UK Med Students: Need the 'real deal' ASAP!

[LittleSamantha]

Dear Group,

Hello! I am a new member, and my name's Samantha. I'm sixteen years old (UK), and currently deciding what A-Levels to take. I will either go into Law or Medicine (aspiration: heart surgeon). Deciding my A-Levels will have to decide this. May I ask all UK med. students a few questions?

1. What do you think of the Medicine degree?
2. Where did you study (if you don't want to say, that's fine)?
3. What are the hours like?
4. Do you find your social life to be similar to non-medicine students?
5. Do you think..... if one had a long-term boyfriend at the same university, that was not in medicine, that you could maintain the relationship?
6. Have you ever been involved with anybody taking a different degree - did you still manage to see each other?
7. What do you want to specialise in after you've done your 5 years?
8. Have you always wanted to be a doctor?
9. What A-Levels did you take, and what results did you get?
10. Do you manage to keep up friendships at the Uni with students who aren't in the medical field?
11. How hard is the Medicine degree in comparison to non-science subjects; do you still have free time?
12. What has been your favourite part of the medicine degree?

Thank you so much - I would greatly appreciate it if student medics could answer any or all of my questions! There are a lot, but choosing your life-career is not something to be taken light-heartedly. Thank you.

-Samantha

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[SMW]

There are not many UK students posting here (if any). This site is pretty much directed at students aiming at allopathic schools in the USA. Best of luck getting your questions answered somewhere.

 

[praying4MD]

You might want to try posting in the "international students" forum, as more people will able to be of aid to you there.

Just STUDY HARD FOR A-LEVELS, (As you know, they decide your life!!) and make sure you research this info early. Start getting the prospectus' from each uni and take it from there. Also, I believe med school deadlines run slightly earlier than other uni deadlines, so keep that in mind. Start filling out UCAS right after A-levels, or at least get a copy of it so that you can know what they're looking for in applicants. UCAS can also be found on the web now I Think. Know your goals and it will help you. For instance, I believe King's College London (Uni of London) has a 5 year program, whereas University College London (Uni of London) has a 6 year program, and Uni of Newcastle Upon Tyne has a medicine stage 1 Entry policy. You will also need an "open reference" for UCAS purposes.

Depending on what you want to do, look into the Royal Free and University College London Medical School of UCL. (College London Med school & Royal Free School of Medicine merged to form this school in 1998.) As far as surgery, I believe their program awards MB, BS together (Bachelor of Medicine & Bachelor of Surgery) in a new 6 year program that incorporates compulsory intercalated BSc for the students.

However, that's the longest program I can think of. The others run about 4-5 years, housejob included! Which is amazing to us American students who would kill to save that much time!

If you are leaning towards radiology, check out Uni of Wales, Bangor as it has a nice diagnostic radiology and imaging program there. I believe Uni of Edinburgh has a 5 OR 6 year program, whereas King's has a 5 year program only (wow!)

Uni of Leicester offers more broad MV, ChB's, with options of medican biochemistry and medical genetics in their degress & the Uni of Manchester has a full 6 year program too.

That's all I can think of for now. Good luck.

PS: I just re-rad this and saw you are 16-- Have you completed GCSC's yet, or are you doing O-levels right now? Since the UK system tends to specialize early, it is fine to be investigating this in depth at this stage... but if you were American, since our program is so much more drawn out, I'd be worried about you asking the Alevel and uni questions at such a young age!