What sort of computer science course would be appropriate for medical schools?

[peregrino]

I read that some medical schools want computer science courses as a prerequisite or recommendation. Before I went to college, I worked in the computer field (self-taught), and later took some coding classes. Of course, back then it was called computer programming, not coding, but it is essentially the same. But, "back then" was decades ago, and I have been out of that field. Any ideas on what to take?

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[theKingLT]

I read that some medical schools want computer science courses as a prerequisite or recommendation. Before I went to college, I worked in the computer field (self-taught), and later took some coding classes. Of course, back then it was called computer programming, not coding, but it is essentially the same. But, "back then" was decades ago, and I have been out of that field. Any ideas on what to take?

It's definitely not a general requirement. I haven't seen any specific schools require a coding course, but im not an expert on all of them.

With the exception of those few graduates that you hear about that opt out of doing residency to start their own Medical app, the majority of coding knowledge in medicine is put to work in research, with most of this type being statistical analisis. If you want to do research but don't already have a specific lab then it's impossible to know what language you'll be working with in the future. Off the top of my head, the more common ones would be python, R, and MATLAB and the more common stats software (not full languages but use specific commands and options to generate analyses) would be STATA and SAS. I'm sure there are more but these are what I've seen/heard of/worked with.

 

[Goro]

I read that some medical schools want computer science courses as a prerequisite or recommendation. Before I went to college, I worked in the computer field (self-taught), and later took some coding classes. Of course, back then it was called computer programming, not coding, but it is essentially the same. But, "back then" was decades ago, and I have been out of that field. Any ideas on what to take?

You read wrong.

You won't need need CS. Take it only because the subject interests you.

 

[hamiltonnyc]

I read that some medical schools want computer science courses as a prerequisite or recommendation.

Yeah you should really cite this.

 

[peregrino]

You read wrong.

I should clarify that what I read was a recommendation, not a requirement.

Yeah you should really cite this.

I read about the recommendaton while digging through some U of C websites. Curious, I found this old pdf from on Columbia Universitiy's website: Medical Schools with (Additional) Math Requirements.

But these were apparently taken from the 2010-2011 MSAR, so things may have changed in the past 8 years.