What classes do you recommend in undergraduate?

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mupreopt

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If you are an optometry student, what class do you recommend I take in undergraduate? What classes will be helpful in optometry school?
Should I take psysiology (sorry about spellilng)?
My college just added a class called biomedical physics. Do you recommend this?
 
start with all of the pre-req's, then I'd consider histology...many of my classmates that did not have histo had a rough time with it in Optometry school.

And you definately want to take that physiology course.
 
Anatomy, physiology, biochem, microbio, pharm, neuro or any of the other basic sciences would help you more than biomedical physics. I'm sure biomed physics would look good on a transcript--but the other biomed science courses (which you will take during your first two years of opt school) would help knock out prerequisites and better prepare you for the courses you will face in optometry school.
 
Biomedical physics sounds like a fun course! I would have taken it just because of the name.

Anyway, some of the courses that are (or would have been) useful, beyond the requirements:
- microbiology
- physics (300+ level optics if you have the prereqs)
- A&P
- pharm

I'd also recommend a course that involves copious amounts of memorization (entomology, mammology, and the like).
 
Thanks.
I will take histology and psysiology.
Don't want to sound stupid but what is pharm?
 
I agree with looking at the courses you will be taking in optometry school and taking them at the undergraduate level. For our first semester, if someone had taken that class recently during undergrad, the optometry class was basically a review with an occasional new level of depth added. If someone had not taken that class during undergrad, it meant much, much more studying.

Plus, the repetition will help you remember everything better. There were a few people who hadn't taken certain courses before that scored very well on exams, but generally the people who had already taken that course did the best. Personally, I did very well fairly easily on courses I had taken during undergrad and had to work like crazy on ones I did not.

Basically all of the courses I can think of have already been mentioned above, but it could vary depending on your planned school's curriculum. Human (rather than a general or vertebrate) anatomy, physiology, neuroanatomy, biochemistry, microbiology, and pharmacology (generally a killer class in the second year of optometry school) would be my strongest recommendations. Many of those are usually prereqs, anyway, but some are not. Perhaps immunology. Histology seemed very easy for me even though I had never taken it before, but some people had trouble with it. Maybe glance through a short geometry refresher Sparknotes or something the year before optometry school, too, for optics (I hadn't had stuff that since high school, although it's almost all similar triangles).

Also, I'd try taking them later rather than earlier. I took anatomy very early during undergrad and had forgotten practically everything by the time I got to optometry school, although since most of those classes are upper-level and require prereqs that shouldn't be too much of a problem. Just don't try to jam everything in the last year, because ignoring scheduling issues, those are some very tough classes.

As for biomedical physics, perhaps. Course titles can be pretty uninformative, though. If you can get a student handbook from the optometry school(s) you are looking at (they should be able to just email one to you), compare biomedical physics to the course descriptions. If it seems like it matches one of their courses fairly well, go for it.
 
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