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Medschool course questions...

Starting to look through potential medical schools to apply to for 2011 and have made notes on the structure and key features of quite a few schools. Just would appreciate some medics' input on the following questions...


1) How beneficial is early patient contact during your pre-clinical years? Does it really make that much of a difference or are they quite gimmicky?

2) If I don't plan to become a surgeon, is there any difference between having a course which features dissections and a course which features prosections? Is teaching the anatomy mainly for the surgical side of the degree?

3) Does intercalating a medical science actually provide you with any benefit in your later clinical career? I do have an interest in the science but wouldn't mind the opportunity to study a humanity for a year, like some unis offer.

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Reply 1
prince_of_paupers
Starting to look through potential medical schools to apply to for 2011 and have made notes on the structure and key features of quite a few schools. Just would appreciate some medics' input on the following questions...


1) How beneficial is early patient contact during your pre-clinical years? Does it really make that much of a difference or are they quite gimmicky?


I've found it very beneficial. I'm at a med school where we have 1 day every week in a GP practice (from week 1 year 1) and blocks in secondary care throughout each year as well so lots of early patient contact, but then, we don't really have a preclinical/clinical split at all. Without this early contact, I would probably be really struggling at this stage as it took me a long time to learn how to talk to patients without being terrified!

2) If I don't plan to become a surgeon, is there any difference between having a course which features dissections and a course which features prosections? Is teaching the anatomy mainly for the surgical side of the degree?


Knowledge of anatomy is important for other areas of medicine as well! My course has a mixture of dissection and prosection and lecture teaching and personally I've definitely found I've learnt more from the dissection side of things (though remembering it is the problem!)

3) Does intercalating a medical science actually provide you with any benefit in your later clinical career? I do have an interest in the science but wouldn't mind the opportunity to study a humanity for a year, like some unis offer.


Intercalating currently gives you some points when applying for your first job after graduation. I don't think there's any difference based on what you intercalate. Later, I've no idea whether it provides you with any benefit or not.
Hygeia
I've found it very beneficial. I'm at a med school where we have 1 day every week in a GP practice (from week 1 year 1) and blocks in secondary care throughout each year as well so lots of early patient contact, but then, we don't really have a preclinical/clinical split at all. Without this early contact, I would probably be really struggling at this stage as it took me a long time to learn how to talk to patients without being terrified!



Knowledge of anatomy is important for other areas of medicine as well! My course has a mixture of dissection and prosection and lecture teaching and personally I've definitely found I've learnt more from the dissection side of things (though remembering it is the problem!)



Intercalating currently gives you some points when applying for your first job after graduation. I don't think there's any difference based on what you intercalate. Later, I've no idea whether it provides you with any benefit or not.



Thankies! you star :biggrin: I was originally considering Oxford, but considering they don't do dissections and have v. little patient contact during pre-clin (both of which I want), I've realised I've been aspiring to it for the wrong reasons...

Would you mind slightly elaborating a little on how patient contact has been helpful?


I must also thank you for starting that thread where students post their pros/cons on their respective medschools... it's been greatly informative and beneficial (i've even added it to my favourites!)
Reply 3
prince_of_paupers
Thankies! you star :biggrin: I was originally considering Oxford, but considering they don't do dissections and have v. little patient contact during pre-clin (both of which I want), I've realised I've been aspiring to it for the wrong reasons...

Would you mind slightly elaborating a little on how patient contact has been helpful?


I'm a person who is not particularly good at talking to others unless I know them quite well so having to talk to patients early allowed me to start becoming more used to it. If I hadn't had the chance to do this properly until 3rd year, I would have felt even more useless! It's also been really useful in finding out what patients experience and how they feel rather than just what the textbooks say. It's allowed me to built up a log book of patients I've seen so that if someone asks me about x disease, I can think of a patient I saw with it and remember what they said rather than trying to remember what I've read (oh, how I long for a photographic memory :p:)


I must also thank you for starting that thread where students post their pros/cons on their respective medschools... it's been greatly informative and beneficial (i've even added it to my favourites!)


:hat2: you're welcome :smile:
Reply 4
prince_of_paupers
Starting to look through potential medical schools to apply to for 2011 and have made notes on the structure and key features of quite a few schools. Just would appreciate some medics' input on the following questions...


1) How beneficial is early patient contact during your pre-clinical years? Does it really make that much of a difference or are they quite gimmicky?

2) If I don't plan to become a surgeon, is there any difference between having a course which features dissections and a course which features prosections? Is teaching the anatomy mainly for the surgical side of the degree?

3) Does intercalating a medical science actually provide you with any benefit in your later clinical career? I do have an interest in the science but wouldn't mind the opportunity to study a humanity for a year, like some unis offer.


1) I would disagree slightly - we only get 1/2 sessions a semester of early patient contact in year one and most people you talk to say it's quite fun but you don't necessarily learn a lot. I personally think it is a gimmock - you will get plenty of time for that in the clinical years and my course (Bute) features a communication skills section as well so it's not as if you won't be prepared.

2) Go for a dissection based course if you want my opinion. You would be missing out on a lot - real anatomy looks nothing like the textbooks and nothing replaces actually seeing and touching the stuff - I do think (from the small amount I've done so far) it is very beneficial and very helpfull and is one of the great priveldges of being a med student. It deosnt matter whether you want to be a surgeon or physician, you still need to know your anatomy and dissection helps to tie everything you learn in lectures together for me.

3) Well I suppose if you study humanities for a year you still get the points but will probably never see much real benefit to your work later (apart from personal development/generic skills). If you do a reseach lab project type thing then it could obviously be beneficial if you want to go into academic medicine. At my medical school you can do a dissertation in things like medical ethics so it's not all out humanities and at the same time you still do an applied medicine module so it's not so much of an out year if you want to avoid that.
Reply 5
1) I don't think it's gimmicky at all. We don't necessarily get a lot of patient contact but we do placements for a few weeks in the year and do a professional development spine where we actually go to the medical school parts of the hospitals and learn about professional values. I think the sort of "drip" learning is quite good, you keep in mind how to act throughout the years.
2) It's not necessarily for surgeons but anatomy is instead an integral part of any medical course and dissection is pretty useful, it demonstrates the human body as it is instead of being some perfect full colour image in a text book. UCL do full cadaveric dissection which is one of the reasons I chose it.
3) It does provide you with an edge when applying for jobs, but I'm not sure how much difference it makes with sciences. But even if it does make a difference, it doesn't matter too much now, you've got a long time to think about it.
prince_of_paupers
Starting to look through potential medical schools to apply to for 2011 and have made notes on the structure and key features of quite a few schools. Just would appreciate some medics' input on the following questions...


1) How beneficial is early patient contact during your pre-clinical years? Does it really make that much of a difference or are they quite gimmicky?


I think its beneficial. I spent 7/8weeks one day per week at a GP's in my first term. We got to just sit down at talk to patients in their homes. I loved it, it really helped break into the sciency side of the lectures. Travelling to the GP's was a bit of a lame, but it was all good in the end :smile:

prince_of_paupers
2) If I don't plan to become a surgeon, is there any difference between having a course which features dissections and a course which features prosections? Is teaching the anatomy mainly for the surgical side of the degree?


Anatomy is my favourite part of the course by far! We get prosections, so don't get any dissection, but being up close and personal with the bodies is a very important experience. Sometimes I feel I'd learn more from dissection. I can do optional dissection in my 2nd year.
I did dissection as work experience and can honestly say there is nothing like cutting up bodies. So if you can I'd go for it! And also apply to uni's that offer lots of DR time if you think thats what you'll want

prince_of_paupers

3) Does intercalating a medical science actually provide you with any benefit in your later clinical career? I do have an interest in the science but wouldn't mind the opportunity to study a humanity for a year, like some unis offer.


People say it can effect your placement and goes on the form used to determine FY1 placements, it's either 60% or 40% of medics in the year intercalate at bristol.. I've a feeling its 40% I just can't for definates remember the split.

Oh and with regards to oxford.. I'll double check but you get patient contact early there too. not as much as some places but I know you deffo get it.

I'm not sure about the anatomy but I'm fairly sure they get bodies too... Oxford seems fairly similar to Bristol, more traditional though.
Sambo2


2) Go for a dissection based course if you want my opinion. You would be missing out on a lot - real anatomy looks nothing like the textbooks and nothing replaces actually seeing and touching the stuff - I do think (from the small amount I've done so far) it is very beneficial and very helpfull and is one of the great priveldges of being a med student. It deosnt matter whether you want to be a surgeon or physician, you still need to know your anatomy and dissection helps to tie everything you learn in lectures together for me.


You're quite right about it being different but i'd say hands on dissection > hands on prossection >no hands prosection > atlas of anatomy > anatomy text book

But there isn't huge amounts of difference between dissection and hands on prosection imo.

(My medschool only offers prosection first year - and its not hugely hands on, but I have done dissection as part of the work exp. I did)
rainbowbex
You're quite right about it being different but i'd say hands on dissection > hands on prossection >no hands prosection > atlas of anatomy > anatomy text book

But there isn't huge amounts of difference between dissection and hands on prosection imo.

(My medschool only offers prosection first year - and its not hugely hands on, but I have done dissection as part of the work exp. I did)


What's the difference between hands on prosection and dissection?
916-CALL-TURK
What's the difference between hands on prosection and dissection?


With prossection the body has already been dissected, but if you glove up you can still have a good poke at it.

if your dissecting it... you're dissecting it....

EDIT: So one you play with a cut up body. the other you get to cut it up and play with it
Reply 10
prince_of_paupers
Starting to look through potential medical schools to apply to for 2011 and have made notes on the structure and key features of quite a few schools. Just would appreciate some medics' input on the following questions...


1) How beneficial is early patient contact during your pre-clinical years? Does it really make that much of a difference or are they quite gimmicky?

2) If I don't plan to become a surgeon, is there any difference between having a course which features dissections and a course which features prosections? Is teaching the anatomy mainly for the surgical side of the degree?

3) Does intercalating a medical science actually provide you with any benefit in your later clinical career? I do have an interest in the science but wouldn't mind the opportunity to study a humanity for a year, like some unis offer.


I'm only able to answer your first question...
early contact is a great thing however, it can depend on who you are attached to. In my first year we had 2 GP home visits, 2 community care visits and 2 week long hospital attachment which i all loved as they were well structured and taught me loads in terms of medical conditions, communication skills, how the healthcare team works, etc. This year however, I have only had 2 weeks of hospital attachment with a consultant who didnt give a damn whether i learnt anything or not and nurses who declined to help me get my procedures done/signed off and consecquently you feel like a spare part standing around. so it totally depends on who you get attached to. but all in all, I think my communication skills wouldnt be where they are if it wasnt for those attachments. but regarding actual clinical procedures/examinations, there isn't much to be done as 1st/2nd year med student unless you get lucky (i got to take blood as a first year after a 10 minute practice run!!)
Reply 11
rainbowbex
With prossection the body has already been dissected, but if you glove up you can still have a good poke at it.

if your dissecting it... you're dissecting it....

EDIT: So one you play with a cut up body. the other you get to cut it up and play with it


but prosections tend to be old and mouldy - whereas dissections are fresh and more life likeish... like all the fat and connective tissue and stuff just isn't the same in a brown prosection.. we agree it's better so if you can have it then why not? - deosn't matter to you wether the benefit is not vast.
Sambo2
but prosections tend to be old and mouldy - whereas dissections are fresh and more life likeish... like all the fat and connective tissue and stuff just isn't the same in a brown prosection.. we agree it's better so if you can have it then why not? - deosn't matter to you wether the benefit is not vast.


Sorry but that is a load of bull. The only prosections I've seen to be 'old and mouldy' are the ones they keep in cardiff DR. the specimins do dry out pretty quick after they've been skinned, but you can have a prosection with the majority of the skin there just gets moved to look at the body underneath

The pro-sections we use are still juicy

oh and the relevance is, that dissection isn't going to be the sole point of decision making for the OP, so it is useful to him to know that its DR time rather than prosection/dissection that really matters imo
Reply 13
rainbowbex
Sorry but that is a load of bull. The only prosections I've seen to be 'old and mouldy' are the ones they keep in cardiff DR. the specimins do dry out pretty quick after they've been skinned, but you can have a prosection with the majority of the skin there just gets moved to look at the body underneath

The pro-sections we use are still juicy

oh and the relevance is, that dissection isn't going to be the sole point of decision making for the OP, so it is useful to him to know that its DR time rather than prosection/dissection that really matters imo


in your opinion.. quite - but imo there is a significant benefit from doing dissection - we started with prosection (and ours where very old and mouldy...) and have recently moved to disection and the consensus is that there is a significant benefit. I would disagree - for OP I would say whether or not a course deos dissection or not should be a major consideration - the benefit gained from the opportunity to disect a human body is immense in my opinion.

However we are both clearly very satisfied with our courses so perhaps if you never get to do it you don't particularly miss it, but I would recommend it.
Sambo2
in your opinion.. quite - but imo there is a significant benefit from doing dissection - we started with prosection (and ours where very old and mouldy...) and have recently moved to disection and the consensus is that there is a significant benefit. I would disagree - for OP I would say whether or not a course deos dissection or not should be a major consideration - the benefit gained from the opportunity to disect a human body is immense in my opinion.

However we are both clearly very satisfied with our courses so perhaps if you never get to do it you don't particularly miss it, but I would recommend it.


Oh I have dissected. Spent a week in a DR on work exp (and yeah I do think its better, but don't think it makes a problemetic difference and you'd probably not notice the lack if you never did dissection)

If you have :snow::snow::snow::snow: pro-sections I can understand why it would then limit you.. unlucky on that front. It does make more of a difference if they dry out - so then the OP would have to investigate carefully the merits of each department :P

I guess it also depends - was your work with pro-sections self directed? same with the dissection? because that would be the other factor that influences the learning people get right?

Sorry this has turned into a bit of a discussion :smile: Sad as it is I do actually love comparing med schools and the different learning :/
Reply 15
rainbowbex
Oh I have dissected. Spent a week in a DR on work exp (and yeah I do think its better, but don't think it makes a problemetic difference and you'd probably not notice the lack if you never did dissection)

If you have :snow::snow::snow::snow: pro-sections I can understand why it would then limit you.. unlucky on that front. It does make more of a difference if they dry out - so then the OP would have to investigate carefully the merits of each department :P

I guess it also depends - was your work with pro-sections self directed? same with the dissection? because that would be the other factor that influences the learning people get right?

Sorry this has turned into a bit of a discussion :smile: Sad as it is I do actually love comparing med schools and the different learning :/


that's pretty awesome work experience.. beats sitting in a GP's room! No it was like a mini lecture in a group of 6 and we did sort of potted sports round the DR looking at different bits.. Yeh our pro-sections where a bit crusty but I think that's cus they're only used for early on 1st years.

Of course it's always interesting to know how others do it :smile:
rainbowbex

Anatomy is my favourite part of the course by far! We get prosections, so don't get any dissection, but being up close and personal with the bodies is a very important experience. Sometimes I feel I'd learn more from dissection. I can do optional dissection in my 2nd year.
I did dissection as work experience and can honestly say there is nothing like cutting up bodies. So if you can I'd go for it! And also apply to uni's that offer lots of DR time if you think thats what you'll want.


DR?
And by work experience, you mean when you're in medschool right? :o:

Oh and with regards to oxford.. I'll double check but you get patient contact early there too. not as much as some places but I know you deffo get it.

I'm not sure about the anatomy but I'm fairly sure they get bodies too... Oxford seems fairly similar to Bristol, more traditional though.


Do you know if Oxford do hands-on prosection (im aware they don't do dissections) and when they start patient contact?


thanks
Reply 17
Phalanges
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You might be able to answer the Oxford questions :p:
From a quick glance it seems that the two main talking points are patient contact and dissections.

At Oxford, we do have patient contact. However, in keeping with the general theme of the course, it's kept very much to a minimum (~2 GP sessions a term in your first year). I have no problem with this - if I was thrown onto the wards now I wouldn't have a clue fundamentally about half the stuff I was dealing with, so it wouldn't be a whole lot of use to me. However, with the occasional sessions I did pick up on one or two things we'd already studied, which gave it a nice summary to those aspects.

We do prosections at Oxford (although we have been told that it's very much a possibility to dissect if you are so inclined, you just have to get in touch with a tutor who will fit you in out of hours. I keep meaning to do this but always seem to have something else on my plate). Prosections are great - we get them once a week, and involve standing around various specimens in groups of ~5 with a junior doctor talking us through what we're seeing (and poking) and compounding our knowledge by asking us questions. They fit in well because we'll generally have had lectures on the area (muscles of the limbs, nerves etc.) in the session before to let us learn the theory, and then straight on we go on to applying it.

Hygeia
You might be able to answer the Oxford questions :p:


:h:
prince_of_paupers
DR?
And by work experience, you mean when you're in medschool right? :o:



Do you know if Oxford do hands-on prosection (im aware they don't do dissections) and when they start patient contact?


thanks


No, I mean work experience I did before I applied for medicine...

I was just lucky enough to do it in a Dissection Room (DR)

See post above about oxford

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