We were told by the administration during the interview process and during orientation, etc. that the point of the Duke first year is to expose us to the essentials of each subject. To an extent, that's true. For example, other schools have an entire embryology course, whereas we address embyrology only briefly in our anatomy course and a bit in our physiology course.
On the other hand, I have a hard time accepting that memorizing every step of nucleotide synthesis is "essential" to my medical education. So my point is, there is STILL crap they could cut out.
Catherine is right, much of the med school curric. could be accomplished in undergrad. I learned physiology, embryology, etc. pretty solidly in undergrad, where testing focused on concepts, processes, and problem-solving...as opposed to the ridiculously superficial multiple-choice binge-and-purge-random-useless-facts that goes on in pretty much every med school.
The point of preclinical year(s) of med school is not necessarily to teach you basic science, except maybe in courses like anatomy which most people don't take in undergrad. It's to develop your mental and physical stamina, groom you into thinking like a doctor, and expose you to the basics of common diseases so that when you go out into the wards you will be "primed" for the real learning experience.
So don't worry about not learning enough basic science in a condensed program - you'll learn what you need to, and less of what you don't need to.
whodamonkeyman?, if you are interested in talking more about Duke, why don't you PM me and I'd be happy to answer your questions.
