Why Western?

[Guest PDSP]

Ok, I've started this thread in Ottawa and will probably start one in each of the other Ontario schools.

 

For those currently at UWO, why did you decided to choose Western? What do you like best about the medical program at UWO? What do you like least?

 

Again, I have some specific questions related to Western's program.

 

1. How do you handle the number of exams in the first two years of the program? Is this the primary motivation for learning the material?

 

2. What type of financial assistance (bursaries) is given out at Western? (Average value, examples)

 

3. How much elective time is there before CaRMS letters are due in December of 4th year? What are the limitations on elective selection?

 

4. Is the "Transition period" used to review material for the LMCC exams?

 

5. Historically, how well have Western students done on the USMLE Step 1?

 

Thanks again.

 

PD

[Guest aneliz]

Hey,

 

I will try my best to answer your questions:

 

1. EXAMS - well there are a lot of them...pretty much everytime you turn around in the first two years....there are 4 sets in first year and three in second year. The first set will hit you 6 weeks into first year. The second set is before Christmas, the third before March break and the last we just finished on Fri. In second year, there are exams in mid-Nov, mid-Feb and the first week of June. Each set of exams has between three and six exams in it...and will cover all of our courses in a particular area - for example, you will write a Respiratory exam that includes questions from biochem, anatomy, physiology, life cycle, pathology, etc rather than writing a 'pathology' exam with questions on multiple organ systems. The exams are primarily MCQ's and short answer...with a bigger emphasis on short answer as you move to second year. As with any exam based system, you will find that the exams will not always pertain to what you think you should know, nor do they test everything that is important. And sometimes, you will find that they test things that you are pretty sure AREN'T important. All you can do is learn as much as possible and hope for the best...but there is almost guaranteed to be stuff on the exam that you didn't focus on in your studying and stuff that you focused on that isn't tested....such is the nature of the beast. The general rule is that you will see three marks on an exam per hour of teaching time...so if you had three hours of biochem lecture during blood week, you should expect 9 questions from biochem on the exam. That said, you have to realise that they can't possibly ask something about everything that is relevant to medicine in the number of questions that they are allowed on the exam. However, as a whole, the exams are not too bad...and we are on H/P/F anyway...so it really doesn't matter.

 

2. Financial assistance - there are lots of bursaries available, you should have already applied for them in the winter if you are an applicant this year. If not, you can apply online - go to the registrar's site and look for 'entrance bursaries' - you will need your OMSAS number. I think that most people got a bursary last year, the average value was ~$2000 in first year...it increases as your debt load increases, most of the second years got ~$4000 I believe. There is lots of help available though, UWO has two financial aid officers that deal exclusively with the professional students, and they come to the med sci building to meet with students, so you don't even have to go hunt them down to get info!

 

3. Elective time - You will be FINISHED your core rotations by mid-Aug of the year of your CaRMS application. This gives you from Sept-Dec to do electives in whatever you want. There really aren't too many restrictions on them, you can stay at UWO, you can go to other Canadian med schools, you can go to the states, you can go abroad or any combination of...you can do whatever you like - surgery, family med, obstetrics, whatever. The only restrictions are that you may do a maximum of five electives - each block is supposed to be four weeks long - but you are allowed to split one block to make five blocks. Other than that, it is pretty much fair game. There are some 'rules' in existence (like you are supposed to have at least two different 'areas' of medicine represented in your electives), but most of the fourth years have found ways to get around them and get what they want - and in the words of the co-ordinator "there is always more than one way to skin a cat".... For example, you are not supposed to do all of your electives in a single area - such as obs/gyn....but you could do one block in an STD clinic and count that on paper as 'infectious disease' rather than obs/gyn and get away with it....UWO is pretty much as good as they get in terms of freedom for scheduling of electives...you are finished all of your core rotations so you look like you know what you are doing when you are on an elective and you know what you want to do electives in, and you will be done all your electives before Dec.

 

4. The transition period - is used for 'advanced basic science' which means basically anything goes...there are courses on everything from surgical anatomy to pathology in family practice...they also spend time reviewing for the LMCC. The material taught during the transition period is not examined, so they have lots of time free for studying for the LMCC...

 

5. Don't know about the USMLE 1 - not too many UWO students write it, so any data you would get would be based on the results of a few scattered students here and there and really wouldn't be representative of UWO students as a whole anyway...

 

Hope that helps!

[Guest UWOMED2005]

I don't know about the USMLEs, but I do know UWO students traditionally do very well on the LMCCs (I think we were tops two years ago? Three?), and the first and second year program here is quite "traditional". . . you cover pretty much all the bases you would at any US school, suggesting to me this school would give you as good a prep as any school in Canada.

 

Everything I've heard is that the greatest strenth of this program is its clerkship program and the organization of 3rd and 4th year. Here, you start clerkship in September of 3rd year, complete it in August. You do your electives from September through December of 4th year. . . late enough so that you're not a rookie, but still early enough that you can get reference letters and impress program directors before CaRMS interviews in January. You then get a period of relative relaxation after CaRMS electives (aka "the transition period") where you take a slew of unexamined elective courses for interest sake only, leaving you with plenty of time for one last hurrah with those friends you made in 1st and 2nd year but never saw in 3rd and 4th year. . . oh yeah, and to study for the LMCCs.

 

As for the clerkship program itself, I haven't started it yet (next Sept,) but it's supposed to be UWO's greatest strength. There's two reasons I can see for that. One is the size. . . from my perspective, UWO is the goldilocks of the schools. It's not so big that you have numerous other med students, residents and fellows (that's a doc who has finished his residency but gone back to subspecialize) all competing for OR time, but it's big enough (cachement size of approx 1.5 million. . . everything from Windsor to Owen Sound) that there are lots of different procedures done here. Second, the clerks here are given A LOT of responsibility. We're fully integrated into the health care team. . . in fact, during the SARS crisis when most of the med students in the province were kicked out of the hospitals, our clerks were only out of the hospital for one day. . . LHSC had to call them back because they realized the hospital couldn't function without the clerks!

 

As for weaknesses, the preclerkship curriculum often seems quite disorganized. In the end, you cover pretty much everything but at times when you're going through it can seem pretty jumbled. They're actually changing the curriculum quite a bit over the summer, so those of you in the class of 2007 might have a better time of it. And preclerkship is basically just background and learning terminology. . . I'd much rather have a strong clerkship program, as that's where you learn medicine anyways. The other disadvantages are the tuition, and the requirement to have a car in 3rd year. . . though I suspect most 3rd year med students end up buying a car at other centres anyways.

 

As for strong specialties here at UWO. . . that REALLY doesn't matter. You can match to anything from anywhere. That being said, I'll say the strongest programs here are probably ALL the Surgical Specialties, particularly gen surg, orthopedics,* plastics, and ENT. . . though all of them are pretty strong here. We're a major transplant centre, so if you're interested in that field, you should at least do an elective here. Sports Medicine is strong here as well, as is Physiatry, which is funny as there's no residency program in physiatry at UWO but the docs here are some of the best published in Canada. Emerg is strong here as well, and if you're interested in Trauma (car accidents, stabbings, gunshot. . . though there seems to be more stabbings in London than gunshot wounds.) South Street is the place to be Internal medicine seems to be solid as well. The only programs I haven't been that impressed with here are Radiology and Pediatrics. You can definitely match to these programs if you come here, but I haven't been impressed so far. . . that may change in clerkship.

 

* I'd go out on a limb and say orthopedics here is the strongest in the country. . . both Steve Yzerman and Eric Lindros have come here for surgery. And Dr. ?Richard? Hawkins, a world renowned orthopedic surgeon in Colorado who has operated on John Elway and a slew of other athletes, and wrote the book on MSSK tests, was trained here.

[Guest artef]

Is the third year clerkship done exclusively in London/Windsor?

[Guest PDSP]

Aneliz and UWOMED2005:

 

Thanks for the great personal insight to the UWO medical program. Your observations regarding the strong clerkship program have been echoed by other UWO students with whom I have spoke. In particular, I appreciate the high level of responsibility placed upon the clerks, when compared to other institutions, such as Toronto.

 

With regards to the disorganized nature of the pre-clerkship years, I thought Western's systems based approach was meant to combat this. I know Toronto teaches in blocks (i.e. all anatomy, then all physiology, ...) I figured it might be easier to learn the material in an integrated, systems-based curriculum. Any thoughts?

 

PD

[Guest UWOMED2005]

Aneliz didn't say the preclerkship curriculum was disorganized, I did. I think it's specifically BECAUSE they try to fit into a systems based curriculum that it gets disorganized. . . in first year each system block (ie Resp) will be a mishmash of physiology/anatomy/biochem lectures that relate to the topic at hand. While it's suggested that this format ties everything related to a system together, personally I felt the result was a bunch of lectures that didn't relate, other than the fact they were somehow tied to the respiratory system. In 2nd year, it's more of the same. . . though the problem there is that the path/pharm/medicine courses often overlap. It can be frustrating to see you've printed 3 sets of notes for 3 sets of lectures only to realize they're all saying the same thing. . . except for the fact they have different epidemiology stats

 

But I'm not sure this is really a weakness specifically at UWO, as I haven't attended any of the other medical schools. For all I know, every other preclerkship curriculum has the exact same problems. The problems essentially stem from the fact that in medical school you never have one continuous course taught by the same prof. . . instead you often have a different prof for every different lecture. As a result, none of the profs know what you've already been taught and what you haven't. . . some of the material they present is above your head, some of it you've already heard. Some of them give great handouts so you don't need to write a thing, others give you handouts that are useless meaning you realize only halfway through the lecture you should have been transcribing everything word-for-word. I'd be surprised if any of the other schools have figured a way to get around this. . . but I have to admit I miss the days of undergrad when you'd have one prof for an entire term, and (s)he would be consistent (even better was High School, where the people paid were actually trained to TEACH, but I digress. . .)

 

But don't worry. . . the preclerkship program here at UWO will give you what you need for clerkship. And that is ALL that matters. And if you're not confident about that, just buy a copy of the MCCQE (aka "Toronto") notes and study from those. One of the most important skills you have to learn in preclerkship is (sorry about this buzzword, but. . .) "self-directed learning." It's often said half the stuff you learn in preclerkship will be obsolete by the time you're finished residency. . . medicine is all about learning as you go, right until the day you retire.

 

Artef - no matter what school you go to, all your clerkship will be done at that school. But you also have 4 months of electives after clerkship that can be done anywhere.

[Guest aneliz]

The preclerkship years aren't THAT disorganised....no system is perfect and no matter what school you go to, you are always going to be frustrated by some aspect of the curriculum...personally, from talking to friends at some of the other Canadian schools, UWO's curriculum problems are tame!

 

Our biggest beef is with the notes (or lack of sometimes) and the fact that as far as UWO is concerned, a 'web based curriculum' means print-your-own-notes-off-webct....yes there is overlap between courses sometimes, but I think that could actually be a good thing! (more time to get it into your head!)

 

No system is perfect, and UWO has A LOT of class hours in first and second year...but I have liked the curriculum in first year...and am still happy that I picked UWO!

[Guest TimmyMax]

Hey all,

 

Our biggest beef is with the notes (or lack of sometimes) and the fact that as far as UWO is concerned, a 'web based curriculum' means print-your-own-notes-off-webct....

 

That is my biggest beef with UWO's curriculum- some of the profs are just plain lazy about posting their notes and then if your WebCT account gets screwed up like mine did, you can potentially be in a lot of trouble when you go to print off the notes right before the HIS final (don't get me started on that, either). But then again, the people here at UWO are great and I had no problems whatsoever getting the missing notes that I needed! As for whether or not I survived said final, we'll find out a little later on!

Word of advice: get yourself a printer! I thought that I could get away without one this year, and having to print at the school was a major pain in the a$$, especially at 10 cents a page! I'd say I spent a pretty healthy amount of money on copies this year, a good $150 for the year, which can really cut into one's chocolate milk and muffin money. Aye! Once my LOC comes about in August, I'll be heading straight to Future Shop to get the latest laser package.

And finally, UWO is a HORRIBLE place to try and park without a parking pass. Again, I thought that I could get away without one, and although I wasn't tagged too often, the sheer inconvenience and the 35 bucks a tag makes a parking pass a must have if you've got a car and you want to drive it to school every day. You can apply for one online via the UWO site. Maybe lcloh will post the link for us all because I'm too lazy to do it and I don't exactly know where it is.

Anyway, those are like my ONLY problems with UWO. Other than that it is truly the best medical school in the nation (not that I'm biased or anything), we have the most fun and we have the best group of people anyone could ever want! So I hope that this helped and I hope to see you roaming the halls of MedSci next year!

Best of luck!

Timmy

[Guest UWOMED2005]

Actually, UWO meds have been bumped up in seniority as far as parking is concerned. . . so you're getting a much better deal than we ever did.

 

Actually, there's a lot of perks you 2007s and 2006s will be getting that we didn't get: better parking, no construction, getting to benefit from the construction, a Pita Pit with a real grill as opposed to a microwave, no HIS (most despised class by most UWO med students,) better structured Intro to Medicine course in 2nd year (probably the most important course you take,) better PCL, more P/F grades in preclerkship, free insurance to do summer electives (that one's pretty key). . . the list goes on.

 

Ok, now I'm bitter. And who do you think fought the admin for all that? (Ok, not me. . . but some of my classmates did!!)

 

The 2005s will now be collecting money for the "Pay our tuition you undeserving wretches who are reaping the benefits of our hard work" fund. Cash or Cheque, made out to the fund c/o The Hippocratic Council. And yes, that's directed to you 2006ers as well.

[Guest TimmyMax]

Hey,

 

If you do set up such a fund, then I think that it should go to the individual political warriors who fought all of the battles to get us all these great changes and improvements rather than a general "help us 2005ers tour Europe this summer" fund. It's kind of like equating oneself with a pro sports team. I mean, some people like to refer to their favorite team as "we", as if they were somehow on the team and had some impact on the final outcome. Won't mention any names, but you know the deal. Except in my case where my actions are actually able to influence the final result. But I still don't refer to myself as if I am a member of the Leafs even if I do like to wear Leafs replica jerseys, hats depicting the Maple Leafs logo and all of my ice hockey equipment is consistent with that of the TML...

 

Timmy

[Guest aneliz]

HEY!!! As far as I have heard, construction will be ongoing next year too (and the year after that...)....yes PCL is getting changed in 2nd year, yes we will have insurance for free next summer and HIS is dead...but we also have gotten decently screwed over compared to you guys too....no OSCE....the rural week fiasco....don't get me started....we'll be taking donations for our tuition fund too....