What can a first year med student listen to on a long commute?

pfian

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Background: I’m a non-trad who is pretty used to waking up early and commuting a substantial distance to work.

Situation: I’ve been admitted to my top choice medical school, a substantial commute from my house; not actually physically super-far, but there are traffic issues. They have required in-person classes at 8AM. I believe if I get out my door before 6AM I can beat traffic and do the drive in an hour.

For this to make any sense I need to functionalize the commute using something like books on tape, podcasts, etc. My understanding of the school’s curriculum is that they don’t provide lecture recordings, and that they give students a lot of personal choice in the resources they study from. I interpret this to mean that there is not a specific assigned textbook I’d want to listen to, but rather that I can choose any resource that covers the material for the week. I’d like the material to be appropriate for learning something for the first time rather than review: plan would be to listen to the “on-tape” version before the school’s in-person version, to stay ahead of the game.

Question: What is the best audio resource I can buy for learning the first year medical school curriculum from scratch?

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Background: I’m a non-trad who is pretty used to waking up early and commuting a substantial distance to work.

Situation: I’ve been admitted to my top choice medical school, a substantial commute from my house; not actually physically super-far, but there are traffic issues. They have required in-person classes at 8AM. I believe if I get out my door before 6AM I can beat traffic and do the drive in an hour.

For this to make any sense I need to functionalize the commute using something like books on tape, podcasts, etc. My understanding of the school’s curriculum is that they don’t provide lecture recordings, and that they give students a lot of personal choice in the resources they study from. I interpret this to mean that there is not a specific assigned textbook I’d want to listen to, but rather that I can choose any resource that covers the material for the week. I’d like the material to be appropriate for learning something for the first time rather than review: plan would be to listen to the “on-tape” version before the school’s in-person version, to stay ahead of the game.

Question: What is the best audio resource I can buy for learning the first year medical school curriculum from scratch?

Goljian (author of a popular pathology book) used to have a great audio series but it's dated now. Here is another good source for USMLE specific study. It's from someone who's done a lot of research into USMLE and breaks the question stems down. I really like his opinions on here and trust his information: Audio Qbank – MEHLMANMEDICAL

Congratulations. You seem like a highly motivated person. I don't think there's really any good basic science M1/M2 podcasts/audiobooks designed for a first pass. If you want, feel free to try the Medical School Crash Course Series (‎Human Anatomy: Medical School Crash Course (Unabridged)). They have them for Anatomy, Physiology, and a few other areas. I personally don't think they'll be worth the time. Focus instead on an audiobook outside Medicine. I recommend Atomic Habits or Breath. Just think of how many audiobooks you can read with this time! Back to your concern, there are other audio review series for USMLE but I don't recommend them again for a first pass. An second year student could probably get away with using these as an audiobook to prepare for Step 1 after his preclinical curriculum has ended when they're at the gym or something, but for you right now it's best to focus on your classes (Step 1 Express Videos - USMLE-Rx).

Perhaps after a few months, you may have a greater context of medicine and find audio lectures useful.
Goljian (author of a popular pathology book-high yield for USMLE 1) used to have a great audio series but it's dated now. Here is another good source for USMLE specific study. It's from someone who's done a lot of research into USMLE and breaks the question stems down. I really like his opinions on here and trust his information: Audio Qbank – MEHLMANMEDICAL

I had friends who commuted 30+ minutes from classes and from hearing their experience, they started out by trying to relisten to lectures on their phone or do some other med school specific audio task, but gradually transitioned to do other things like catch up with a loved one after work or listen to some entertaining podcast. Medical school will take up a lot of your time and I feel the ride back should be used more to decompress. Maybe a happy compromise like using the ride in to review something and using the ride back to decompress or listen to an audiobook?

Hope this helps! Also in the future you'd probably get away with posting this in the main MD Student Section as subforums are less explored: Medical Students - MD
 
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I make a playlist for each system composed of various podcast episodes on the topic. Some of the ones I use are Daddy Goljan Lectures (what it's called on spotify), Bradely's Micro, Physiology by Physeo, Dr. Matt & Dr. Mike, Medgeeks, Divine Intervention, Zero to Finals, and Humerus Hacks. All of them are free.
 
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Listening to podcasts does not equal listening to dense lecture style material. That may not be true for you but it’s definitely true for me. It’s a lot easier to let your mind wander when it’s not interesting.
 
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Classic Rock or metabolic pathways (I think I'm gonna go with Classic Rock)
 
Goljan is dated (ca 2002ish I think?) but there are a lot of fundamentals that don’t change. Listened to it a ton during my dedicated for step 1 in 2018 and it was very helpful. I’d start there.
 
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There's one on Spotify called Curbsiders I've listened to a few times, it's not strictly academic but moreso stories and topics with physician input. I do pick up some fun real-world info and it's more engaging than lectures. Just a thought.
 
Goljan is dated (ca 2002ish I think?) but there are a lot of fundamentals that don’t change. Listened to it a ton during my dedicated for step 1 in 2018 and it was very helpful. I’d start there.
I got at least 3 questions on the Steps I wouldn't have gotten otherwise without Goljan. Low yield but you're driving anyway. It also helped reinforce fundamentals greatly
 
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Divine Intervention without a doubt... or some melodic techno
 
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There are lots of audio resources for learning board material, but I have had the best results with Divine Intervention. His stuff is seriously great! His website has all of his podcasts organized by exam, so you can filter by organ system, USMLE step 1 or step 2 CK (don't think about that yet though!). There were more than a few questions that I wouldn't have gotten on CK without his podcasts. Here's the link to the USMLE Step 1 podcasts. Cheers!

-Eric, Elite Medical Prep Tutor
 
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I recently found Rx Bricks for free on spotify as well which is pretty good.
 
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