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Higher education

Talk to other parents whose children are preparing for university on our Higher Education forum.

Medicine 2020

990 replies

EightToSixer · 30/09/2018 20:53

Ok, so I know it's super early, but I've been hovering at the medicine 18 and 19 threads. DD is keen to apply for medicine in 2020. Is anyone else in the same boat?
I thought it would be useful to share info and stories, it's all a very steep learning curve because despite me now having a PhD and working in a RG university I was late to learning and not a patch on my DD who is very driven and organised.
Hopefully people will find this group and we can share the rollercoaster of the next two years.

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Needmoresleep · 03/10/2018 11:05

Grey's Anatomy is OK. DD decided she wanted to be a medic after watching House.

I woud really recommend some experience of the grottier side of medicine. DD worked in a care home: "waitressing", ie helping people with their food; kitchen porter and cleaning. The manager suggested that it would provide her with an essential insight into whether she was cut out for medicine. Some people are comfortable about working with the elderly, others not.

DD had a gap year, including chalet hosting for a family ski company. Again a real insight into the family dynamic. I think that in the light of her experiences so far she would be happy working in a specialisation with a lot of elderly patients, but might want to avoid paediatrics.

Her gap year helped. Her course (Bristol) has a real vocational feel, and medics are different from other students. For example they only started their first year exams after others had finished theirs, and it was back early to do a three week placement before the start of term. Post gap year, this suits her. She likes the mix of practical and academic. Sadly one of the patients she had got to know, died during one of her shifts. Equally one of the junior doctors took the time to introduce her to a patient with something very rare, which she might never see again in her career.

Bristol offer the option of intercalation, and as well some interesting options within the University, allow students to spend a year elsewhere. (This is not true everywhere.) My understanding is that, as well as providing background for a specialisation, quite a lot of students like to break up their training with a year as a proper student.

daisyway · 03/10/2018 18:13

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

oneteen · 03/10/2018 18:25

whoops posted using my iPad and didn't even realize I had an old user profile

Thanks for the info needmoresleep.

I'm not too bothered about DD's work/volunteer experience - I think she has covered a lot of insightful experiences (projects to do with the homeless (sleeping rough for a night)/SANDS and a part-time paid job). She's going to spend some time at a friends GP practice at Christmas - mainly admin based but at least this will give her a different take on the workings of the NHS.

She has real grumps last night having spent 2.5 hours on Physics homework only to find out today that she didn't have to do all of it - most girls had only completed 4 out of 9 questions - DD did all 9!

UKCAT states out on the 5th which should be interesting.

MarchingFrogs · 04/10/2018 01:30

Grey's Anatomy is OK. DD decided she wanted to be a medic after watching House.

She might be a little disappointed to find that British (at least NHS) medical practice tends to be rather more, 'let's consider the most common cause of the presenting symptoms first and less, 'let's conduct every expensive and invasive investigation in the pursuit of the most obscure cause possible before we do anything else's!

Going back a few years now, as a former A&E sister, the medical TV I found to be most realistic was Cardiac Arrest.

mumsneedwine · 04/10/2018 17:00

Can I join in ? Been on 18 thread as my DD has just started at Nottingham for medicine. So any questions I might be able to help - it's definitely a hurdle race ! And I'm now back on the hamster wheel for DD2 for vet med. No UKCAT thankfully but loads of work experience - don't think she's got a week of holiday left for year 12.

oneteen · 05/10/2018 07:45

Hello mumsneedwine...definitely agree its a hurdle race! One of the girls in DD's cohort is looking to do vet med. How much work experience do they expect?

This may be of interest to some DC's www.ucl.ac.uk/target-medicine/mentoring-scheme

3catsandadog · 05/10/2018 10:58

For those doing Medicine Medify for UKCAT and BMAT Ninja are really good online resources

mumsneedwine · 05/10/2018 14:23

Hi oneteen. They want a lot of work experience (although less than a few years ago when Liverpool required a minimum of 16 weeks). Now the most I've seen is 3 weeks vet and 3 weeks animal husbandry. Mine has so far managed a week with an equine vet, 2 weeks at small animal practices, 8 days at London zoo and 8 years at stables. She has another week at cattle vet planned but still needs some more animal care !! It bonkers as we don't know any animal people (except for horses as they've been lucky and looked after other peoples for years). She's had to work her butt off to get this sorted and requires me to drive her to some far flung places. But she's determined !

mumsneedwine · 05/10/2018 14:26

And UKCAT results today. They've gone down a lot but more people sat it - and I have heard that the VR was horrible this year. Much less SJT 1s too.

oneteen · 05/10/2018 15:49

Interesting UKCAT scores looks like the QR was much harder given the lower score.

Wow, that is a lot of work experience mumsneedwine!

3catsandadog · 10/10/2018 08:10

.

oneteen · 10/10/2018 18:39

Its a quiet thread ...although I think reading the 2018/2019 threads seems to answer a lot of my questions and give lots of information.

Its difficult to comprehend that this time next year our DC's will have applied for Uni or very close to having finished their applications. I will need to nudge DD quite a lot because she is very much a last minute person (I'll do it tomorrow).

MedSchoolRat · 11/10/2018 22:21

DD signed up to attend this talk in London, 5 November. I am v. cynical that it's a waste of time (will be 5 hrs travel for her). But I suppose she'll hear some things she has been slow to absorb (along with some BS). Anyone else attending?

Medicine 2020
oneteen · 11/10/2018 22:34

Quite a few of these events are on school nights- DD would not be able to make it given it would be the first day back to school after HT (DD's school has two weeks off so I would not want her to miss a day).

She's doing a medicine event at Cambridge in November - only because we live 35 minutes away....not that we are considering Cambridge.

The Warwick Uni Lab days are really good if they are running again next summer.

BenjaminTheDonkey · 11/10/2018 23:00

Where are you @MedSchoolRat? The Medic Portal is running the same event in Birmingham on 21 Nov. Be aware that the reason it's free is that the University of Nicosia will be doing a sales pitch. It's very important for anyone considering studying medicine abroad to get advice from someone who doesn't have a financial interest. TMP runs similar events around the country throughout the year. Most of them aren't sponsored (or at least they weren't up until last year: my knowledge might be out of date), so you pay a fairly modest amount but all the presentations are impartial.

EightToSixer · 20/10/2018 15:10

I've neglected this thread lately as work has been busy and DD has been ill. We also missed out on some open days so will be very busy in the Spring when they start again. Have any of you been to any this month?

@oneteen - I have signed DD up to the debate chamber weekend in February, a Christmas present from my mum, we will be starting nearby. Thanks for telling me about it, it looks great.

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oneteen · 20/10/2018 15:28

DD has not been to any more open days. We have registered to do the medicine masterclass at Cambridge in November- oddly enough DD's school are running two day trips in that week too - one to London - Chemistry and one to Cambridge Physics.

Half term here - DD has two weeks off - no homework just revision but all the tests were done last week so its nice that she can chill. A levels going really well apart from odd blip - Chemistry practical was a nightmare - but in all the theory work she achieved a grade A.

EightToSixer · 20/10/2018 16:36

Excellent marks @Oneteen. We have another whole week in school until half term starts, we seek to have it much later than most in Wales.

DD doing well so far in marks she gets back, seems to have finally got a bit of confidence in her abilities at last.

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oneteen · 20/10/2018 18:13

It is all about confidence - Chemistry is potentially DD's weakest subject but she has two extremely good teachers so this is really helping - they are quite patient and very good in praising work which is really helping DD.

DD just got a part time job has an ELF over the Xmas period which I think she will love ...not sure it will help with medicine application!

BenjaminTheDonkey · 20/10/2018 18:36

DD just got a part time job has an ELF over the Xmas period which I think she will love ...not sure it will help with medicine application!

It will if Santa frightens some of the children and your daughter has to comfort them and calm their parents down.

MedSchoolRat · 21/10/2018 06:49

I conclude DD isn't serious about medicine. Which is fine but means I'll leave thread, need to put her path out of my mind.

Some snippets I learnt recently, might help others:

MedicPortal has a 'help you choose' tool for admiss reqs, easy to use, but often wrong. Assume the info always needs to be verified on actual Medschool website. MSC is more reliable.

Google your nearest med school & "widening participation" to see what their outreach programme is called, eligibility rules, how to apply. Typically for yr12s in local schools, esp. with parents who didn't themselves go to Uni. Free residential programmes, mentors, taster days, etc.

Work experience... well! This is insider info. Recent (many Uni) meeting of admiss leads got heated with traditionalists arguing that only shadowing consultants was good enough WE, others saying that all kinds of experiences, even customer service, could be relevant (and fit with widening partic goal). Traditionalists were from RG Unis. No surprise there I guess.

Also heard a story about Anglia Ruskin being hardass and demanding.

EightToSixer · 21/10/2018 18:16

@medschoolrat. Thank you so much for joining us and for your advice. Best luck to your DD whatever career path she chooses.

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BenjaminTheDonkey · 23/10/2018 15:54

Work experience... well! This is insider info. Recent (many Uni) meeting of admiss leads got heated with traditionalists arguing that only shadowing consultants was good enough WE, others saying that all kinds of experiences, even customer service, could be relevant (and fit with widening partic goal). Traditionalists were from RG Unis. No surprise there I guess.

At the risk of outing... I was at that meeting. I wasn't conscious of any heat (not on that issue, anyway). And the person who argued most strongly for favouring customer service experience over hospital shadowing was from a Russell Group institution.

MedSchoolRat · 23/10/2018 18:09

That's good to hear the correction, Benjamin. I am glad to yield to first hand info not the 3rd hand I had. I will bow out of thread & maybe pop up later on another about chemistry applicants or whatever DD decides. :)

BenjaminTheDonkey · 23/10/2018 22:06

@MedSchoolRat - What's your daughter's school/college like for advising on the range of possible options? It's worth discussing possible career paths and the relative value of chemistry, medicinal chemistry, pharmaceutical chemistry, analytical chemistry, environmental chemistry, (biological) chemistry for drug discovery, etc. I know quite a few schools that seem to refuse to look beyond either school subjects or professional courses, with the exception of natural sciences at Cambridge, which they all seem to know about. I met a lad at a sixth-form HE fair once who wanted to do Land Economy at Cambridge but his careers adviser pretty much refused to believe it existed.