UMKC 6-year BS/MD Program

Pre-Med & Medical School Multiple Degree Programs
4421

@AdVitam‌

Just an extension on @Roentgen‌ 's comment on UMKC internal medicine residents.

UMKC is not a desired internal medicine residency program. There are some students who decide to stay here because it is close to family but most of us want to get outta here because we have already been here for 6 years. Also a lot of us are academically advanced so we can actually get into upper level programs, and why would we decide to stay here if we can get into Baylor, UTSW, Emory, USCD, Indiana, U Minnesota (all upper tier IM matches this year).

Here is the thing about foreign graduates and UMKC:
Since UMKC is not in a desirable place (to some, I actually love KC), and their IM residency is not the best, a lot of people who want to come here are foreign graduates. Foreign graduates are at a disadvantage when they apply just because they are FOREIGN graduates. Top tier institutions don’t take them because they want US Seniors. Not saying that they don’t ever, but that’s usually the case.
But they are all smart as eff, and are actually already attending physicians in their own countries. But when they move to the US, you gotta start over again.
For a foreign graduate to get into internal medicine, they need an extremely high step 1 score. So the ones that actually end up at UMKC have above average board scores and are actually really good teachers and smart clinicians.

Side note: UMKC’s internal medicine residency is not terrible because of the doctors. The clinical education you will get here is comparable to many respected mid tier programs. It just does not have the funding and clinical variety that other residencies do. And because we are not a very high academic institution, there is not much research here, so it becomes hard for fellowship placement. Plus Truman Medical Center mainly serves drug seeking, homeless, or uninsured population, and that becomes exhausting to take care of. Residents to rotate at St. Lukes (and that’s a more private feel like hospital, but I have never rotated there so I cannot comment on their experience there)
But we still match people into cards, GI, nephro, and pulm/crit care every year. Again the IM residency becomes like the UMKC school of medicine. No one is gonna spoon feed resources, you just gotta figure it out yourself. That’s the best comparison I can give. And students who are from UMKC just don’t want to deal with that aspect all over again, so they decided to go elsewhere.

I would also say, please, please, please don’t go to a DO school. Wait for the traditional route.
When someone see’s DO on your application for residency, its like an automatic ding.
Plus what a lot of DO schools don’t tell you is that you have to set up your own rotations. That’s true for KCUMB. Since they don’t have a affiliate hospital, they have to set up rotations by themselves. For us, the school takes care of that. And that’s standard at ALL medical schools, not at all osteopathic schools.
DOs are some of the hardest working, smartest doctors and residents I’ve worked with, but they are at an extreme disadvantage for MD residency match. Seriously, I know UMKC takes a lot of hits on this thread, and rightfully so, but it is way better for your future career prospects than a DO school.
But just because you didn’t get into UMKC don’t jump off a cliff and join a DO program.
Take a chill pill, enjoy your summer before undergrad, start undergrad fresh, work hard and get As, get involved in ECs that are medically related and community service, get unique experiences, get some research if you can, do well on your MCAT and try again. If you don’t get it then and still wanna be a doctor, they try a DO school.

4422

@prospectivemed, if you check the website - http://med.umkc.edu/bamd/faqs/

“The incoming class will be 110 – 115 students, with 60-65 students admitted from the state of Missouri, 30-35 students admitted from the regional states (Arkansas, Kansas, Illinois, Nebraska or Oklahoma) and 10-15 students admitted from out-of-state.”

But as far as any answers as to how many OOS people decline the inital offer of acceptance will be pure conjecture on their part, if not outright guessing. Different years will have different levels of movement on the waitlist for a variety of reasons, not the least being cost, but other reasons: distance, reputation of the undergrad or medical school, etc.

I do know people who were OOS who declined the offer and either went to a higher ranked BS/MD or went to a traditional undergrad, so it’s definitely not automatic that people will accept. I think it’s more due to websites like these that allow students to much more easily compare BS/MD programs and see the positives/negatives of such a decision, vs. 10 years ago.

4423

It’s key to understand what @Blugrn6 mentioned. After 6 years, most students will want to get the **** out of Kansas City. Age 18 to Age 24 is a huge jump when we’re talking about people’s personal growth and their personal lives. That’s just the reality of being around the same classmates, the same students in other years, same clinical faculty, etc.

Especially if you want to go for a fellowship, you want to start anew, make new good impressions on faculty, get LORs for fellowship, publish in the subspecialty, etc. It’s hard to make new good impressions when everyone already knows you from Years 3-6. Some IM programs have really great opportunities and resources for publishing in research to help get into subspecialty fellowships. UMKC’s strength in research is pretty weak, overall in comparison to other places as @blugrn6 mentioned, and people want to experience different hospital systems and the way they do things: Barnes-Jewish with Wash U, Parkland with UT-Southwestern, Mayo, Brown, Indiana, Baylor, Emory, etc.

The people who tend to stay at UMKC at least for IM, usually tend to have some underlying reason – a lot of the times relationship based, but sometimes it’s because they are from KC itself if not Missouri, or that is just where they matched. There are some who clicked well with the faculty and don’t mind staying another 3 years (definitely not me, I was ready to go).

A lot of us (even people who live in Missouri) wanted to move to places that are warmer and don’t snow for long periods of time or is cold for a lot of the time. KC has such weird weather, in general. This year’s match list showed a lot of students for Pediatrics decided to stay at Children’s Mercy Hospital. Children’s Mercy is also a great hospital and since students only do 2 months there, there is a lot of that hospital most students have not explored so it’s much easier to still get a fresh start there since nearly all training and didactics are in that hospital, unlike UMKC IM residency where residents go to the theatres in the medical school for conferences.

4424

Congrats to all!! Just accepted my offer. So I’ve decided to do the liberal arts route. Can someone give me a schedule of how my day to day classes will look? Or send me a link on where to look? I’ve seen the major map but I’m looking for a concise day-to-day outlook. Can’t wait to meet all of you guys!

4425

@bkow711, your day-to-day schedule depends on the specific undergraduate courses you will be taking. You can see on the Pathway website, the different courses from your major map, which will have the timings and frequency the class meets per week.

Pathway: https://umkc.umsystem.edu/psp/prdpa/EMPLOYEE/HRMS/c/COMMUNITY_ACCESS.CLASS_SEARCH.GBL?AITS_HDR_CODE=2

4426

@blugrn6, @Roentgen, @UMKCRoosMD, I apologize if you may have already addressed this, as I’ve been avidly keeping up with reading this thread.

I also have heard from several different sources that UMKC medical students (on average) don’t do as well on their board exams in terms of actual scores, i.e. USMLE Step 1 exam, as those students from traditional medical schools, which is important to at least get your foot in the door for certain types of specialty residencies.
You mentioned a few reasons why this might be the case – the 6-12 month gap between finishing basic sciences and taking the exam, etc. I would counter that UMKC students in Year 4 get about a year to slowly prepare for and study independently for their USMLE Step 1 (even though focused studying where you are doing nothing else may only be for a few months - still longer than other med schools though), but even then, still don’t do as well in terms of scores. I disagree with @AdVitam (who ironically is going to the program), I don’t think students at UMKC’s med school that I met are dumber than students at other BS/MD programs, and were candidates who couldn’t get in anywhere else.

In 2014, the national average for USMLE Step 1 was 230 and the national average for USMLE Step 2 CK was 240. 1) Do you know what the average USMLE scores were for UMKC this past year or in years past? Are those numbers ever released to students or in newsletters?

I was looking back in this thread and saw this link for the “In the Know” newsletter: http://med.umkc.edu/docs/sa/announcements/2013/InTheKnow_07-22-13.pdf, where it was announced that there was a change in the passing score, and they said the average USMLE Step 2 CK score in that last year for UMKC was 229, but nationally, the average for that exam was 237 (2011-2012) or 238 (2012-2013).

Interestingly enough, when there was a change in the passing score for USMLE Step 1, 6 months later, http://med.umkc.edu/docs/sa/announcements/2014/InTheKnow_01-06-14.pdf, UMKC announced the change as well, but this time did not list their average USMLE Step 1 score, unlike what they had done for USMLE Step 2 CK. It just seems really shady, to only announce an average Step score for Step 2 CK, and not Step 1, just because you can’t brag about it - and the Step 2 CK score wasn’t even at the national average for that year.

2) When does the USMLE Step 1 basic science material officially start in the program? Is it with Biochemistry? Or is it earlier with undergraduate Cell Biology or Genetics? My understanding is that Anatomy 119 and Microbiology 121 in Year 1 are more undergraduate, easier versions of the more detailed medical school courses you take later. 3) Which of your basic science courses (or professors if you’re ok with revealing that) did you feel taught well and/or actually covered what you needed to know for USMLE Step 1? Which courses/professors did you know you would have to just learn the stuff for Step 1 on your own?

4) What tips or recommendations do you have for those of us entering the program who want to eventually do very well on the USMLE Step 1 exam but have to face the reality that in all likelihood that basic science courses at UMKC may not be that great when it comes to preparing us for USMLE Step 1? 5) Did you use review material along with your classes so it was easier when you studied again in Year 4? 6) Do many students end up doing some type of Kaplan prep program for USMLE Step 1? – I’ve talked with friends at traditional medical schools and they all said they didn’t have time alloted in their schedules to take these type of prep courses, which are usually taken more often by foreign medical graduates.

Sorry for all the embedded questions as I just don’t want to be caught off guard in terms of expectations and I want to still try my best to be successful in the circumstances that I am in. Thank you for taking time out of your schedule to answer my questions.

4427

@bladerz1‌

I’m sure it was addressed somewhere indirectly, but instead of making you sift through all that junk it will be quicker if I just respond:

Prep for step 1:
Yes, UMKC students do have more study time on average but because you are so far away from learning that material you simply cannot remember it that much. At your stage you will not understand just how much crap is on that test, its impossible to memorize it all.
And honestly, no one has the dedication to go through all of that material learned in basic science all over again for step 1. You have the time for it, but it is incredibly “low yield” (aka those details are not gonna be tested that much) to go over that much in detail again when you are studying for step 1. You use review books and get the “high” yield stuff that is very likely to show up.
Again, this is where other medical schools are at an advantage, they don’t have to go over all of that low yield stuff all over again, its kinda sort up there to help them make an educated guess. For us, that kinda sorta was a long time ago. For example, lets say you started HSF this year with all the muscles (insertion points, tendons, movement, etc), and that was in January 2015. When you take step it will be around May/June 2017. That’s a long time.

  1. There was a brief moment first year when the dean told us that our average step 1 for that class that year was 224. But you have to understand that most schools do not publish their step 1 score. Its not common to do that. Even top 25 schools hardly do. To give you a frame of reference, I will tell you that in 2010 when our dean told us this, the national average was 222. So UMKC is right around there. Since then, there has been no mention of that. Here is a more recent study about step 1 score that might help put things in perspective: https://anastomosed.■■■■■■■■■■■■■/2014/03/15/step-1-scores-at-top-schools-2012/

These are at the top med schools in the nation. Look at the number for the med school at the bottom, its 229, and the national average in 2012 was 227. So again, there is no real way of knowing how UMKC fares. I agree if you went to the first school mentioned, they had an average 243, that’s impressive. But again, you have to account for other factors (aka students who got into Harvard med or UCLA are probably a little bit smarter than your average medical student), so it is really the education that got them a higher average or their intellect. Likely a mix of both.

Yes UMKC does get a lot of crap for being at the bottom of the barrel but the education is not so bad that you will be automatically scoring below national average.

It is known fact, I have seen the records from previous years Step 1 scores, students at UMKC do score in the 270s, 260s (at least a couple per class), and there are numerous 240s and 250s.
You have to understand that the national average is just that, THE AVERAGE. Statistically speaking, most medical schools will fall somewhere in that range.

  1. Stuff that you need to know on Step 1 starts with HSF. Before that nothing you do really will help you, so until HSF you can probably chill by knowing that cramming and forgetting after is not going to hurt you.
  2. Best taught classes in terms of USMLE Step 1 prep based on when I took them: anatomy, physiology, microbiology, immunology, and pharmacology. With the exception of physiology and pharmacology, most of it (the well taught classes that I mentioned) is pretty low yield for the exam. Unfortunately our pathology course is really weak. They change instructors every year, and it is not the best organized. They are working on it. Students get by it though, because we just buy "Pathoma" a supplemental pathology course for Step 1 and fill in most of the gaps that way.
  3. Read the textbook and do the required reading, most students just use the lecture, which does not always have all of the information. The LCME regulates how many hours a medical school can give lectures, so there is only so much they can teach you. Get review books early for path and pharm, and do them and annotate notes into those review books while you are in that class (it seems like a simple task, but no one does it). Just do lots of practice questions: get all three questions banks: USMLERx, Kaplan, and USMLEWorld and do them all. (There are lots and lots of forums devoted to step 1 prep, don't worry about that right now).
  4. Yes you do you use review material for step 1, but that usually does not happen until the upper level courses: pathology and pharmacology. Before that you don't really need it.
  5. No one takes Kaplan courses, our education is not THAT bad that we need to supplement it. If you want to take one, it won't hurt you. But rarely does someone do that. We do have people who do them, but its not like they are adding record breaking to your education. Most students end up using Kaplan lecture videos to study, just because we are so far out that we need someone to remind us all of the stuff again.
4428

@bladerz1,

I’ll follow the same format as @blugrn6 did above to give you my take on your questions.

Prep for Step 1: It’s true, Year 4 you take 2 months Pharmacology, 1 month Behavioral Science, 2 months of Docent Rotation with your team, 1 month Family Medicine, and a campus semester. So assuming you took Pharm that summer (June-July), Behavioral in August, and you were to take the exam next June, you would get about 10 months total to study for boards at the end of August.

In theory, for boards prep you’re supposed to review the basic science you’ve learned, but in actuality when I prepped for it, there were many times I was covering things that were never to be found in class notes, not even talked about in class, etc. It’s kind of the downfall of having a letter graded system here (there are quite a few medical schools that are pass/fail in the first 2 years) to where you study what is going to be on the teacher’s test, rather than to learn something you should know even if it won’t be on the course test, but more for boards. At the time though, you have to be aware of your science GPA so you will naturally study in order to keep up your grades to promote. I’ve heard rumors in the past, that the reason UMKC gives students so long is because they know that there is a lot of gaps in student’s knowledge due to quality of courses and because things go at such a fast speed in the program.

1) I have no idea what the average USMLE scores were for UMKC this past year or in years past. It would be pretty dated and useless for you to know stats from my time. As far as I know, UMKC has never outright released their USMLE Step 1 score averages in print, even in newsletters, but most U.S. allopathic medical schools don’t release their USMLE Step 1 scores either. The one exception that I’ve seen on the Internet is the University of Virginia that has released their USMLE Step 1 averages every year since 1999: https://www.med-ed.virginia.edu/handbook/academics/licensure.cfm, which I’m guessing is where you got the national averages on each Step.

If it is one of the things that is factoring into your decision to accept or not, it doesn’t hurt at all at this point to ask them what have been the USMLE Step 1 scores in the past several years. Hopefully they’ll be honest and tell you, but they also may not tell you. Schools can tend to be pretty hedgy about telling applicants about their average scores, unless they’ve done really well.

2) Officially, basic sciences starts with Biochemistry. The course category “BMS” stands for “Basic Medical Sciences”. I would say though that Cell Biology can be helpful to learn and master as a lot of courses build on it – Biochemistry, Pharmacology, Physiology, etc. I would say much less for Genetics.

3) The ones that I thought were well taught:

Pharmacology - mainly because it is very organized, you get all the handouts at once at the beginning of the course, but not great that it was only 2 months to learn everything so there were some drug classes that couldn’t be covered, I also thought it relied quite heavily on knowing drugs already due to self-paced Pharm and from clinic (whether it actually happened or not) rather than standing on its own in terms of introducing you to the material. Honestly, I think because we were so used to classes not being taught well and unorganized, Pharm just stood out as at least finally just being organized, even though some of the PharmDs aren’t good at teaching to help you understand.

Med Microbiology - the course director is tough, but is an effective teacher and has written boards questions in the past. An excellent course and one of the subjects I had to review the least because it was taught so well.

The ones that I thought were weak:

Biochemistry - the tenured course director is finally retired, but the other professor is still there who isn’t that great. I don’t know anything about the new course director that was hired. Maybe @blugrn6 may know here.

Gross Anatomy in HSF - one of the professors is quite confusing in lectures for students. People either really liked both professors or really hated them, quite honestly, in terms of being effective teachers. I think personally for me, not dissecting made it harder to learn.

Physiology in HSF - the person who taught this course actually taught Histology as well, but Physiology was not his area of expertise. I believe they have an actual PhD physiologist teaching the course now, so I am sure it has improved immensely.

Pathology - has always been poorly taught. It’s the one course not taught by the Basic Medical Science Department at UMKC so it’s not under their power to change. It’s taught by the UMKC Pathology department, with instructors changing every year, not very organized, etc. This has been a problem for actually quite a while now - which sucks since it’s nearly 20 credit hours in terms of your GPA. People usually use other supplementary resources to learn the material as @blugrn6 mentioned, as there is also an NBME standardized exam in Pathology you take at the end.

4) I would keep up with your grades: go to lecture (or at least listen or watch lectures if your class records them), take notes, review and study them consistently. Don’t procrastinate too much and fall behind. No point in thinking about boards foremost, if you’re not able to keep up your science GPA to promote in the first place. Some courses will be much easier to be able to use review books in: i.e. Biochem, Pathology, than others i.e. Human Structure Function, when things are just going too fast and you have an exam every 2 weeks.

5) I used review books along with courses, but usually because it explained things so much better than the resources you had at your disposal: i.e. lecture, textbooks, lecture handouts/powerpoint presentations, etc. In certain courses, you’ll get to a point where it is literally too much information to go through several times like you study in undergrad. That being said, I did think it helped later on when it came to recalling because I was at least semi-familiar with it. If I had to do it again, I probably would have used the same review books during courses, and then again during Year 4.

6) Maybe things have changed somewhat from my class to @blugrn6’s class, but in my class, while not everyone, I would say quite a large number of people did participate and paid for some type of commercial prep course: Kaplan, DIT, Falcon (or whatever it is called now). I think deep down all of us knew that overall our basic science education wasn’t that great, so we knew we would have to turn to other sources especially if we wanted to do very well. I don’t think it’s a magic bullet to a fantastic score (there were some people at the top of our class who did very well on boards without a laid out course also), but I think it gave us a lot of confidence that we weren’t getting from courses and their types of test questions in terms of mimicking the boards.

The people who did Kaplan either did Kaplan CenterPrep (you go through videos independently), Intense Prep (live lectures for 3 weeks), LivePrep (live lectures for 7 weeks. Some people did DIT (Doctors In Training), etc. Very few people that I know just did question banks alone. I also did the LivePrep course like I think @UMKCRoosMD did and I wouldn’t change a thing: the books were great, the instructors were fantastic. It was a pain to travel somewhere else, but in the end it was worth it for me. It can be expensive for some people though.

4429

Thanks you guys!! That was really helpful.

@blugrn6, how successful are people who leave the 6 year medical program when it comes to going the traditional route to med school? Did they stay at UMKC to get their Bachelor degree to apply the traditional route? Or does it depend on when they leave the program?

If they went the normal route, what was it about the BA/MD program that caused them to leave?

4430

No offense, to all other new viewers of this thread: the most relevant parts of this year’s discussion start around page 275/276, so if you’re looking around and have a question, you’ll a get a TON of info from just reading through these past twenty pages, or if you have time :slight_smile: the entire nearly three hundred.

I’m not calling any out, but just for the sake of consistency and not having a five hundred page thread before next year, maybe we should start a new one, it just helps if already answered questions don’t come up again. :slight_smile: Thanks.

4431

@AdVitam I’m confused on why you would get on CC to insult your future classmates but…

4432

@bladerz1‌

Most, actually, all from my class left before Year 2 was done.
A lot of people leave when they started to have academic problems and or already extended and then were still having struggles.
The rest left because parents forced them to come here and two years later they were like: enough is enough, they stand up for themselves, tell their parents they are done and move on with what they actually wanted to do all along OR they realized medicine is not for them once they get in.

I don’t really know what they are up to right now. You hear that they are taking classes at UMKC and then applying again but you mostly lose touch with those people (it’s sad I know). Don’t really know what their situation was, how much they had problems with getting their credit accepted at other schools etc.

Of all the ones that we hear want to pursue the traditional route, most I’ve seen stay at UMKC and finish undergrad. Of all the ones that leave the program, and don’t stay at UMKC, I have no idea what they are doing. From the students that left the program, I don’t know of any that were either regional or out of state. They were all in state.

I will say one thing: and I’ve said this multiple times already but can’t stress it enough: if you think that leaving the program or pursuing the traditional route is a possibility in your life think TWICE before you come here. There is no room to leave the program and have a “normal” traditional route experience again. This will come as no surprise to you, but UMKC is not the best undergraduate school. And leaving here and applying to well respected school then sparks the question: why did you leave? That’s always more awkward to explain, you will constantly doubt if you left the program for the right reasons (even if you did leave for the right reasons), and will end up losing more time in the end.

If you are positive you want to do medicine, there is no doubt in your mind then you will be fine. Sure we all have our moments of frustration but as soon as we get into patient rooms we all are reminded that it worth all the headaches that we have to go through at UMKC and with medicine in general.

There is nothing wrong with saying that you need more time to figure it out. (This is not geared towards you but all the students making a decision in general). Even if you accepted, its still not too late to withdraw. But honestly, if you are either regional or OOS student and made the decision to come here than i’m sure you will be just fine. Not saying that regional students will not be successful here, I purely mean to say that financially speaking (with all the scholarships that a lot of those students get), leaving is an easier decision for them to make than it is for regional or OOS students.

Again remember, BA/MD programs are not THE route to medicine, they are the ALTERNATE route, if that. More than 90% of doctors in this country get their medical degree the traditional way. BA/MD is not the NORM, its the EXCEPTION to the rule.

The struggles that you will face getting into medical school the traditional way is nothing compared to the hurdles you will have to face later on: USMLE Step 1, Medical school clerkships, Residency applications, Residency, Fellowships, Specialty board exams, and License renewal exams, etc. Not to mention all the traditional things people do in life in general.

4433

@PinkPrincess2014,

I missed this question, but I think it’s really important to address, since there are a lot of UMKC BA/MD students who are from outside the state of Missouri. I think many factors contribute to the adjustment period: the student, their experiences, which state they are coming from, being able to make friends, how homesick they tend to get at baseline, their overall expectations, weather, etc.

I do think that is easier somewhat if you’re coming from a closeby state like Oklahoma or Illinois, where a lot of times the driving distance from KC to their home city, is equivalent to the drive from Kansas City to St. Louis. Regardless of whether you’re in-state, regional, out-of-state, I think there will definitely be many times during the course of 6 years, to where you will want to go back home to visit family. Even people who come from St. Louis get very tired of Kansas City and visit home. I don’t know one person who stayed in KC all the time, even during breaks, all 6 years unless they were from KC, but even then, they may have traveled to other places during holiday breaks.

Kansas City just isn’t like other popular major cities in terms of weather, the activities and events that are available for young college students, etc. Kansas City isn’t New York City, Los Angeles, Chicago, Houston, Philadelphia, Phoenix, etc. → http://blog.upack.com/posts/10-largest-us-cities-by-population

I can’t even remember there being any freeways (highways they do have) as the population isn’t large enough to merit needing a lot of freeways. Kansas City also tends to have very weird overall weather patterns. Some years it’s cold and snows for months on end, even going into February/March, other times the snow stops earlier. I agree with @blugrn6, the weather changes can be quite ridiculous even within a span of a few days, which was quite funny to see some of the people from California react to coming from the sunny weather they were used to. I do think that the weather can sometimes contribute to people’s overall moods and/or not wanting to come to/frequently skipping class, so definitely resist that temptation. You’ll be entering rotations some of which you have to get up at 4:30 am to get to the hospital at 5 which may be scheduled during the snowy winter. I do think also that when you’re tired and exhausted in medical school – the “bipolar” KC weather as @blugrn6 calls it, doesn’t help when you just want to curl up in bed and stay warm.

Being around the same classmates 24/7 will get tiresome or exhausting, you’ll hear the same perennial complaints, have many of the same stressors, the rumor/gossip mill can run into overdrive (although some people enjoy this), exhausting rotation clerkships, etc. - to where you just need some nice time to recharge whether it’s just over a weekend, over a long holiday, etc. Also when there are times that students are freaking out - i.e. around boards time, you will want to isolate yourself from these freakouts (trust me).

Imagine the stresses of moving to another place for undergrad when, thus far, you’ve lived under your parents’ roof your entire life. Then on top of that, imagine that not only are you moving away to a completely different place for college, but also in a completely different state that you’ve never visited. Then on top of that, imagine you’re entering an accelerated combined BA/MD program which runs year round, in which you won’t exactly have your typical undergraduate experience at a flagship university. That’s quite a huge adjustment when you think about it, at such a very young age.

The truth is that when you move to Kansas City for the 6 year program, you have to move there with the mindset that you’re moving there for a new permanent job opportunity. It’s YOUR city, now for the next 6 years. It’s not a temporary situation like every other college student who can say they only go to a particular city for school. Realize those students get their summers off. Even premeds who will be doing other activities: shadowing, being a healthcare scribe, doing healthcare ECs, get their summers off, and can recharge since they aren’t taking actual classes if they follow their degree plans.

I do think a lot of regional/OOS students can come in with the attitude of:

a) “I’m only here for 6 years, so I’ll only just study hard and concentrate on my studies, and then go where I want to for residency”

b) “I’m only here for 6 years, so I’ll just go home/fly home a lot during that time do it doesn’t feel like I’m living in KC”

c) “I’m regional/out-of-state, so since this is the only combined program to accept me, at least I don’t have to take the MCAT and I’m done in 6 years”

I think those mindsets can be very counterproductive, if not destructive in this program.

I think a lot of times regional/OOS students “settle” in terms of rationalizing why they are here in the first place. The biggest by far is not taking the MCAT and the 6 year timeline. They may not like Kansas City, or if they did like it initially, they explore things pretty quickly and get very bored of it. Regional and OOS students can also be scared (and dare I say, paranoid) about the med school application process (seeing friends go thru it who may not have been successful, etc.), that they figure being in UMKC’s BA/MD program is better than nothing at all - which isn’t really the case. The psychological fears allayed of the premed application process is quickly replaced by something else as the program assumes that you, yourself, only want to be a physician and no other profession, and won’t back out later.

I do think family – whether that’s wanting to make their parents proud or whether parents directly forced to continue in their footsteps, can play a strong role, as do tuition money invested, with regional/OOS students sticking with the program at higher rates than in-state students. They have a lot more to lose in terms of leaving the program later, than someone who is in-state. It is not a surprise that regional and OOS students coming in especially now, tend to be very wealthy. You kind of have to be to shell out that much in tuition. And I think with that amount of tuition, the expectations that students have about the education at UMKC’s medical school often are higher than what the school can reasonably provide.

Regional/OOS students have certain specific stressors, that many in-state students don’t have, so it’s something to very much take into your consideration.

4434

@ang, part of the problem I think is that if we were to start a new thread, people would forget to look at the original thread which has a lot of good information and different viewpoints. Honestly, I do think it’s worth reading the entire thread before deciding or while applying, considering how much money students will be forking over to attend.

There is actually a magnifying glass at the bottom of the thread right next to the page numbers, so if applicants want to search certain terms in this UMKC thread like “USMLE Step 1”, “rotations”, or “tuition”, they can do so to find information on that topic.

4435

@Blugrn6, you had said about the UMKC Career Counseling Office: http://med.umkc.edu/sa/residency_match/, there is a career advising elective which you can do to narrow down the specialties you are interested in.

  1. In that elective, can you shadow specialists at other institutions like at KU or outside of Kansas City, who have residencies in those fields, especially if that specialty isn’t offered at UMKC, or is it only within the UMKC hospitals?

  2. Also you said, “In terms of finding mentors and resources in the competitive specialties they might guide you in the right direction but you’re pretty much on your own…But most students who do intense specialties pretty much figure it out on their own so you often get the advice ‘I would ask the students who matched this year to see what they did’ etc.” Is that the only real guiding they do? For example, if I decided I wanted to go into ENT, and if no one matched into ENT that year, I pretty much have to figure things out on my own, or just hope there will be a student who matched that year into ENT that I can ask? I guess I’m looking for a realistic plan at UMKC on how and whom to approach to be led in the right direction to faculty who have an influence in getting that specific specialty or to participate in research in that specialty. Not to be unthankful, but with the amount of tuition students pay, I would have thought there would be something better at UMKC in terms of overall specialty guidance for those who want to go for residencies not in primary care.

  3. My other question is whether it is common for UMKC medical students to do reseach at the Stowers Institute for Medical Research in Kansas City near the undergrad UMKC campus: http://www.stowers.org/. Are there any students in your class who participated in some type of research at UMKC or nearby at KU from Year 1 and if so what type of research?

4436

I have some questions about the actual education at the six year program as well as about studying:

  1. How many hours, on average, do most students study each night? Surely each student studies differently, but do most generally study for many hours every single day of the week?

  2. I’m a little confused about the clinical exposure aspect of the program. What is the difference between docent rotations and clerkships, and what are the expectations (what students are expected to do) for each?

  3. What would you say is your retention rate of the information you learn in medical school? To what extent are we expected to recall the information that we learn?

  4. Some med students talk about struggling with the “overload” of information they are expected to memorize in med school. When would you say the six year program reaches the level of “overload”? How did you deal with this?

  5. What are some helpful pieces of advice for studying and remembering all the information we learn?

Thanks in advance, I really appreciate it.

4437

@bladerz1

  1. So I haven’t personally done the elective but I have known students who have gone over to KU to shadow specialities that are not at Umkc. So I think as long as the hospitals are in KC they can set up the rotation for you. So you cannot go to Barnes Jewish at STL for it but KU is definitely on their list of hospitals they use to set up that rotation for you.
  1. Yea if no one matched in ENT in the class above you, you will have no student resources. But I am pretty sure you can contact enough doctors are KU or children's mercy that would be more than willing to help you. But again it's up to you to make those contacts and be persistent until you find a resource willing to help you. The school of medicine can give you contact that might be helpful to contact but no one is going to guarantee that mentorship. The only thing that I can think of that would help is that we have a yearly career fair where all the docs from all the specialities are invited for like a speed dating sort of a situation. You can get contact info for a lot of docs that way that probably mentor students. It also depends on the speciality. ENT people are generally very nice but other specialities are not so much. But in that case you can email a former Umkc grad who is maybe two years out to help you and most of us are pretty receptive to emails asking for help because we know exactly where you are coming from.
  2. Yes I do know students who go to stowers and KU. Don't know how they make the contacts to do that. KU is pretty hard to get for research unless your persistent because they give first preference to their own students. But you can get in with a little perseverance.
4438

@Butterfly16, to give my persepective:

  1. You’re right - different people study differently, and are able to process and retain information differently. So the amount of hours that one needs to study for a particular grade, will also vary. I do think as a rule, most students would say the amount of studying hours for an undergrad class would be a lot less than studying for a medical school class. I don’t believe it’s a requirement to study every single day all 7 days studying all the time. If you are, then usually it’s an efficiency issue.

  2. Docent Rotation is another word for the Internal Medicine clerkship. Different from other medical schools, students at UMKC do it once in Year 4, once in Year 5, and once in Year 6. It’s required to do it 3 times in those years. I think clerkships can vary a lot by responsibility but it’s obtaining a history and doing a physical exam, following patients, going to rounds, discussing your patients, writing notes, getting certain clinical tasks for the day completed, being “pimped” (meaning asked questions on the spot) by residents/attendings as to why you feel a patient should be managed in a certain way, etc. At the end, you receive a grade of Honors/High Pass/Satisfactory Pass/Marginal Pass/Fail, which is usually a combination of subjective clinical evaluations and your NBME exam score, and maybe a presentation on a topic if it’s part of the clerkship.

  3. I have no idea what the retention rate is - we all retain differently. You’ll realize that it is truly impossible to retain EVERYTHING you learn in medical school much less in medicine. Your study methods will change in medical school compared to undergraduate coursework, just purely due to the volume. You won’t be expected to recall everything, but you’ll obviously have to retain more pertinent information for the wards, or at least be able to quickly look certain things up (UpToDate) when you are “pimped” about the hospital course, treatment, and management of your patient.

  4. I think in terms of being in medical school, UMKC is no different in terms of overload of information. A lot of times medical school has the cliche of “drinking water from a fire hydrant” in terms of information. That being said I think the term “overload” has different meanings for different people in terms of how much information is too much. I think the time that point is reached is different for different people and can also vary by course. For example, for me, I thought Human Structure Function was quite an overload, but the semester of Micro/Neurosciences was not.

  5. I think people have different methods: flashcards, making charts, writing things out and rewriting, highlighting, etc. I think the key no matter what your style is to keep the information active. The one thing I would work on perfecting is being able to increase your reading speed, as exams in medical school can cover a lot of information per test, so being able to study and read material efficiently is very key.

4439

@Butterfly16

  1. As you said this is an extremely individual question. I can't speak for my class I can only answer what I do. I am from the study hard party hard philosophy. I don't study until I absolutely need to. I can sit down and get stuff done for 12 hours a day but then on most days you will find me watching tv and chilling the eff out after I come home. Undergrad exams: I used to study 1-2 days before Med school tests: I used to study 4-5 days before Shelf exams: I study 2-3 weeks before Usmle step 1: studied for 1.5 months total But i have to say when I go to lecture I pay attention and try to understand as much as I can. And when I study I usually study It well once and then I'm done. I have friends who study the day before and are brilliant enough to pass (not saying they ace the exam) but they pass it. I have friends who study every single day and ace every exam. It just depends.
  2. Year 1-2 docent: pure shadowing experience where all you will be asked to do is to talk to the patients and get story of their medical problem or their life in general Year 3-6 clinic: you will see general internal medicine patients in clinic, go see them, get a history and physical exam, present the patient to you docent, go see the patient with your docent together, come up with a plan and then repeat weekly for 4 years. We don't just throw you in, you will gradually learn how to do each part and then after 5 months you should be able to do it on your own. I have post earlier that goes over what the goal for each clinic year is in detail Year 4-6 docent rotation: these are you 6 months of general internal medicine. You come in see your assigned oatients in the morning that are admitted into the hospital, you round with your whole team and you will present you patients to the attending, done by noon ish, go get lunch, and then after that admit patients in the afternoon, leave at 4 pm.

Clerkships: surgery, obgyn, peds, psych, ER, ICU, etc.
Surgery - come in and see post op patients in the hospital in the morning, round, see surgeries during the day, and if not in surgery then go see patients in clinic (just like you medicine clinic but these are surgery problems - gallbladder removal consult, cyst removal consult, etc), check on your patients in the evening, go to checkout rounds at 5:30 pm ish, give the residents any updates and go home.
Obgyn - see patients in different clinics (obstetrics clinic, GYN clinic, oncology clinic, high risk clinic, etc), scrub into obgyn surgeries, labor and delivery (deliver babies, triage patients, etc).
Peds - one month of inpatient (basically internal medicine for little people), two weeks nursery, two weeks PEDS clinic.
Psych - glorified shadow month, follow an attending for a month where you see crazy psych patients detained in the behavioral hospital.

I don’t think I need to go into the details on the expectations and day to day activities it’s into something that is necessary at this time.

I cannot answer 3,4, and 5 any better than @Roentgen did.

4440

@Blugrn6,

  1. Which specialties, in your opinion, aren't so nice when it comes to mentoring UMKC med students to help build up their application for the match? Is this at KU/Children's Mercy or at UMKC?
  2. Did the students, that you know, who did research at Stowers and/or KU start in Year 1 or later?
  3. Why is it difficult for UMKC students to get research done with faculty at KU? Is it really because UMKC students are considered visiting students, even though in terms of distance, UMKC and KU are actually very close together?