book comes close to Lippincotts Biochem.


Good Luck

 

[LifetimeDoc]

Or you could just hang out on this forum.

Yeah Baby! Yeah!

[YOUTUBE]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kLh5kpkP6HA[/YOUTUBE]

 

[tacrum43]

Memorizing the structure of the 20 amino acids and the TCA cycle will likely be helpful. But I wouldn't try to learn a whole bunch of things.

I thought that the Lippincott textbook was helpful too for background info, although it goes into way too much detail sometimes. It's good to have as a reference once you're in class.