How is Manchester for medicine?

Recommended texts don't really matter to be honest. You just need to find a standard textbook you like (for physiology etc.) and stick to it. When I say broad, it could be stuff like (as an example off the top of my head) "know about adaptive and innate immunity"...you just have to figure out yourself how much you need to know about this (there are whole books on this topic). You'll see a lot of people going into specialised immunology texts in the library but really you can pass with honours/distinction (awarded to around top 15% in each exam) with simply knowing stuff in a general pathology text inside out.

Regarding the difficulty, that comment was in 2010 and Manchester have made efforts to make the course more rigorous since and our year (2010 entry) was the first to get learning objectives for students. I understand there are various mid-semester assessments now that requires more consistent learning. I found year 1 quite rigorous actually, although I have a tendency to go over the top. I agree that if you intend to scrape a pass mark then that might not be too difficult. Year 2 is a step up and requires more effort. In the clinical years, I find our OSCEs to be fairly challenging and generally I think the standard is good. There is initially a bit of a gulf in pure basic science knowledge between us and the St. Andrews lot (they join the course in year 3) but Manchester medics catch up rapidly over the clinical course and there's no difference in exam results.

Having said that, there isn't as much as anatomy as there should be on the year 1+2 exams and I just feel that the pre-clinical course doesn't prepare you well for the clinical years due to the sporadic coverage of certain important topics while certain topics are over-emphasised (e.g. psychosocial theories) and don't actually seem relevant to everyday clinical practice you encounter. Oh and the early clinical experience is a gimmick.

Don't worry! Learn the appropriate topics and work hard and you'll be as good a doctor as any. I think that some people are less knowledgeable than others in pre-clinical but year 3 onwards, everyone's roughly on the same page. Don't fret now...enjoy your gap year. Hope my rant helps

I echo the EXACT same thing here in Peninsula. Sporadic coverage of a lot of topics, over emphasis on reflective BS but eventually you begin to appreciate the structure. Rather than teaching you medicine, they teach you HOW TO learn medicine. We have no anatomy and physiology exams after year one, which isn't that great in it self anyway. I think Manchester's examining system is similar to ours, progressive testing through the years? Years 1-5 sit the same exam, different pass marks, 4x a year.

And on the note of textbooks, I literally use wikipedia for anatomy/physiology and a lot of journals for pathophysiology etc etc. Books are overrated.

I echo the EXACT same thing here in Peninsula. Sporadic coverage of a lot of topics, over emphasis on reflective BS but eventually you begin to appreciate the structure. Rather than teaching you medicine, they teach you HOW TO learn medicine. We have no anatomy and physiology exams after year one, which isn't that great in it self anyway. I think Manchester's examining system is similar to ours, progressive testing through the years? Years 1-5 sit the same exam, different pass marks, 4x a year.

And on the note of textbooks, I literally use wikipedia for anatomy/physiology and a lot of journals for pathophysiology etc etc. Books are overrated.

Giving high flow oxygen to certain COPD patients can be dangerous. But not giving oxygen to any patient who is dying from hypoxia is even more dangerous. It's not as clear-cut as you might think.

You're not an anaesthetist by any chance?

How did you guess?