Medicine 2012...(hopeful entrants) !!

Aww, that sucks. My friend thought I was lying to her about Liverpool being PBL so that I would have less competition, lol.

Yeah about that. I had three larger paragraphs plus a concluding sentence and the whole second paragraph was mainly work experience Though I chose to talk about a two week placement and went into more detail. The other WE I left to my reference.

Do you study at a private or comprehensive sixth form college?

I need a D for maths so thats sorted, but I need an A on the dot for chemistry but I'm resitting AS coursework so i'm not worried and I need a medium A for biology which i'm worried about.
In total I would like A*A*A but i think if I aim for an A* in chemistry i'll get a B in biology so i'll just aim for A*AA.

Yeah about that. I had three larger paragraphs plus a concluding sentence and the whole second paragraph was mainly work experience Though I chose to talk about a two week placement and went into more detail. The other WE I left to my reference.

At least with this lot of exams you can focus a bit away from maths and on chem/bio which means it'll be easier to manage time. Good luck with your cwk resit. Medium A could be hard to get, but as long as you perfect synoptic technique (because it sounds like a lot of people fall down here) you'll do fine.

"Just" aim for A*AA? Nah, seriously though, good luck, hopefully August will be a happy month.

I am worried as hell! Oh well, not much I can do now but try and get as much as possible.

Yeah hopefully, I mean well I have to try and get that, peninsula have started A*AA offers now, so I won't be surprised if they change a lot of the offers to that, if I did better in biology I wouldn't be in this mess. But yeah I've got time for biology at least for revision, so it isn't too bad, damn unit 4, that D has messed me up, at least with chemistry I can get an A by just doing coursework and getting A's in the exam. When I mean medium A for bio I mean 85% not 90 luckily.

If you don't mind me asking, what was the 2 week placement?

And, actually, now you're at med school, do you feel like the volunteer/work exp/extra curric stuff that you did actually helps you (as in, is it just a matter of ticking boxes and/or developing skills to get in, or does it genuinely have a long-term impact)? There must be a reason why med schools want it, but it just seems like medical school moves too fast for the stuff to have an effect.

PENINSULA have started giving out A*AA offers? Wtf! WHY? When you say "I won't be surprised if they change a lot of offers to that" do you mean Peninsula or other unis? I'm so glad I'm applying for 2012, the competition is going to get horrendous.

Aww, no. What went wrong in unit 4? Not enough revision? All you can do is try your best really. How you feeling about the June exams atm?

I might be wrong but from what my school's said they want the work experience to prove to them that you really want to be a doctor, and understand what it's about. They want people that they're confident will thrive in the environment, and become great doctors, rather than someone who enters with not much enthusiasm other than wanting to earn a lot of money or learns after a year or so medicine's not for them and drop out because they hadn't been to any work experience showing them.

I also think it's just because it's so comeptitive they needed an extra category to class people against, haha.

I think I just read the revision guide and didn't do many test papers for unit 4. I'm feeling half scared half confident for the exams, I haven't done any proper revision for maths and chemistry but i've finished learning them well kinda and I'm near finished learning biology. Hopefully by the end of easter I would have finished everything.
On the peninsula website it says that it ranges from A*AA-AAA so you never know other unis might change it, but if you're good enough to apply you can get the grades I guess. How you feeling about your june exams?

Yup if I get 3A's, though that's easier said than done. AR is a killer, but I guessed half of them and didn't even finish and I got 590. I guessed most of VR as well, QR was easy and DA was last and I thought I failed so I got bored so I got 570 for DA. I was so shocked when I saw my QR result I was like 850 wtf, then I counted the results and I said that's alright lol. I was failing QR until the day of the exam, I did a GCSE maths paper in my head so I think that helped.
It's just practicing an IQ test, if you're applying for medicine you already have a high IQ.

If you don't mind me asking, what was the 2 week placement?

And, actually, now you're at med school, do you feel like the volunteer/work exp/extra curric stuff that you did actually helps you (as in, is it just a matter of ticking boxes and/or developing skills to get in, or does it genuinely have a long-term impact)? There must be a reason why med schools want it, but it just seems like medical school moves too fast for the stuff to have an effect.

Where can I do a practice UKCAT test?

Just a couple of weeks at a small community general hospital. I focused more on how various situations (palliative patients for example) had affected me and helped me identify misconceptions I had about a medical career.

I would say that there is certainly an element of box ticking from people, myself included Having had my first year of seeing patients as a medical student, I definitely think the previous contact with people in hospital was a definite advantage. You don't feel quite so intimidated by the surroundings Nothing can really prepare you for it completely but getting first hand experience before medical school will help you and isn't merely another box to tick.

Ah, cool. It sounds like a really good experience and your reflections sound really astute and mature, your PS must have been amazing.

That makes sense. I mean, work experience (generally) can give you an impression of what medical life is like but tbh I don't think anyone can truly understand sleep deprivation and having loads of sick people to see and being torn between wanting rest and wanting to do what you can. But if it does help you get more comfortable in the surroundings then I can see why med schools want applicants to have it.

One last question. Do you ever feel like you went to med school too early? I feel way too immature to be considering it and to see the things you'd see and essentially have to go grow up really quickly.

Ah, cool. It sounds like a really good experience and your reflections sound really astute and mature, your PS must have been amazing.

That makes sense. I mean, work experience (generally) can give you an impression of what medical life is like but tbh I don't think anyone can truly understand sleep deprivation and having loads of sick people to see and being torn between wanting rest and wanting to do what you can. But if it does help you get more comfortable in the surroundings then I can see why med schools want applicants to have it.

One last question. Do you ever feel like you went to med school too early? I feel way too immature to be considering it and to see the things you'd see and essentially have to go grow up really quickly.

Yes. I wasn't ready at all; for the workload or the emotional maturity that one needs when dealing with patients.

You do get used to it, and i've a long way to go yet We all have to take gambles at some stage, you just have to hope that you can cope

That's pretty scary. I think I'm beginning to see why some unis don't have early patient contact, in that case. Apparently the honeymoon period of medicine ends after about three months.

Do you think it'll get easier or harder through med school? :/
True, but once you drop out of med school you can't go back, seems sad that some people might never be drs even though they'd have made good ones just because they got their foot in there too quickly.