How To Get Through University (Medical School — PART ONE)
“Congratulations. You have been accepted.”
The sense of relief, that all the hard work and the time invested has paid out and you finally made it into your dream university, can be overwhelming.
Now the real work begins.
You’ll see your non-medical friends party, graduate, work and have kids, whereas you’ll spend countless hours behind books or in the hospital. Don’t worry about it though — you’ll catch up and you’ll even have the title MD.
The worst part about the studies is that most won’t understand how one month of studying for one subject is sometimes not even enough.
No matter how much you have to sacrifice, finishing medical school means your future is guaranteed.
Everyone (even the worst students) can get a job in the medical field once they have completed their studies. The money is great and if you ignore the fact that you’ll have to spend more time there, than for sleep or long family hours, it’s all worth it.
Enough of the chit-chat. Let’s talk about actual advice on not only how to survive, but how to strive in medical school.
START WITH DAY ONE
The most important thing: good notes/learning material. Some like to attend all the lectures; others learn from books. As my experience goes, neither of these options is ideal. In a perfect world you would read through the material, listen to the professor’s lecture and ask him everything you don’t understand. But in medicine with dozens of small exams or just a couple of those huge ones (yes Internal Medicine I’m talking about you) you won’t have time for that.
Therefore, I suggest going to live lectures for subjects that are famous for being difficult. If you manage to read through the topics beforehand great, otherwise make sure to go through your notes from the lecture the same or the next day and edit your MAIN MATERIAL (= from where you will study for the exam). Attend other lectures only for what is obligatory and not an hour more.
PERFECTION verses PASSING
I know the people I have studied with. I know some of them finished school by just going through old questions, a bunch of luck and goodwill of professors. I know people, to whom I would never trust my health. Like never. Dear reader, I don’t care if you cheat on your physics exam, but cheat on Internal medicine and people will die.
Top tip on how to pass with minimal effort: never skip old questions from previous exams and study the material that the professors pointed out
If you want to have above average grades, you need to have your MAIN MATERIAL ready at least 2 weeks before the exam. In the case of Internal Medicine I would put that number to 3 months.
To conclude on how to get good grades: study (effectively) ALOT
In PART 2 we’ll discuss what does effective studying mean and how to be a straight A-student.