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Finished my first year of medical school - Ask me anything!

Hi all!

I have just finished my first year of medical school and thought I would do an AMA for you all. Feel free to ask any questions about my application, how I found first year, university life, the medical course, or pretty much anything you want :smile:

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what's ukcat? some kind of entry test?
Which uni are you at?
Did you really party more then every other student whilst doing serious work?

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Reply 4
Original post by chickenfoot
what's ukcat? some kind of entry test?


Yes, the UKCAT is a test required by pretty much all medical schools, used as one of many selection tools, alongside your personal statement, grades etc. It is made up of several sections - verbal reasoning, quantitative reasoning, abstract reasoning, decision analysis, and situational judgement :^_^:
Reply 5
Original post by Skill Twix
Which uni are you at?


Keele :biggrin:
Reply 6
Did you have dissections at your uni?
If yes, how did you cope? :redface:
Original post by bailey432
Yes, the UKCAT is a test required by pretty much all medical schools, used as one of many selection tools, alongside your personal statement, grades etc. It is made up of several sections - verbal reasoning, quantitative reasoning, abstract reasoning, decision analysis, and situational judgement :^_^:


Is it hard is the verbal reasoning like the ones in the 11+ exams?
Original post by bailey432
Keele :biggrin:


Ah nice :smile:
Reply 9
Original post by Moonstruck16
Did you really party more then every other student whilst doing serious work?

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Personally, no. I partied very little, however some of my classmates did go out quite a lot! I would say that on the whole we can keep up with the other non-medical students, but only if you were dedicated! I found I had too much work to do or too tired to go out much, but many of my friends went out at least once a week!

I would say though that the nights out arranged by the medical society (as opposed to a standard night out or a night arranged by the student's union) were undoubtedly some of the BEST. When we plan parties - we make them really fun! :tongue:
Reply 10
Original post by SiminaM
Did you have dissections at your uni?
If yes, how did you cope? :redface:


Yes, we did dissections on cadavers once a week in first year and will do so again in second year. I never found it a problem, but there were a few people who were a bit put off by it to begin with! However after a few weeks everybody becomes desensitised by it and it becomes much more "normal". My non-medic friends and family would be very grossed out by some of the things I told them but to other medics it would be considered normal conversation! :tongue:
Reply 11
Original post by xGCSE_Studentx
Is it hard is the verbal reasoning like the ones in the 11+ exams?


Depends what you define as "hard"! Personally I found it very difficult, but I bought an amazing book that was full of practice questions (just enter "UKCAT practice questions" into Amazon and lots of books come up) that was a massive help :smile:
Reply 12
Is the course at Keele traditional or with problem based learning? If so what's your views on traditional style/PBL?
Original post by bailey432
Yes, we did dissections on cadavers once a week in first year and will do so again in second year. I never found it a problem, but there were a few people who were a bit put off by it to begin with! However after a few weeks everybody becomes desensitised by it and it becomes much more "normal". My non-medic friends and family would be very grossed out by some of the things I told them but to other medics it would be considered normal conversation! :tongue:


I'm on a biology degree and we haven't even got close to dissecting a friggin leaf :frown: :frown: :frown:

Did you do the whole scrubs stealing thing? :wink:

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Reply 14
Original post by muchensmile
Is the course at Keele traditional or with problem based learning? If so what's your views on traditional style/PBL?


Keele is PBL based, but you do get lectures to support you. In first year it is much more mixed, with much of your knowledge coming from lectures. However in second year you have fewer lectures and almost all your learning comes from PBL.

Keele was the only PBL-heavy university I applied to, the rest were more lecture based, so naturally I had some doubts. However I found first year a good balance between the self-directed PBL learning and lectures, which makes me now feel much more confident in how the PBL system works going into second year, where I will need to rely on it much more. Hope this helps!
Reply 15
Original post by bailey432
Hi all!

I have just finished my first year of medical school and thought I would do an AMA for you all. Feel free to ask any questions about my application, how I found first year, university life, the medical course, or pretty much anything you want :smile:


Hi there, I have an offer to study medicine, hopefully if I get the grades this results day I will be starting in October! Was there a massive jump in the difficulty of work and how did you cope? Also, what was the workload like? How long did you have to study a day? Oh and do you get 'homework'? Sorry for the questions, I really don't know how the system works :P


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Reply 16
Original post by Moonstruck16
I'm on a biology degree and we haven't even got close to dissecting a friggin leaf :frown: :frown: :frown:

Did you do the whole scrubs stealing thing? :wink:

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Unfortunately not! :frown: we don't wear scrubs to anatomy class, just our lab coats and disposable gloves. Would love to wear scrubs!
Original post by bailey432
Unfortunately not! :frown: we don't wear scrubs to anatomy class, just our lab coats and disposable gloves. Would love to wear scrubs!


Aww but I thought the scrubs stealing and scrub party was a tradition for medicine freshers! :tongue:

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Reply 18
Original post by Ani97
Hi there, I have an offer to study medicine, hopefully if I get the grades this results day I will be starting in October! Was there a massive jump in the difficulty of work and how did you cope? Also, what was the workload like? How long did you have to study a day? Oh and do you get 'homework'? Sorry for the questions, I really don't know how the system works :P


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Well done on your offer and good luck on results day! I can only speak from experience so take from this what you like. Honestly, I found the jump between A levels and Medicine to be massive, both in work load and difficulty.

The workload is very big, time management is crucial to ensure that you get all of your work done, as well as enjoying your new university life and making friends! I would say I didn't cope brilliantly, but looking back I would say to you that a good way to cope would be to make sure you ask for help if you don't understand something (sooner rather than later!!) and DO NOT give up your hobbies and interests just to make time for your work, it just isn't a good idea at all.

I can't put a number on how many hours I worked per week during term time, I just worked as much as I could, but within reason!!! Meaning I would work as many hours as I could, but still allowing time for hobbies, making friends, relaxing, and the occasional trip home :smile:

We get "homework", sort of... Every monday in PBL we set ourselves a list of questions to answer over the week (E.g. Describe the process of breathing and the muscles involved), and would research the answers, which were supported by our lectures and lab classes. Also you could count "homework" as going home and spending 5 hours trying to make sense of the hour long immunology lecture you just went to! Going over lectures easily took up most of my study time during the week.

Sorry for the long response, wanted to answer fully, hope this helps!
Reply 19
Original post by Moonstruck16
Aww but I thought the scrubs stealing and scrub party was a tradition for medicine freshers! :tongue:

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Haha, ahh no, at our university our medicine freshers tradition is the pyjama pub crawl!! :dance:

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