The MCAT really was useful!!

I just wanted to write a quick little post about how the MCAT really does come back in med school.

When you study for the MCAT, the studying is more about dissecting questions and coming up with the correct answer based on basic information than it it is about stuffing facts into your brain.  You have to be aware of words like ALWAYS, NEVER, NOT, ect.  For pre-meds suffering through the MCAT, I promise all your work and toil will not go down the toilet when you get to med school.  Med school exams are not comprised of simple questions.  You have to be able to break down the terminology, decide what is really important in the question and what isn't.  (ie. you see the name of some random disease you have never heard of in the question, but you need to replace it with "some pathology" in your head to make the question make sense).  This isn't because the professors are trying to trick you (once you are in, they are all on your side, they want you to graduate and become a good doctor), it's because, for the rest of your life, you will need to be thinking through complex, multi-step questions. 

As many of us are preparing for this first exam, I keep hearing people say "oh I feel like this is MCAT time all over again."  Most of us probably lived out 3-5 months of really intense study time.  You will need to sustain that when you are in med school, so not only is the MCAT good practice for dissecting questions, it's good training for developing effective study skills.  Remember, med school is about organizing a lot of material in your brain in a short amount of time and then being able to turn it around and apply it to real-world situations.  Sound familiar?

Med School, The analogy

Someone in my class posted this video on our facebook page as an analogy to how we feel trying to learn all this content.  Couldn't help but share:

MS1, day 1

Today was the official first day of classes at med school.  I think we were all expecting an easy day with course introductions, lab protocol instructions and the like.  The beginning of the day was pretty relaxed.  We started out spending 30 minutes hearing about histology, then went upstairs to meet our "first patients."  I was surprised as I was quite nervous in the moments before they removed the shroud even though I have seen 3 dissected cadavers and countless surgeries.  After lunch we had 2 hours of anatomy lecture.  The first lecture was pretty low key.... just basic anatomical terms.  The second lecture was where the pace picked up.  We learned a lot of material in one short hour.  It was the most fascinating, engaging lecture I have ever attended.  Our professor is awesome.  Even so, everyone was in a bit of a daze at the end, and my brain was more than fried.  My plans for an easy, low key weekend are shot, and I will definitely be spending the weekend in library.

Here we go.....