Medicine 2020 (part 2)

[Monkey2001]

This follows on from the first thread - www.mumsnet.com/Talk/higher_education/3380915-Medicine-2020

I wonder if anyone would be able to give me any thoughts on Medify? DD has been using this to prepare for her UCAT which is on 5th Aug.
She’s seem a few comments on TSR saying that the real exam is harder than Medify?
Does anyone have any thoughts on this? She did her first full timed mock on Medify last weekend and was fairly pleased with her score but I think she’s now wondering if it’s actually going to be a lot harder. Thanks.

@LaLaFlottes my DD said Medify was harder than the real thing. She got her best mark when actually doing the test. There are practices tests on UCAT website too.

@mumsneedwine that’s good to hear thank you!
I think DD was planning to save the official mocks on the UCAT website for nearer the time but she might mix and match a bit!

@LaLaFlottes my d felt that medify was a good approximation but scored higher on the actual test than medify. She was getting about 670/680 average on the medify tests but got 720 average on the day. She said the tests on the UKCAT website were harder than medify, one in particular (I can’t remember the number but they might well have changed them round now anyway) the QR she found impossible and it caused a bit of a meltdown. She’s not weak on QR, she got 880 for it on the day, which helped pull up her weaker AR which she always found the hardest.

I can remember driving up to the test centre to pick her up, seeing her standing on the corner clutching her piece of paper looking close to tears. My heart sank, trying to think of positive upbeat things to say, but she was actually quite shocked how much better her score was than she expected.

We have Medify scores in a spreadsheet somewhere and they carried a bit in difficulty, but agree with others that real thing was a bit higher, but Medify was a good approximation. Also agree that you should warn DC about one of the official UCAT ones being alarming!

I think Medify is much too generous on SJT though. DS got 1s for all the mocks, but got a 2 first time and 1 second time in the real thing. We never managed to work out how it was scored.

Varied a bit, not carried

@Monkey2001 @HostessTrolley thank you so much for the info. Really useful and I’ll make sure DD knows to be prepared for the difficult UCAT website questions!

@ladsmum I have been wondering what happened about your DS's resit. Is he able to get a calculated grade? Is all OK with him?

@Monkey2001 Yes thankfully his sixth form were happy to give him a calculated grade - unlikely to be anything higher than A grade but we will be very satisfied with that. So sad for lots of DCs resitting that have been told that they won't be given a calculate grade by their exam centres. Looks like they are facing a further year out.
Mini-monkey must be relieved that he has his grades already. Where has he chosen? St Andrew's?

That is good news!

Yes, DS is off to St A. Is yours going to Sheffield? It was a close call, but he liked the fact that St A offers the opportunity to have 3 years like a normal student before 3 clinical years which will feel more like an unpaid job in terms of hours, holidays etc. Also thought that the Sheffield experience would be more affected by covid-19 - St A does not have any clubs to close!

Hi, did anyone on here apply to Liverpool? It wasn't really on our radar, but DS went to the virtual open day today, and in terms of strategic applying, it seems like a really good option, given his GCSE results. Especially as the other universities he is mostly considering have the UCAT exam as key, so it seems sensible to include one where the UCAT is not so heavily emphasised. And it is apparently an integrated course, with dissection.

But not being able to go anywhere in person means we are very limited in the information we can glean, and it would be really useful if anyone can pass on any information regarding Liverpool and what it is like to study medicine there, that they accumulated during their quest.

DD1 just finished first year at Liverpool. She loves it, great social life, great city. Itching to get onto more medicine, feels a bit like she’s done human biology only so far as first year is the least integrated but has specially enjoyed the communication course, and placements kick in in 2nd year, tho delayed till after Xmas because of covid. Think it’s all prosection not dissection but I can check when she’s home. Facilities seem very good and pastoral care impressive. Only negative is that first year exams delayed till September so another summer of study! Happy to answer any questions.

@sergeantmajormum Thanks. Have passed on your message to DS. May well have questions.

All very quiet here. DS has info about stethoscope etc to buy. Does anyone know if the safety goggles we have from old chemistry kits are good enough for med students if they still fit?

I’d hold off a bit on stethoscopes, dd was given one and a lab coat x

Thanks @HostessTrolley, but he has been told to get stethoscope, lab coat and safety goggles. Grandparents have already given him stethoscope and we got him lab coat ages ago, can buy safety goggles but the ones on Amazon look very like the chemistry kit ones we already have, we try to re-use where we can.

Is been planning to buy my Dd a stethoscope as a results day gift (optimism lol) but it wasn’t needed. I bought gift cards for costa, nandos etc instead x

Further question on the Medify versus the real thing: DS tried doing a practice test on the UCAT website for the first time today, after using medify, and he had several issues. He had understood that Medify gave you the same environment that the real thing did, but he found:

1. The backspace button did not clear the calculator on the UCat website, and so he had to use his mouse to clear the calculator (which took him longer). On Medify he had been using the backspace button. Any idea whether it can be used in the real thing?

1. The calculator reverted back to it's original position on the screen after each question and did not remain in the same place when he toggled shift+c after each question which means he had to keep moving the calculator each time after moving to the next question so he could see the next question. Any idea if the calculator moves annoyingly in the real thing?

1. He was unable to make the test full screen (he usually does it by pressing F11 (on a windows computer). He tried it with three different browsers. DS is planning on sitting the test at home, and obviously this isn't something he can find out from anybody who has sat it before, as nobody has sat it from home before, but in the test centre does the test just come up full screen?

Does anybody from last year remember having major differences in the way they had to handle shortcuts between medify and the UCAT itself?

DS says it is like the UCAT one, the backspace did not clear the calculator and it reverted to position. The test wais full screen when he started at the test centre.

@Monkey2001 Not what DS really wanted to hear, but thank you so much, at least this means he is prepared, rather than finding this out in the exam itself.

Do you think they could have changed it?
DS has just found this : www.medentry.edu.au/ucat/entry/ucat-calculator-how-do-the-ucat-practice-exams-differ-from-the-live-ucat

Which says: The calculator in the live UCAT (i.e the calculator in the testing centre for the actual UCAT) has several differences to the calculator available on the official UCAT practice exams. These changes range from cosmetic (e.g. colour, style) to functional differences.

MedEntry’s Simulated UCAT Exam Platform is the most accurate representation of the live UCAT calculator. You may therefore notice some differences between MedEntry’s UCAT calculator (and the live UCAT calculator) compared to the official UCAT practice exams.
Difference 1: Backspace and Escape buttons

In the live UCAT, the backspace and escape buttons behave differently to the official UCAT practice exam calculator:

Backspace: clears the UCAT calculator (in the same manner as pressing the ON/C button). This button does not do anything in the official UCAT practice exam calculator.
Escape: does nothing in the live UCAT (however, it clears the calculator in the official UCAT practice exam platform).

MedEntry’s UCAT Platform replicates the behaviour of the calculator in the live UCAT.
Difference 2: Clearing memory

In MedEntry’s UCAT Exam Platform calculator, like the live UCAT, memory can be cleared by pressing the MRC button twice. This is in addition to pressing M- followed by MRC:

This suggests that the live UCAT is different from the practice, and more like Medify.

Hmmm, maybe DS has forgotten, will double check!

On stethoscopes, DD had to buy hers. She went for an exotic colour. Useful as it is more identifiable so is less likely to get lost.

@bimkom DS said he did not really use the back space, so MedEntry more likely to be right. The test definitely started in full screen mode though.

For those of you with DC going to med schools which do not provide lab coats, you might like to look into them. St Andrews require a "Howie style" lab coat, which seems to have just 1 UK supplier (Portwest) who have sold out of all sizes except 4XL until 11/9 (which is after term begins for Scotland). I managed to order a medium on Ebay, but I expect they will not available there for long.

Not sure what we will do with the standard lab coat we got for DS when he got the offers.