Surviving First Year Medical School: Things I wish I knew
Iโd like to begin with a disclaimer: I am not the student who โdreamt of being a Dr before I could even talkโ (or even all the way through college)โฆ It took me 7 years afterย I graduated to even considerย studying medicine. So, when I started school I, (1) didnโt know anyone -all my friends who wanted to go to medical school were already doctors- (2) didnโt know anything or what to expect (3) I had just moved to another country to study after spending the last 7 years somewhere else. Maybe some of the things you find here are super obvious to you, but I honestly wouldโve loved to know them before I started and not catch up little by little as time went by. So, in no particular order, here it is:
1- Medschool is SUPER hard and itโs OK to get scores that are far from perfect. Even if you were top of the class as an undergrad, trust me, if youโre not Acing medical school that DOES NOT BY ANY MEANS equate to you being stupid.
2. Whatever study habits you had as an undergrad are most likely not going to work here. Thereโs just not enough time to really digest all the information in the way that used to work before
3. USE REVIEW BOOKS I really wish someone wouldโve told me that those Board Review Books are not just for boards, they are an excellent source of itemized information that will help you consolidate aspects that are really high yield. Itโs not *all* the info you need to know, but theyโre a great way to make sure you didnโt miss the important stuff. Books that I absolutely recommend and saved my butt:
- Anatomy lab-> Color Atlas of Anatomyย by Rohen & Yokoshi
- Neuroscience-> High Yield Neuroanatomy ย by Douglas J Gould ; USMLE Roadmap Neuroscience by James S White
- Anatomy, Embryology & Biochemistry-> Lippincottโs Q&A Review There are several books, one for each discipline and theyโre great for practice questions
- Physiology-> Medical Physiology by Guyton & Hall (great for practice questions) and what everyone and their mommaโs use (because itโs great) Linda S. Constanzoโs Physiologyย
- Basically every class-> Board Review Series (BRS) great for reviewing, but questions are a bit too simple & First Aid (aka the bible)
4. DO PRACTICE QUESTIONS BEFORE YOU KNOW ALL THE MATERIAL!!!! I canโt stress this enough. Doing those questions even when you wonโt know basically any answers will show you howย you need to be approaching the material. Especially during anatomy, a least in my case, classes were very descriptive and exam questions took an entirely different approach, and I wouldโve known this if I had bothered to do practice questions instead of drowning in a sea of Netterโs cards
5. Study EVERY DAY and donโt trick yourself into thinking that you can โcatch upโ during the weekend.
5. YOU CAN DO IT, there might be times when you think you made the wrong choice and youโre defnitelyย not going to make it. I created this blog because I used to be a very positive person, but medschool had the power of making me look at the worst side of everything, especially myself. I finished the first year after a lot of effort and Iโm as proud as can be and, while the worst is most likely yet to come, I want to be able to look back and say โwell, I didnโt think I was going to get through the first class (Iโm talking about you, biochem!) let alone first year and I F*ing made itโ and I firmly believe that if you put the effort in, you can make it too.ย