Stanford from an outsider

[pathstudent]

Just heard from a friend today about her experience as a visiting student at Stanford.

She says it is in incredibly affluent hospital and medical school where most of the patients are rich and all the students and residents are cute and tan, blonde or asian.

The students are the most laid back group of people she has met which is the complete opposite of most schools. Many of them take undergrad classes during med school and some take things like music and art (this is unheard of for most medical students). However, a lot of them take 5 years to graduate because of this.

Also the med students get to wear long coats. Nothing is worse than the short white coat. So this is another lucky aspect.

On the downside, it seems like "not a true representation of the US" (being that everyone is wealthy and beautiful) as far as the Stanford community goes, plus Stanford is located in a non urban area filled with millionaires, the closest city being San Jose which is nothing more than a million suburbanites sprawled out together. SF is of course a mere 35 miles away, but has no real connection with stanford.

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[gertie]

hey pathstudent,

i was fortunate enough to have an interview at stanford and, indeed, the school is swimming in money. i wanted to got there so bad but i was rejected post interview 🙁

one of the reasons i loved it so much is that the studenst ARE very laid back and some of them go sailing regularly, can take classes at the Hoover institute on international conflict resolution (how cool is that!)...opportunities abound! their med scholars program rocks and that is why so many take 5 years. they r not playing around for that extra year..they r usually in the med scholars program doing a paid year of reserahc or are furthering their education some other way..they r not slackers..but they r laid back and have fun while in med school.

all the med students there i spoke to who were honest admitted that, while the patient poulation is diverse ethnically, it is not diverse economically as at some other schools. they do tend to be wealthy..after all, the stanford hospitals are in one of the wealthiest regions of the US. BUT, then again, u will have many patients from East Palo Alto, which is dirt poor. so, my overall opinion, is that their is diversity in the patient population..u will have both very porr and very rich patients and a lot in between.

i did see a couple of cute med students, but on average, they were average. the best-looking med students i found were at Vanderbilt. everywhere else, med students are very average looking. unfortunately, many intelligent people are not that beautiful, and why this is so, should be a topic of another thread...it would be nice if someone could start that thread as i have heard soo many theories on y those who are the smartest in society are usually never more than average looking. i have heard sooo many theories but, who knows..it would be nice to hear more.

 

[lyragrl]

I can't speak for the Stanford Medical School, but I did go to Stanford for a graduate degree. The south bay area is affluent (although slightly less so in the post-dot-com-bubble era). But next to Palo Alto is East Palo Alto which is extremely poor. Moreover, a lot of people who live in suburbs like Mountain View aren't that well off. The cost of living is so high in the south bay, you end up spending a lot of your income simply on rent, etc. So I think the idea that everyone at Stanford is rich and tan is a little simplistic.

 

[PrettyPlease]

You don't make any sense. You're spewing nontruths. You even say you're an outsider, so why did you post things that are made up?

For those of you who want to know the truth,

Students don't graduate in 5 years because they're having fun taking music and art. Yes, students can take music or art if they want - but it's for fun. They don't fill their schedule with music and art and then find that they didn't take their medical classes. The people who graduate in 5 years do something substantial like research or another degree or take a series of graduate courses in another field to give them experience in something (like health policy or whatnot).

East Palo Alto is an urban, underserved area that is 10 minutes from the Stanford campus. Palo Alto is far from filled with millionaires.

Most of the patients at Stanford hospital are NOT rich. As I said, East Palo Alto is disadvantaged and that's where a lot of the patients come from. Many free clinics in the area too, which med students established.

Everyone is not wealthy and beautiful - that is the dumbest thing I've ever heard. And then you claim it's a downside because it doesn't represent the US??? What is your point? Can you make any worse a generalization?

 

[pathstudent]

Go to the Bronx, Chicago, Houston, New Orleans,

and then compare that with the size and scale of E.P.A. and Mountain View. Give me a break.

 

[gertie]

prettyplease,
indeed, physicians will admit that those who are very poor do present more opportunities to learn clinically. they present many illnesses that r not as common in wealthier people..higher rate of gunshot wounds, drugs (yes, u see this in the wealthy a lot too but different ways of dealing with the situation), higher infant mortality, infant/child malnutrition, usually dealing with less intelligent individuals so different ways of talking and explaining things to patients, diseases of prostitutes...soooooo many interesting cases are presented by very poor people..and that is why Bellevue hospital, one of NYU's teaching hospitals is so popular among their med students..it is a public hospital that gets a lot of NY's poorest and homeless...they will tell u that the cases presented there ARE very different from NYU's Tisch hospital, which is private and that treats a more affluent patient population..all the med students i spoke to said they learned sooo much more clinically at bellevue than at tisch.

P.S. this post was in reponse to a post by prettyplease trashing the other posters, saying "the wealthy have different diseases than the rich..c'mon, give me a break! the learing opportunities r no diffrent"
after reading my post, prettyplease deleted his/her post. i must have proved my pojnt well then 🙂

 

[28129]

I visited the Silicon Valley region in better times (December 2000). It is a nice place. Most people there aren't millionaires. And those who are millionaires, don't have as a high a standard of living as you might think, because housing, taxes, etc. are extremely expensive.

 

[gramcracker]

Originally posted by pathstudent
She says it is in incredibly affluent hospital and medical school where most of the patients are rich and all the students and residents are cute and tan, blonde or asian...

However, a lot of them take 5 years to graduate because of this.

SF is of course a mere 35 miles away, but has no real connection with stanford.

It's kind of amusing that such stereotypes exist about the students at Stanford. In this fall's class, I'd say we're about as racially diverse as is possible, we have students from all over the country (although many Californians), big schools, small schools, Canadians, at least 9 married/engaged students, one with a child... so sorry, I don't buy the "blond and tan" stereotype. (I'm not going to argue with anyone stereotyping me as cute, however.)

There are an immense number of varied research opportunities at Stanford. That's why many choose the 5 year program. You can TA, do lab research, clinical research, community service/service-learning, a year at Berkeley for public health, health policy, humanities in medicine research.

And there are now TWO fully student-run health clinics for East Palo Alto, which are apparently packed every weekend that they're open. I don't think there's a lack of need. Stanford studenst also train at the local VA as well as the Stanford hospital, since it's a tertiary care center.

You're right, it might be possible for students to stay within their comfort zone or suburban bubble, but that's possible at a lot of medical schools. For me, that's not my interest.

 

[AJM]

The majority of patients at Stanford are not wealthy. Most of the patients treated at Stanford Hospital are either on Medicare or Medicaid, or are uninsured. Patients come to Stanford from all over the Bay Area, not just from Palo Alto (actually, patients from Palo Alto comprise a small minority). In addition, Stanford is a mojor referral center for Northern California, and there are a large number of patients who come from Nevada and the Central Valley (mostly rural farming communities, and mostly not very well-off). So, while you may see a higher proportion of patients of higher socio-ecomic status than some other hospitals, it's still not as many as you might be led to believe. I like to say that for every one Woodside resident that comes in with a horseback riding injury, you see 10 poorly controlled diabetics with out-of control infections.

If Stanford Hospital was the only hospital that the med students train at, then I would agree that there is less diversity in the patient population than at other places. However, Stanford students train at a total of 5 hospitals, and spend about equal amounts of time at each of them -- and each hospital is a very unique place with it's own range of patient populations and acuity. Here's the run down of the hospitals:

1. Stanford Hospital

2. Packard Children's: connected to Stanford, tertiary/referral center for pediatrics. Similar demographics to Stanford.

3. Palo Alto VA: mostly lower to middle class male patients. High acuity hospital (ie: very sick patients). Major referral center for California VA system. Also is an academic center closely affiliated to Stanford -- the attendings there are Stanford faculty.

4. Santa Clara Valley Medical Center: the county hospital serving the city of San Jose and the surrounding community. Patients mostly lower class, uninsured, and often homeless. Large Hispanic, Vietnamese, Russian, and Chinese populations. A true county hospital.

5. Kaiser Santa Clara: HMO-run medical center, mostly working middle-class patients. Definitely an interesting and enlightening experience to work in that kind of setting, especially since every physician has to deal with HMO's in their own medical practice.


And by the way, even though it doesn't get as much press as San Francisco, the city of San Jose has a population of over 900,000 people, and is the 3rd largest city in California (and that's not even counting the surrounding communities in the South Bay, which bring that population figure up to about 1.5 million). And Stanford and it's affiliated teaching hospitals is the only group of teaching hospitals serving this area -- definitely no lack of good cases to learn from there.

 

[meanderson]

As for the cute comment, I don't buy it. Unless the admissions committee goes out of their way to select a physically attractive class(and I doubt they do), Stanford isn't likely to have a better looking class than any other school. Yeah, one particular class may be a little better looking or a little worse looking than normal, but this will even out over time.

And let's be honest, medical school classes aren't as attractive as many classes. Walk into an undergraduate communications class at many large state universities and the quality women(or men) in their would just blow any medical school class out of the water. I'm not arguing that most medical students are really ugly because that would clearly be an overstatement towards the other extreme, but medical students on average aren't as attractive as students at a large public university.

 

[gertie]

very true meanderson. i am very curious to hear people's opinions why this is so..i.e.why medical students are not as good-looking.

 

[pathstudent]

Hey, I am not trying to disparage Stanford, but just relating my friend's personal experience. She is one that now has experienced multiple programs being in her 4th year of Med School. That was her feed back.

I think based on what she said that it would be a great place to go. The fact that she said the students are so laid back is testament right there. Every other school the kids are neurotically studying and having very little enjoyment the first couple of years. Plus the Stanford name is worth its weight in gold for residency positions.

I don't know anything about Staford, but I do know that San Mateo and Santa Clara counties are horrible places to live unless you like strip malls and suburban housing developments and having to drive everywhere. If you don't own a car, forget about it. There are no art museums like the Met or AIC or science museums like the Field museum or MSI.

SF is the most urban area around and you can transverse its downtown in ten minutes if you are walking fast. It has one OK museum SFMOMA, but even that is nothing compared to MOMA or the MCA.

 

[meanderson]

mertie, it's probably several different factors coming together that accounts for why medical students are not very good looking on average.

My ochem class had 1 good looking girl, and she wasn't exactly britney spears. She was cute however. Still, 1/40 is a pretty low ratio. In a psychology or education class at my undergrad this number would have been 10-12/40. There was one attractive chemistry major, but she was going to pharmacy school so she doesn't count. I've noticed a lot of attractive girls go to pharmacy school. I don't know why; they just do.

Reasons?? My guess is that really good looking girls who are somewhat intelligent don't want the stress or working lifestyle of medicine. They know they can have a great lifestyle regardless, and they want to meet a great looking, fun, successful man and have a great life with him. Going to medical school, residency, etc is not always compatible with that. Fields like pharmacy and education offer alternative careers that are more compatible with this.

And this applies to guys too. Just go to any university hospital's webpage and check out the resident, fellow, and attending pics. Do they deviate from the norm by a huge amount? No, not really. OTOH, medical students and residents certainly are not as attractive as many other groups of young people.

 

[lyragrl]

Hey Pathstudent,

I've lived in Los Angeles, Washington DC, and Chicago (the latter for more than half a decade). I am fully aware that Palo Alto is a more homogenous, priviledged area than a major urban center. However, I believe the situation is a little more complicated than the initial poster was implying. I was explaining my impressions of the South Bay, that's all. Not everyone in the area is a millionaire.

 

[pathstudent]

although it probably has nothing to do with appearance,

Iseserson's guide to residency states that only 65% of female physicians marry compared to 95% of American Women.

95 % of all male physicians will marry.

This probably has more to do with the personalities of women attracted to a career in medicine combined with societal factors.

 

[gramcracker]

Originally posted by pathstudent
95 % of all male physicians will marry.

And the other 5% have to go to Vermont for civil unions.

Sorry, couldn't resist.

 

[scifi]

Originally posted by gramcracker
And the other 5% have to go to Vermont for civil unions.

Sorry, couldn't resist.

hahah... good one, gramcracker.

i have my theories on why good looking people are not often classified as intelligent, especially women. a large part of life is about finding our strengths, whether it's academics, interacting with people, or sports. my theory is that girls who are attractive grow up and get distracted by other things (ie, boys) and are less inclined to devote so much of their time studying and pursuing challenging careers. this is a gross generalization but they probably figure they can just marry someone who will take care of them.

but hey, i was hoping that people in med school would be better looking than at my undergrad (yikes!)

 

[ATPase]

I think it has more to do with the numbers. First of all, wouldn't you say there are more unattractive people in the world than attractive? Likewise, there are more unintelligent people than there are intelligent ones (i.e. people in med school). So the odds that someone would be both very intelligent and gorgeous are not overwhelming. Maybe that's why the average med school class doesn't look like the cast of a soap opera.

 

[pathstudent]

You should check out the residents at Nortthwestern. Some are smokin' hot and most are FINE.