The Student Room Group
Uni students - Complete our survey >>
Uni students - Complete our survey >>
Uni students - Complete our survey >>

This discussion is now closed.

Check out other Related discussions

Can I do Medicine if i hate biology?

Im taking chem/bio/maths and i really want to be a doctor.

But thinking about it i really don't particularly enjoy biology but i love chemistry and maths.

i particularly don't like it because it's just 100% memorisation and it's like another language!

I'm not sure if it's just because i'm not particularly understanding it just yet or if it's because of my apathy towards it (don't want to self-diagnose but i'm pretty sure i've been depressed for quite some time now and i'm just so apathetic about everything).

being a doctor is really ideal to me but it's just the studying/education to become a doctor that i may struggle with if i dont like biology.

I was thinking medical/pharmaceutical research or biomedical engineering or something but i really want to become a surgeon in the future.

So confused???

Scroll to see replies

no it is basically biology
Whilst ability in Chemistry is for many Med Schools more important than Biology, a career as a Dr isn't realistic if you dont find human biology 'interesting' is it?

Have a look at non-clinical medical science degrees instead.
Examples are the Cellular and Molecular Medicine program at Bristol : http://www.bristol.ac.uk/cellmolmed/study/undergraduate/,
or the Medical Science degrees at Aberdeen : https://www.abdn.ac.uk/sms/undergraduate/index.php
What part of biology do you not like? If it's human biology, then I'm afraid I have bad news.
Original post by returnmigrant
Whilst ability in Chemistry is for many Med Schools more important than Biology, a career as a Dr isn't realistic if you dont find human biology 'interesting' is it?

Have a look at non-clinical medical science degrees instead.
Examples are the Cellular and Molecular Medicine program at Bristol : http://www.bristol.ac.uk/cellmolmed/study/undergraduate/,
or the Medical Science degrees at Aberdeen : https://www.abdn.ac.uk/sms/undergraduate/index.php


Non-clinical medical sciences degrees are far more biology-centred than is clinical medicine...

OP, it's really up to why you don't like biology. Do you find physiology and disease interesting? If not, I'd usher you away from medicine, but if you're just bored by the plants, the molecular biology and the cells then I'd keep it on the cards.

Posted from TSR Mobile
I think i hate biology because there are just SO many new words and terms like everything's in such tiny detail and it literally doesn't seem like English half the time. After i see all those weird words i just give up.
Original post by sarah_j_jane
I think i hate biology because there are just SO many new words and terms like everything's in such tiny detail and it literally doesn't seem like English half the time. After i see all those weird words i just give up.


Welcome to medicine.
Reply 7
Avatar for Maker
Maker
20
Medicine is 95% memory.
Original post by ForestCat
Welcome to medicine.


lol. Am i screwed?
Original post by sarah_j_jane
lol. Am i screwed?


Medicine really has its own language (and an awful lot of Latin derivatives). But you get used to it, you learn to recognise words and commonalities.

Honestly, studying anything at a higher level is going to involve learning a lot of new words. It's something you just have to accept and deal with.

Medicine is a lot of rote memorisation, especially at first. But there is also a lot of application of this knowledge. I certainly wouldn't rule it out because you've not enjoyed one a level. This is where work experience is key.

Posted from TSR Mobile
Original post by sarah_j_jane
lol. Am i screwed?


You're about as screwed as the chap the 75 year old gentleman I had on the ward who was admitted with a dull pain in the groin thought to be an incarcerated inguinal hernia. The ABG showed a lactate of 5 on admission, indicating some degree of ischemia which fit the picture. There was no obvious mass on examination and bowel sounds were present, but there was a large, pulsatile mass felt in the abdomen. An urgent CT scan was requested which found a ruptured anterior abdominal aortic aneurysm. Thank **** he'd been G+S'd as his Hb came back as 84 and he was becoming progressively more tachypnoeic and tachycardic. We stabilized him best we could and sent him on his way to the big boy hospital.

Long story short, you're screwed.
Original post by Hippysnake
You're about as screwed as the chap the 75 year old gentleman I had on the ward who was admitted with a dull pain in the groin thought to be an incarcerated inguinal hernia. The ABG showed a lactate of 5 on admission, indicating some degree of ischemia which fit the picture. There was no obvious mass on examination and bowel sounds were present, but there was a large, pulsatile mass felt in the abdomen. An urgent CT scan was requested which found a ruptured anterior abdominal aortic aneurysm. Thank **** he'd been G+S'd as his Hb came back as 84 and he was becoming progressively more tachypnoeic and tachycardic. We stabilized him best we could and sent him on his way to the big boy hospital.

Long story short, you're screwed.


I'll do you one better:

http://gomerblog.com/2014/12/soap-note/
Original post by sarah_j_jane
i particularly don't like it because it's just 100% memorisation and it's like another language!


This is the key part of your post. Medical students and junior doctors spend a huge part of their lives learning and memorising things from books, almost all of which is in a strange language that doesn't have any words of fewer than nine letters. I suggest you have a little think about whether medicine is for you.
Original post by Hippysnake
You're about as screwed as the chap the 75 year old gentleman I had on the ward who was admitted with a dull pain in the groin thought to be an incarcerated inguinal hernia. The ABG showed a lactate of 5 on admission, indicating some degree of ischemia which fit the picture. There was no obvious mass on examination and bowel sounds were present, but there was a large, pulsatile mass felt in the abdomen. An urgent CT scan was requested which found a ruptured anterior abdominal aortic aneurysm. Thank **** he'd been G+S'd as his Hb came back as 84 and he was becoming progressively more tachypnoeic and tachycardic. We stabilized him best we could and sent him on his way to the big boy hospital.

Long story short, you're screwed.

omg no it's that sciencey language i just really hate! like it just sounds like blah blah blah.
Will i hate it less if i learn to understand this language?
Original post by Good bloke
This is the key part of your post. Medical students and junior doctors spend a huge part of their lives learning and memorising things from books, almost all of which is in a strange language that doesn't have any words of fewer than nine letters. I suggest you have a little think about whether medicine is for you.


see my other post :smile:
This is the main thing putting me off. But like when i started learning German i hated it because i didn't understand it. Now i'm great at it and I did really well (at GCSE)
If i start to learn this language and understand it more, will i hate it less like when I was learning German?:s-smilie:

I'm being serious:colondollar:
Original post by Hippysnake
You're about as screwed as the chap the 75 year old gentleman I had on the ward who was admitted with a dull pain in the groin thought to be an incarcerated inguinal hernia. The ABG showed a lactate of 5 on admission, indicating some degree of ischemia which fit the picture. There was no obvious mass on examination and bowel sounds were present, but there was a large, pulsatile mass felt in the abdomen. An urgent CT scan was requested which found a ruptured anterior abdominal aortic aneurysm. Thank **** he'd been G+S'd as his Hb came back as 84 and he was becoming progressively more tachypnoeic and tachycardic. We stabilized him best we could and sent him on his way to the big boy hospital.

Long story short, you're screwed.


lol
Original post by Democracy


Let's not discourage him/her completely. Guessing what the **** your consultant wants you to do by reading the just barely legible acronym laden discharge plan hastily scribbled during a round or post-op is one of the most fun things to do as an F1.
Original post by Frappé
omg no it's that sciencey language i just really hate! like it just sounds like blah blah blah.
Will i hate it less if i learn to understand this language?


Probably not. I understand it and I still hate it. I rarely say the patient is 'tachypnoeic' on a ward round or during handover as it doesn't really tell you much. The next question almost inevitably is 'what is the resp rate', as there's a big difference between say 19 and 26, even though they're both high.

There's alot of mumbo jumbo that you slowly pickup, you'll learn to understand it, but it doesn't mean you'll learn to like it.
Doing a level biology, I hate the plants and animals bit of it such as succession and things although ,it is interest no, I just don't particular like the exam questions on these topics.
However, learning human biology, I know that I want to do medicine and I love the exam questions for these because it's really knowledge based rather than application style.


Posted from TSR Mobile
Original post by Frappé
omg no it's that sciencey language i just really hate! like it just sounds like blah blah blah.
Will i hate it less if i learn to understand this language?


Most professions have technical jargon to be honest, you just have to pick it up and deal with it. It's a better story than "Man had hurty tummy. Bleedy bleedy inside tummy. Uh-oh. :frown:"

Related discussions

Latest

Trending

Trending

Articles for you