Which is more important for an MD: memorization vs problem solving?

[martin.ky]

Howdy everyone,

Like so many here, I am attempting to make the decision about if I want to take the plunge towards med school. I'm trying to get a better idea of what the field is like, and already have some shadowing opportunities lined up, but I was hoping the folks at SDN could help out with a more broad question: in medicine, how important is rote memorization vs grasping concepts and problem solving? I'm not just talking about MCAT and med school, I mean as a general skill, do MDs tend to rely on large stores of memorized information, or draw on conceptual understanding to solve problems?

I love learning systems well enough that I can solve a problem that I've never encountered before just by understanding how everything works. On the flipside, I hate working in situations where your competency is contingent only how how many factoids you've managed to recall.

Thoughts anyone?

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[aymar]

Rote memorization is important for medical school. Medicine is mostly problem solving and application.

That is not to say you won't have to retain facts as an MD, simply that whether or not you remember that PTH acts on osteoblasts and not osteoclasts won't help you when you have a patient on the table. The minutiae won't matter.

 

[efle]

Well I can at least tell you that preclinical is 95% memorization, 5% thinking/problem solving.

 

[Mad Jack]

You'll be useless if you don't have both.

 

[Pagan FutureDoc]

How can you solve problems without the requisite knowledge? You will need both and in large quantities.

 

[Planes2Doc]

MS-1 and MS-2: Memorization
MS-3: More problem solving with some memorization
MS-4: Please tell me you're enjoying yourself
PGY-infinity: Mostly problem solving

 

[efle]

MS-1 and MS-2: Memorization
MS-3: More problem solving with some memorization
MS-4: Please tell me you're enjoying yourself
PGY-infinity: Mostly problem solving

Oh thank god

 

[Goro]

Howdy everyone,

Like so many here, I am attempting to make the decision about if I want to take the plunge towards med school. I'm trying to get a better idea of what the field is like, and already have some shadowing opportunities lined up, but I was hoping the folks at SDN could help out with a more broad question: in medicine, how important is rote memorization vs grasping concepts and problem solving? I'm not just talking about MCAT and med school, I mean as a general skill, do MDs tend to rely on large stores of memorized information, or draw on conceptual understanding to solve problems?

I love learning systems well enough that I can solve a problem that I've never encountered before just by understanding how everything works. On the flipside, I hate working in situations where your competency is contingent only how how many factoids you've managed to recall.

Thoughts anyone?

Being able to apply what you've memorized is far more important that the brute memorization itself.

 

[martin.ky]

Thanks for the good replies everyone. Obviously both qualities are important, but it's good to hear that bulk memorization calms down after med school.

Being able to apply what you've memorized is far more important that the brute memorization itself.

That sounds like a good way to say it, thanks. Obviously there needs to be some foundation of memorized knowledge to draw from, but useful application of facts sounds like a more desirable goal than brute force memorization.

 

[Goro]

Thanks for the good replies everyone. Obviously both qualities are important, but it's good to hear that bulk memorization calms down after med school.


That sounds like a good way to say it, thanks. Obviously there needs to be some foundation of memorized knowledge to draw from, but useful application of facts sounds like a more desirable goal than brute force memorization.

Just to give you some insight into clinical thinking skills, Boards and med school exams won't ask you a simple question like "What is the tendon controlling abduction of the [structure]?"

The questions will be more like: "A 23 year old patient with a penetrating injury that fractures bones X, Y and Z will cause what deficit?" OR "A 23 year old patient with X deficit and Y symptoms has a tumor affecting [what structure]?"

 

[Menander's Bust]

Memorization not even close. I mean you do have to “problem solve” which goes like this. Patient has RLQ pain, have you MEMORIZED all the things that could be and MEMORIZED the most important things you should rule out and MEMORIZED the tests that you use to do this and MEMORIZED what different results on these tests show, then MEMORIZED what you should do about the underlying condition once you work through the algorithm or pseudo-algorithm you MEMORIZED? See, there’s plenty of problem solving.

 

[oldman]

Medicine is a language. You initially have to learn the vocabulary. Later you can write a novel.

I'm see patients all the time who don't fit the textbook definition and I have to figure out how to solve the problem. It sometimes takes me a while to piece it together. I have also encounter complications I never thought could happen. One of my senior partners mentioned how they became good through the painful process of encountering every complication you could think of.