fibril Posted December 31, 2011 Report Share Posted December 31, 2011 After recently learning that I stand a good chance at interviewing at the University of Calgary, Faculty of Medicine this year, I have began doing my own research on things like CaRMS matching stats and the quality of education at UofC. One aspect of the program that concerns me is the length; being only three years, with no breaks for activities to build up a stellar CaRMS application, it seems like pursuing an education at UofC may not be the best idea. I've also learned that UofC does not cover a lot of basic science knowledge in the first few years of med school, which is also alarming. I may be jumping the gun just a little here, but I would like to make an informed decision about the quality of the program before my (hopeful!) interview. Has anyone from other schools come into contact with clerks from UofC? How competent do they seem in comparison to those form other institutions? Any help would be greatly appreciated Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kylamonkey Posted January 1, 2012 Report Share Posted January 1, 2012 I may be jumping the gun just a little here, but I would like to make an informed decision about the quality of the program before my (hopeful!) interview. Has anyone from other schools come into contact with clerks from UofC? How competent do they seem in comparison to those form other institutions? Any help would be greatly appreciated As much as I love UofC, I have my concerns. Please realize I'm NOT saying this because I have my sights set on UofC too, but because I've actually heard this. I have a friend who is a physician up here in Whitehorse who told me they are less prepared from what he's seen. He was trying to convince me to forget about calgary and go Carib, though. Oh well. He and I discussed this a little- I'll paraphrase below. We discussed with respect to what I know about the admissions process and what he knows of the clinical clerks he's seen. I think this may be one of the reasons UofC seems to consider authenticity and life skills more strongly. There's just less chance to build certain clinical skills when you only have 3 years. If they start off by choosing people with strong people skills, though, the students shouldn't have a problem. I work with at-risk youth and I have been a personal trainer. I know you have to be careful with what you say to people when discussing their physical and mental health, and I have certain skills I've picked up through working with all these people. These skills will help me when I get to clerkship immeasurably. I'm not trying to toot my own horn or anything, but this is what we discussed. That's all. I didn't know about the "basic science education" thing- maybe you can clarify? You can PM me if you want. Sooo.... from my limited, anecdotal experience, you do have a valid question and it's worth looking into. I don't think it would change my mind about the program personally, though. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jochi1543 Posted January 1, 2012 Report Share Posted January 1, 2012 I can't answer the competency question, but one thing I do know is that if you are not sure what you want to do, the lack of time to explore different specialties before CaRMS apps can really screw you over. I know someone at U of C who applied for a certain specialty before doing a core rotation in something s/he ended up liking much more, and then this person had to jump over all kinds of roadblocks to get out of a residency s/he didn't want, and ended up having to delay graduation by a year. So keep this in mind. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cardiomegaly Posted January 1, 2012 Report Share Posted January 1, 2012 I'm a firm believer that all medical schools in Canada produce relatively competent doctors and good residents. There will always be exceptional residents and some that are mediocre or less strong. I've met fantastic residents out of Calgary and some that I felt had a terrible knowledge base and clinical judgement. I could say the same for U of A graduates. The major disadvantage I see to any 3 year program is the lack of time to decide what you want to do with adequate time to experience different specialties. As a third year student in a 4 year program, I have friends who started medical school at the same time as me who are now in the 2012 match going for interviews. I personally feel completely unprepared to have made that decision at this point in my education. Others in my class are quite sure of their choice. The disadvantage also comes from doing elective time early and having to choose electives before experiencing core rotations. U of C clerks do 12/16 weeks of their elective time before starting a core. More often than not you get a better idea of what a specialty entails after you've spent 6-8 weeks in it, rather than shadowing or doing 2 weeks elective. That's my 2 cents. My core rotstions so far have changed my perspective of what I want tO do in the future, totally throwing me off guard at times! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
olecranon Posted January 1, 2012 Report Share Posted January 1, 2012 just go to calgary. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NLengr Posted January 2, 2012 Report Share Posted January 2, 2012 There are no bad schools in Canada. All of them give you a quality education. Much more important than program length is individual factors like work ethic. The downside, as previously mentioned is less time for CaRMS. The upside is one less year of living expenses. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
inspiring-curmudgeon Posted January 2, 2012 Report Share Posted January 2, 2012 I had a choice and went to U of A for all these reasons. I also have a friend at U of C and he said he would have also gone somewhere else if the option was available. Right now I am thinking about what I am going to do over the summer. Do some shadowing, do some international electives, research (again), or nothing. He doesn't get that choice. I go to a three year school, and ALL those options are available to us. Just not over the summer. I've done a few electives (horizontal), and have two papers in the works, so research is certainly possible. Personally, I'd rather learn medicine continuously, not in chunks with summers off. I can use that extra year to pick up a masters in residency, or a fellowship, and that will be much more useful to me for my future career than a more in-depth pre clerkship curriculum. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
thebouque Posted January 2, 2012 Report Share Posted January 2, 2012 Personally, I'd rather learn medicine continuously, not in chunks with summers off. I can use that extra year to pick up a masters in residency, or a fellowship, and that will be much more useful to me for my future career than a more in-depth pre clerkship curriculum. I'm sure mcmaster is a great school but an in depth clerkship curriculum (from my point of view) gives you a knowledge base that you'll never get in the future. Everything is built upon those foundations and they influence your thinking and your actions. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
inspiring-curmudgeon Posted January 2, 2012 Report Share Posted January 2, 2012 I'm sure mcmaster is a great school but an in depth clerkship curriculum (from my point of view) gives you a knowledge base that you'll never get in the future. Everything is built upon those foundations and they influence your thinking and your actions. I said pre-clerkship. We have just as many clerkship hours as the 4-year schools since we have no summers. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
A-Stark Posted January 2, 2012 Report Share Posted January 2, 2012 Really? Our clerkship runs from Sept-Sept with only 3 weeks off, then 21 weeks of electives and some mandatory rotations prior to ACLS and CRAM, with about another 2 weeks off. I certainly don't feel like I had a summer... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
inspiring-curmudgeon Posted January 2, 2012 Report Share Posted January 2, 2012 Really? Our clerkship runs from Sept-Sept with only 3 weeks off, then 21 weeks of electives and some mandatory rotations prior to ACLS and CRAM, with about another 2 weeks off. I certainly don't feel like I had a summer... I believe we also start clerkship earlier because of the truncated pre-clerkship. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
thebouque Posted January 2, 2012 Report Share Posted January 2, 2012 I said pre-clerkship. We have just as many clerkship hours as the 4-year schools since we have no summers. Oops I meant PREclerkship (I wrote clerkship in my message, typo) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cardiomegaly Posted January 2, 2012 Report Share Posted January 2, 2012 We get no break other than the weekend between 3rd and 4th year either, I think we spend ~ 50 weeks on hospital rotations. Plus 15 weeks of mandatory clerkship rotations in 4th year on top of 15 weeks of electives and review courses/ACLS. A-Stark the difference in clerkship length probably comes in available elective time.. in Alberta it's 20 weeks + optional summer electives vs. 16 weeks. I agree with thebouque though. I'm glad I had a solid foundation in anatomy and physiology and had time to process it all...once you're on the wards it's easy to fall into the trap of just learning clinical stuff but if you don't tie it back to your basic understanding of pathophysiology it's shallow learning. I find the best preceptors can teach you both to help you reason out why you're doing a certain test or intervention, rather than by "that's just the way it is/what Uptodate/clinical practice guidelines/textbook said" Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
thebouque Posted January 2, 2012 Report Share Posted January 2, 2012 I'm glad I had a solid foundation in anatomy and physiology and had time to process it all...once you're on the wards it's easy to fall into the trap of just learning clinical stuff but if you don't tie it back to your basic understanding of pathophysiology it's shallow learning. I find the best preceptors can teach you both to help you reason out why you're doing a certain test or intervention, rather than by "that's just the way it is/what Uptodate/clinical practice guidelines/textbook said" This should be published in the next CMAJ issue Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TonesRN Posted January 2, 2012 Report Share Posted January 2, 2012 I agree with thebouque though. I'm glad I had a solid foundation in anatomy and physiology and had time to process it all...once you're on the wards it's easy to fall into the trap of just learning clinical stuff but if you don't tie it back to your basic understanding of pathophysiology it's shallow learning. I find the best preceptors can teach you both to help you reason out why you're doing a certain test or intervention, rather than by "that's just the way it is/what Uptodate/clinical practice guidelines/textbook said" Honestly, it makes no difference in clinical preparedness in those who went to a 3 vs a 4 yr school. I've had great preceptors and not-so-great preceptors who went to 3 year programs, and similarly some from 4 year trained programs. The difference is based upon the individual alone, as compared to their medical preparedness. Also, you really think that people in a 4 year programs remember everything from first year preclerkship when they are a 4th year clerk? Simple answer: no. Medicine is a field where one constantly learns, forgets, and re-learns information. It is near impossible to remember all of the fine details taught in pre-clerkship one month later, never mind 3 years later. As someone, who wrote the LMCC Part 1 last spring I can tell you that me, along with my counterparts in a 4 year program, likely spent about the same number of hours studying, performed relatively similarly on the test, and also likely forgot the same amount of information after it was done. This is a reality in medicine. So imo, you will get the same quality of education at any medical school in Canada. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TeaHatingBrit Posted January 2, 2012 Report Share Posted January 2, 2012 University of Alberta has roughly 142 weeks of school. U of C has 132 weeks. That isn't much of a difference. And that 10 weeks of remaining time is mostly all electives. So yes, we have less time to do electives. But we have classes like Medicine 330 - where you spend time shadowing a family doctor in first year. Med 440 - where you do 80 hours of clinical work with whoever you want. So the option to discover what you like/don't like is there early on. We spend less time learning basic sciences early, is it relevant? Not really. We learn basic sciences as needed to understand concepts. I don't really remember the Krebs cycle, is it good to know? Maybe. Has it EVER come up? Nope. Never. So do you really need to learn it when there is a wealth of more relevant medical knowledge to pick up? U of C tends to normally match just fine, so the idea of not being able to build a competitive application is ridiculous. If you want something, you go out and get it.. Make it happen. That onus is on you, not the school. Every school in Canada produces phenomenal physicians, Calgary is no exception. The idea that Calgary has 'less competent' students is laughable. Many Many Calgary students have done rotations in other cities and were told they were better than students the staff were used to seeing there. A school doesn't make you a good or bad physician, your ability to put in the work does, the school merely provides you the tools. U of C does a phenomenal job of that, I feel I am going to be more than qualified, I should hopefully match to the speciality of my choice, and I'll be done a year before anyone else... And that speaks to the majority of most U of C students. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
coastalslacker Posted January 3, 2012 Report Share Posted January 3, 2012 I think there's alot of fluff and irrelevant basic science in the first two years of med school. Three year schools probably have it pretty good in that, I would hope, much of the bs is trimmed. The skills one needs to suceed in clerkship are completely different from the school smarts you need before. However, having to do electives before core rotations is ridiculous. Queen's had this when I went there (has subsequently changed I believe, at least in part) and I found out I liked something totally different from what I had wanted to do - once most of my elective time was gone. This was not a unique experience in my class at all. Many people just talked themselves out of trying to switch late to something they found they really liked. You really won't know whether you truly love something until clerkship. You can like all sorts of things, but you need to live it to make a career decision. If I had to do it again, I would avoid schools that place electives before core rotations in clerkship. This might seem like a little thing, but it's not. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
moo Posted January 3, 2012 Report Share Posted January 3, 2012 To the OP: you are not going to medical school to learn the basic sciences. You are going to med school to learn to become a doctor. If you want to learn the basic sciences, go get a PhD. Cramming basic sciences into one year is fine. Duke University in the US does this, and they graduate extremely competent doctors (although they are a 4 year program; they have a dedicated research year). In my experience, UofC grads are fine. You really learn in residency, and all that basic science stuff is quickly forgotten and only the relevant details remain. Mac grads, however, I find are a different lot but I don't think it has anything to do with the three year program but rather the PBL-based nature of their curriculum. The real question should be: who in their right mind would want to spend 3 years in Calgary? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
thehumanmacbook Posted January 3, 2012 Report Share Posted January 3, 2012 ^ I thought Calg operated through PBL as well :S aren't they and McMaster comrades in arms? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kylamonkey Posted January 3, 2012 Report Share Posted January 3, 2012 To the OP: you are not going to medical school to learn the basic sciences. You are going to med school to learn to become a doctor. If you want to learn the basic sciences, go get a PhD. The real question should be: who in their right mind would want to spend 3 years in Calgary? That's a great point, moo. Always full of sage advice. As for your last point, at least it's not 4 yrs! Also, it is close to crowsnest pass/rockies/foothills! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NewfieMike Posted January 3, 2012 Report Share Posted January 3, 2012 I'm sure grateful that by going to UofC my med/graduate education will be 7 instead of 8 years somewhere else. to the OP: one step at a time Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mbene085 Posted January 4, 2012 Report Share Posted January 4, 2012 One thing I've noticed is that U of C clerks on electives tend to look really bad compared to many other schools. They send their clerks out for electives before they're done their core rotations (I think Queens does this as well). Worked with a U of C clerk on OB/GYN who was at my school (U of O) doing an elective before she had done OB/GYN as a core rotation. Needless to say she wasn't impressing anyone. This has been a general trend that my classmates have noticed as well. That doesn't mean that they aren't good students, but they tend to look weaker to other schools before they venture out into the world before covering all the basics back at home. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tooty Posted January 4, 2012 Report Share Posted January 4, 2012 That is a valid concern but it shouldn't reflect negatively on their evaluations. Preceptors should take into consideration the training of the student before judging their competency, especially at such a critical transition stage that is 3rd year. I fee that the disadvantage that U of C students face due to less elective time is real. Carms even informed U of C that their students' applications were weaker relative to other schools, presumably due to less time to build credentials. Although the student can take a certain amount of initiative to offset this disadvantage by being more aggressive with shadowing and research, you have keep in mind that 4-year students are doing the same thing. U of C students love to say that it's up to the student to be competitive. That's true to a certain extent. But if you pair a 3-year and 4-year gunner together, with all else being equal, statistically speaking the 4-year student will match better in Carms. Chances are this disadvantage will be negligible because most people choose family or internal, programs in which more seats than applicants exist. The worst case scenario is that programs like derm or ophtho (the uber competitive prorams) are among your list of possible, or even serious, career interests. If I recall correctly, just a bit more than 1 in 2 applicants made it into ophtho last year. For the uber competitive programs, every little bit counts so I would advise against U of C. Now, I have a feeling some turd is going to chime in and say they know of someone from U of C who matched to ophtho. Yes, I'm sure it happens, but statistically the population as a whole is disadvantaged. Of course if you somehow know 100% that you want optho or derm, then by all means do up U of C and gun for it. I'm talking about the population of students who don't know what they want but have yet to exclude the competitive programs. U of C is a fine school. Their anatomy is taught well. Having labeled pre-dissected specimens is 100x better than making students dissect imo. They tend to shove family medicine pretty hard and they don't have any shortage of useless HPOP lectures, but you'll see aspects of that at U of A too. If I could go back, I'd go to U of C. Having 1 extra year while not losing much is pretty sick. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NLengr Posted January 4, 2012 Report Share Posted January 4, 2012 The cost isn't just a year of tuition and living expenses, which is hardly peanuts (you won't be saying those words when you are a resident struggling to pay back/keep level on your loans). It's an extra year of real doctor earnings you will miss out on. So the extra cost isn't $40k, it's 250k + 40k. That's not to mention the extra year of life not in undergrad. As for basic science concerns, I will echo Moo. You shouldn't worry to much. Medicine is about application of science to find solutions, not the solutions themselves. You can be a perfectly competent physician without knowing what ion channels amiodarone blocks, the 5th step in the krebs cycle or all the branches of the external carotid. The vast majority of trivia type learning from per clerkship will be gone by the time clerkship starts. In the end, you need to look at all your options of schools where you have been accepted and pick the one that feels right for you. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
meds400 Posted January 4, 2012 Report Share Posted January 4, 2012 I would quickly chime in to say that I love the U of C program and have no regrets in turning down other schools for this medical school. People are making too big a deal about the pre-clerkship electives - it's six weeks, where most of us will likely be doing 3 x 2 week rotations in virtually whatever field we want. As for the program itself, it is very well designed and I'm not sure where this whole notion of "we do not get any basic science" comes from...if anything, the basic science is even more intense because they don't fluff up the lectures by reviewing basic principles early on in the program (don't come to U of C if you were hoping to start back at the eukaroytic cell or to learn the different structures of immunoglobulins – this is all expected knowledge and then some). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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