Biomedical Sciences VS Medicine Undergraduate degree

Hello!

I am finding myself a little conflicted between choosing between these two subjects at the moment.

It is only quite recently that I have considered medicine as an option when I was working at a vaccination centre and got to meet a lot of GP's who after telling them what I was interested in and saw me working strongly recommended I do a medicine degree. This is because they said I will cover all the topics I want to and can have a key focus, better job prospects and still have a very scientific degree.

Here is where I am conflicted. I'm thinking about biomedical sciences at the moment as I enjoy scientific research and it wouldn't be heavily focused on patient communication but more on exploring scientific processes in depth. I was thinking that if I studies biomed, I would still have the choice to study medicine after if my mind changes and I'm certain on studying it. I also know of a couple of universities that run transfer schemes to medicine if you are completing a biomedical sciences degree although they are very competitive.

With medicine, I think I would enjoy the element of exploring a breadth in science and then focusing on a specific area in the end and specialising in it later on. I can deal with people quite well so I don't think the patient side would be too bad although I don't know if I'd have the ability to break bad news and have someones serious health conditions in my hands (although I don't know if this a skill taught at medical school?). If I did study medicine I think I'd prefer to go into something specific like dermatology/immunology but I'm not too sure if you can do that? Also there's the fact that the course is 6/7years long but I think if I was going to do a graduate entry most likely anyways that it would take the same amount of time or longer.

My questions is,what are the benefits of studying medicine over biomed or vice versa and how large is the difference between the courses? Also, do you think it is too late for me to decide on studying medicine, as I know the UCAT exam needs to be booked VERY shortly.

Any help would be much appreciated!
Thank You!

Biomed and Medicine are 2 very very different degrees, the only thing they have in common is the med bit in the name! If you want to go into research and do not want to do medicine than go into biomed.

If medicine is what you want to do then take a gap year and apply next year as you might not have enough time to fully prepare for it. Medicine will prepare you for everything you need to know such as breaking bad news and loads of other skills so don't worry about that or let it put you off medicine.

I would advice that if you want to do med then don't try for Grad Entry Med or transfer schemes as GEM is super competitive, costs a lot more and takes much longer than an undergrad med course and transfer schemes are more of a lottery thing and are super hard to transfer from

Biomed and Medicine are 2 very very different degrees, the only thing they have in common is the med bit in the name! If you want to go into research and do not want to do medicine than go into biomed.

If medicine is what you want to do then take a gap year and apply next year as you might not have enough time to fully prepare for it. Medicine will prepare you for everything you need to know such as breaking bad news and loads of other skills so don't worry about that or let it put you off medicine.

I would advice that if you want to do med then don't try for Grad Entry Med or transfer schemes as GEM is super competitive, costs a lot more and takes much longer than an undergrad med course and transfer schemes are more of a lottery thing and are super hard to transfer from

exactly correct, but there still is time to take a very late UCAT or the BMAT Bmat you have time for, UCAT less so

From the sound of this you don’t want to do medicine. It is nothing like Biomed and is very patient focused. You’ll spend a long time taking medical histories, memorising drugs, and performing small to medium procedures repeatedly. You do learn about science but in nowhere near as much detail as biomed. However biomed is full of med school rejects and makes the course quite in enjoyable for those who don’t want to do medicine, a reason why I dropped it. Just because some people said you’d do it well isn’t a reason to do medicine, they tell almost everyone that to be nice. Doctors, lawyers, vets etc are very bias to their degree and career path. I guess to summarise medicine is patient focused and procedure focused, biomed is lab and research focused.

Yep, that's what I was thinking too. I'm thinking of applying for Oxbridge if I were to do biomedical sciences anyway so would have to sit the BMAT. Do you know how many universities out there ask for the BMAT for medicine because all the ones I've looked at so far apart from oxbridge, have offered UCAT. Thank you for clarifying about the exams, is the test style of the BMAT similar to that of the UCAT (MENSA style questions)?

Thanks

BMAT and UCAT have their own threads, check those, but they are very different. UCAT if you do it on 29th september you could pull off a decent score with a lot of hard work over the next fortnight. You can google this information easily and the info about the unis too