<p>IT's a long way off, but I was thinking of putting a little time each day into pre-med since I Have to learn about every part of the body before I do anything else with medicine. How could I start preparing? I'm sure the books are thousands of pages long, so if you guys could go back in time, would you choose to do like 1-2 pages a day everyday to prepare when you first started college, or it doesn't matter too much?</p>
<p>I hope you're not talking about reading the actual med school material, because that would be a waste of your time. You should focus on you prereqs and doing well in your major, and thats about it at this point. Take this step by step</p>
<p>Why on earth would anyone do this?!</p>
<p>Don't waste your time doing something like this! Enjoy your free time. You'll learn things when you encounter them in class.</p>
<p>I think you win most neurotic pre-med post on CC. Congratulations.</p>
<p>I would have choosen to enjoy something other than practicing medicine for what might have been my last chance!....oh wait....that's what I did!</p>
<p>pick up student gray's anatomy or clinically oriented anatomy and start with the upper limb.</p>
<p>I'm not talking about hours each day, I had a page a day in mind when I posted this. MAybe less. I mean I probably won't do it, but if you guys think this could be really beneficial, then why not, but just forget it.</p>
<p>It will not be beneficial. You will learn "every part of the body" while in medical school - that's the point.</p>
<p>You would be better benefited if you devoted that time to your premed courses (or if you used that time to pick up an extra-curricular activity and become involved in it).</p>
<p>I'm not in med school, but I doubt you'd even understand it w/o your prereqs anyway</p>
<p>^^^^^^
Not true.</p>
<p>The actual science (anatomy, physiology, path, etc) is not that difficult. There are a few underlying principles from organic and cell bio that you may miss initially, but you'd figure them out. The difficulty of medical school lies in the amount of material and the level of detail required to pass exams.</p>
<p>
[quote]
^^^^^^
Not true.</p>
<p>The actual science (anatomy, physiology, path, etc) is not that difficult. There are a few underlying principles from organic and cell bio that you may miss initially, but you'd figure them out. The difficulty of medical school lies in the amount of material and the level of detail required to pass exams.
[/quote]
So you basically have to do much more memorizations than understanding, right? It sounds like hell because I really hate straight memorization.</p>
<p>So someone in high school would understand your med books? interesting</p>
<p>You can't really pigeonhole med school material into either "understanding" or "memorizing." You have to be able to do both. But, for the students who are capable of getting into med school, their struggles have more to do with memorizing the volume of the material than understanding it. I just had my first big test (4 hours) covering 1300 powerpoint slides' worth of material and it only covered 4 weeks worth of lectures. I had been exposed to a lot of it before in undergrad but there was so much material that, even when you subtract what I already knew, there was still enough left over to make me slightly stressed studying for the test.</p>
<p>
[quote]
So you basically have to do much more memorizations than understanding, right?
[/quote]
In my experience, this is absolutely true.</p>
<p>Regardless of the great advice everyone is giving you on this thread, I highly doubt you will follow it.</p>
<p>Read the following medical textbooks:
Robbins & Cotran Pathologic Basis of Disease
Amazon.com:</a> Robbins & Cotran Pathologic Basis of Disease, Seventh Edition: Vinay Kumar, Nelso Fausto, Abul Abbas: Books</p>
<p>Clinically Oriented Anatomy
Amazon.com:</a> Clinically Oriented Anatomy (5th Edition): Keith L Moore, Arthur F Dalley: Books</p>
<p>Once you see the sticker price (or if you check it out from a medical/college library) and see that most high school/college kids don't do this, go volunteer in an ER department at a hospital. You're likely to learn WAY more doing hands on stuff about the body that you will ever learn in a textbook at this age.</p>
<p>If you are really really serious, join an EMT class and work as an ER tech. The first day of medical school will be breeze.</p>
<p>
[quote]
So someone in high school would understand your med books? interesting
[/quote]
</p>
<p>In isolation, absolutely. I definitely could teach a high schooler anatomy or the basics of heart disease (I'm not sure the same could be said for some of my professors though!). But it would have to be at a much slower pace than what speed I was required to operate at. There's a post somewhere on here talking about the increasing efficiency that occurs from year to year as a student, which fits what I'm discussing. I don't really feel like doing a search for it though...</p>
<p>NCG - just "slightly" stressed?</p>
<p>
[quote]
NCG - just "slightly" stressed?
[/quote]
</p>
<p>The first test only covered the "fundamentals" of biology (biochem, genetics, and mol. bio). I majored in molecular/cell bio in college so I've taken courses in all of those areas. Plus, for the first time in my life, I actually stayed on task instead of trying to cram so I was much less stressed for this test than the tests I had in college.</p>
<p>The next test will have anatomy and histology. A 3 hour dandy, 1 hour lunch, followed by 4 hour practical. ~I can't wait.~</p>
<p>
[quote]
Read the following medical textbooks:
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Does anyone actually read Rubin or Robbins? As in start from chapter 1 and go until the end? I use Rubin as a reference - if I need to look at some pictures of osteomyelitis, I'll go look it up. I won't sit down and read the whole darn chapter about bone.</p>
<p>Holy crap NCG, a 4 hour histo practical? Thats absolutely brutal. I just had my first histo test/practical last week and the practical section was only an hour. Good luck on that one.</p>
<p>And to shades, I don't really touch any of my books except for Langman's (embryology), which I do read cover to cover. My school goes a little overboard on embryo. Everything else basically comes straight from the lecture slides.</p>