atomickitten86 Posted May 1, 2012 Report Share Posted May 1, 2012 Hi everyone! I was wondering if others can share their opinions, comments, experience and/or insight into McMaster's 3 years program. I understand that McMaster has less "holidays", but it still works out to be significantly less "in school" time - approximately 31 months versus 38 for Mac and 3 year programs, respectively. The clerkship duration seems pretty similar in length between a 3 year versus 4 year program (more or less 2 academic years with little or no summer in between), but the preclerkship seems to be much shorter. I guess what I am asking is how does McMaster get the preclerkship done so much faster than other schools? It seems to be ~1 year if you don't count the preclerkship elective. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
inspiring-curmudgeon Posted May 1, 2012 Report Share Posted May 1, 2012 Hi everyone! I was wondering if others can share their opinions, comments, experience and/or insight into McMaster's 3 years program. I understand that McMaster has less "holidays", but it still works out to be significantly less "in school" time - approximately 31 months versus 38 for Mac and 3 year programs, respectively. The clerkship duration seems pretty similar in length between a 3 year versus 4 year program (more or less 2 academic years with little or no summer in between), but the preclerkship seems to be much shorter. I guess what I am asking is how does McMaster get the preclerkship done so much faster than other schools? It seems to be ~1 year if you don't count the preclerkship elective. Mac doesn't go over as much basic science, so it saves a lot of time in pre clerkship. The curriculum is set up so you focus on the basic science related to the disease itself, not learning obscure biochemical pathways just for the sake of learning. Clinicians (and other students) have told me that once you become a clerk, almost all of the rote basic science is useless, and the understanding of the pathophys is much more useful. The approach at mac is to integrate the useful basic science with clinical education so that we're prepared to treat the patient, not regurgitate information on multiple choice exams. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FuturePT216 Posted May 1, 2012 Report Share Posted May 1, 2012 To add onto the above post. Mcmaster focuses on problem-based learning and solving problems, with less lecture-style classes, so it takes less time to cover, especially since there's school in the summer terms as well. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ArchEnemy Posted May 1, 2012 Report Share Posted May 1, 2012 Mac doesn't go over as much basic science, so it saves a lot of time in pre clerkship. The curriculum is set up so you focus on the basic science related to the disease itself, not learning obscure biochemical pathways just for the sake of learning. Clinicians (and other students) have told me that once you become a clerk, almost all of the rote basic science is useless, and the understanding of the pathophys is much more useful. The approach at mac is to integrate the useful basic science with clinical education so that we're prepared to treat the patient, not regurgitate information on multiple choice exams. If basic sciences is indeed not as useful for a clinician, why would almost all medical schools, other than UCalgary and Mac, make it a compulsory component of their curriculum? I'm still a "premed" so correct me if I have mistaken, but major part of medicine is learnt during your clerical years and during your residency. So would it not make more sense to shorten all MD programs to 3 years and maybe extend the residency by 1 year instead? In this way, students will have more exposure to medicine prior to becoming an attending, hence becoming more competent doctors. students also benefit from drawing a salary, albeit meagre, to help pay off some of the loans more practising residents to share the heavy patient load, reducing burn-out rates, so quality of care could possibly increase I see a win-win situation here Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Der Kaiser Posted May 1, 2012 Report Share Posted May 1, 2012 The approach at mac is to integrate the useful basic science with clinical education so that we're prepared to treat the patient, not regurgitate information on multiple choice exams. But I love regurgitation! It's what university trains you for! Seriously though, Mac's approach sounds refreshing. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
benhc911 Posted May 2, 2012 Report Share Posted May 2, 2012 To each their own - some people thrive in a 3 year program like Mac's. I'm definitely not one of them, but it's a great program for a select group of people. This. I had debated taking my mac offer, but after punishing myself through chem eng plus medschool prereqs, mcat and nserc, I realized that the extra year was not worth the extra stress... that said... if I was less burntout finishing my medschool it would have been my number one. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
atomickitten86 Posted May 2, 2012 Author Report Share Posted May 2, 2012 This. I had debated taking my mac offer, but after punishing myself through chem eng plus medschool prereqs, mcat and nserc, I realized that the extra year was not worth the extra stress... that said... if I was less burntout finishing my medschool it would have been my number one. Thanks to everyone for their replies, I really enjoyed reading them. @benhc911, this is an interesting point that I imagine I would feel the same too. I'm an older applicant (PhD) so every year counts at this point (not getting any younger) and I'm use to and prefer less structure and more time to study on my own. I dislike going to lectures too. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Applemanv3 Posted May 2, 2012 Report Share Posted May 2, 2012 Thanks to everyone for their replies, I really enjoyed reading them. @benhc911, this is an interesting point that I imagine I would feel the same too. I'm an older applicant (PhD) so every year counts at this point (not getting any younger) and I'm use to and prefer less structure and more time to study on my own. I dislike going to lectures too. I'm in the same boat. I'm older, but not old, but every year counts. Also, if you have any significant health/clinical experience (as in my case), you may be able to navigate choosing a residency more easily. I have wanted Mac from 2007 and I actually didn't think it would present itself as a possibility. So, I'm pretty sold on Mac. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
1234 Posted May 2, 2012 Report Share Posted May 2, 2012 Mac doesn't go over as much basic science, so it saves a lot of time in pre clerkship. The curriculum is set up so you focus on the basic science related to the disease itself, not learning obscure biochemical pathways just for the sake of learning. Clinicians (and other students) have told me that once you become a clerk, almost all of the rote basic science is useless, and the understanding of the pathophys is much more useful. The approach at mac is to integrate the useful basic science with clinical education so that we're prepared to treat the patient, not regurgitate information on multiple choice exams. What a foolish statement. Understanding basic sciences/first principles is essential in reasoning through complex clinical scenarios and understand pathophysiology in a way those who haven't learned basic sciences will never understand. I would hold these sorts of statements until you've actually been through it. You haven't had the experience yet. But there is a reason why clinical supervisors at most every other school have a less than admirable perception of Mac med students. You can say that everything is the same come PGY1, but it isn't. As for being tested, it ensures a certain baseline of knowledge. Its not as if MCQ replaces the clinical setting. It is an augment to ensure students are acquiring knowledge so that clinical exposure provides repetition, not initial exposure, to the knowledge. There is a lot more focus on studying in preclerkship when you have to pass a test. I know MANY Mac Med students - and they all read the day before the group gets together. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
1234 Posted May 2, 2012 Report Share Posted May 2, 2012 If you want anything other than family medicine, it is a risk to go to a 3 year program. I'm not saying it is impossible, it is just more difficult given the lack of summers to build a resume, very early elective time (which makes it more difficult to impress), just lack of time, lack of time, lack of time to do anything. Hence, there record high unmatched this year. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
japlanet Posted May 2, 2012 Report Share Posted May 2, 2012 If you want anything other than family medicine, it is a risk to go to a 3 year program. I'm not saying it is impossible, it is just more difficult given the lack of summers to build a resume, very early elective time (which makes it more difficult to impress), just lack of time, lack of time, lack of time to do anything. Hence, there record high unmatched this year. I would argue that if you know going in that you want a specialty, the 3-year program isn't risky. The risk is that you go in thinking family, then realize 1/2 through clerkship that you want ob/gyn - that's where people get screwed by the 3 year thing (they would probably be screwed in a 4 year program too, but it's somewhat worse with 3 years). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aaronjw Posted May 2, 2012 Report Share Posted May 2, 2012 If you want anything other than family medicine, it is a risk to go to a 3 year program. I'm not saying it is impossible, it is just more difficult given the lack of summers to build a resume, very early elective time (which makes it more difficult to impress), just lack of time, lack of time, lack of time to do anything. Hence, there record high unmatched this year. except that, apparently, Mac students *can* do a 4th year to improve competitiveness in an area should they realize a little later in the ballgame they want to pursue something that they didn't realize earlier on. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
inspiring-curmudgeon Posted May 2, 2012 Report Share Posted May 2, 2012 If you want anything other than family medicine, it is a risk to go to a 3 year program. I'm not saying it is impossible, it is just more difficult given the lack of summers to build a resume, very early elective time (which makes it more difficult to impress), just lack of time, lack of time, lack of time to do anything. Hence, there record high unmatched this year. I know tons of people who want competitive specialties, and they have worked to produce publications and network. I don't really think the summers add that much, especially if you know what you want to do. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
thehumanmacbook Posted May 2, 2012 Report Share Posted May 2, 2012 I know tons of people who want competitive specialties, and they have worked to produce publications and network. I don't really think the summers add that much, especially if you know what you want to do. Just out of curiosity - to perhaps "make up" for elective time that a four-year school would have for its summers, does Mac provide more elective time during the year to pursue ex. research? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
inspiring-curmudgeon Posted May 2, 2012 Report Share Posted May 2, 2012 Just out of curiosity - to perhaps "make up" for elective time that a four-year school would have for its summers, does Mac provide more elective time during the year to pursue ex. research? Mac's curriculum is quite flexible so students who work smart certainly have time to do horizontal electives or research during the school year. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
McMasterHopeful Posted May 3, 2012 Report Share Posted May 3, 2012 I would argue that if you know what you want to do for residency before you even start medical school - then that's a bit of a red flag. Unless you have family members/some exceptional circumstance it's pretty difficult to go in knowing what you want to do before exploring all specialties and the practice of what you chose before entering. Red flag for what? I am 35 years old and applying to Mac this year. I know I want to go into family medicine for a variety of very specific reasons (maybe a +1 EM but undecided). I do not have family members that are doctors, nor do I have "some exceptional circumstance". I don't see it as a red flag. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
thehumanmacbook Posted May 3, 2012 Report Share Posted May 3, 2012 Mac's curriculum is quite flexible so students who work smart certainly have time to do horizontal electives or research during the school year. What I'm worried about is that people who "work smart" at Mac compared to people who also "work smart" at a four year school, someone with more time to develop the necessary relationships and publications will inevitably have an advantage on the match. There are only two schools with three year programs, and Calg and Mac have had concerning match years in the last few cycles. I'm not trying to hate on any school (I would like to get into Mac or Calg next cycle) but I'm just wondering about what the differences may be. Thanks for answering my questions! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
McMasterHopeful Posted May 3, 2012 Report Share Posted May 3, 2012 Yes you do - you are 35. This is anecdotal evidence but the vast majority of mature applicants want to get to practicing right away and don't have time to tack on a 5 year residency + fellowship. Even if age wasn't a factor you'd basically telling me you know what you want to do for the rest of your life without ever having exposure to said career, and you have chosen this specialty over all the other specialties, which you have also had 0 exposure to, and to top it off, you are pretty confident --> that's what I mean by "red flag". A lot of assumptions my friend. I'm not sure to what end? The length of the residency, be it 2 or 5 years, does not factor in for me or many of the mature med students I have talked to. Labelling someone as a "red flag" without knowing didly about their rationale or their background is premature at best. If it wasn't, admissions decisions could be made based on message board postings. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
atomickitten86 Posted May 3, 2012 Author Report Share Posted May 3, 2012 First I just want to say that I am loving the discussion on this thread. Thank you everyone for your contributions. I think in the end it really relies on what you do with your education. And is that teaching approach/style suited to you. There are arguments towards building networks and doing research. Whether it's 3 years versus 4 years, I don't see how that matters. It's what you do with the time, the decisions you make, the people you meet and connect with etc... everyone will be different, everyone will have a unique path! Some people come in with MSc and PhDs with years of research experience. Personally, coming from a PhD I can only see myself getting my feet wet with more clinical research in a MD program, I just don't see how it could stack up to an entire PhD. Of course whether that PhD research is relevant and the productivity are factors to consider too. I hypothesize that the weaker match rates that McMaster and Calgary students face may be due to 1) certain students who are not maximizing what is being offered to them and/or 2) students coming from a diverse background that may have a huge learning curve ahead of them and are being "rushed" through a MD program (note that some Mac and Calgary students will undoubtedly be very seasoned in the field before entering medical school) and/or 3) certain students going for extremely competitive specialties. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aaronjw Posted May 3, 2012 Report Share Posted May 3, 2012 If you want anything other than family medicine, it is a risk to go to a 3 year program. I'm not saying it is impossible, it is just more difficult given the lack of summers to build a resume, very early elective time (which makes it more difficult to impress), just lack of time, lack of time, lack of time to do anything. Hence, there record high unmatched this year. And what were they in 2010, 2009, 2008, compared to other schools? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aaronjw Posted May 3, 2012 Report Share Posted May 3, 2012 Match rates aren't a good way to assess a school. A school that places 75% of it' candidates in ophtho is better than a school that places 100% of its students in family medicine. There's more to the statistics. I agree, yet the fear mongers still like to throw around useless out of context statistics to try and prove a point. So what are the good ways to assess a school then? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
benhc911 Posted May 4, 2012 Report Share Posted May 4, 2012 Match rates aren't a good way to assess a school. A school that places 75% of it' candidates in ophtho is better than a school that places 100% of its students in family medicine. There's more to the statistics. only if you want to do optho haha and at the end of the day, I think the students play a bigger role than the school... NOSM has had students get into derm and other competitive specialties... but for me, I don't even want a competitive specialty... for me rural medicine is more appealing because of the variety and continuity of care... I do agree with your first statement though, match rates aren't a good way to assess a school... stick to things like clinical experience, location, teaching style, class size etc Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
igeorgex Posted May 4, 2012 Report Share Posted May 4, 2012 just to speak about the time McMaster students get during the year - personally, I feel as if the program gives you HUGE amounts of time throughout the week. a large chunk of it will be spent in tutorial/preparing for tutorial (6 hrs tutorial + ~>6 hrs of preparation), plus 3 hrs clinical skills and 3 hrs professional competencies = 18 mandatory hours. then you've got lecture which is optional (I don't attend because I prefer to watch them at 2x speed at the library), any horizontal electives you're doing, and any interest group events you want to attend (i.e. the Internal Med interest group has an event on stroke identification or something). this leaves many chunks of time free for you to do what you want. I'm not as into doing horizontal electives as my peers, but my class probably averages at least 5 hours of elective time during the week. a lot of the interest group events (held in evenings or weekends) are strong and many people attend. and a lot are doing research as well. I'm probably doing 10-15 hours of research a week now on top of school. it just depends on how you organize your time and being self-directed. the time you'd spend in lecture and reviewing those notes for a test is instead spent reading textbooks and articles to get the same information.. it's tough in that information isn't really handed to you and you have to search for it (which can be frustrating, considering how many resources there are...) but that's what it is. if it takes you longer to consult resources and consolidate information, you'll have more time to spend on tutorial and less time to do other things. you'll get good at it eventually though and thus, free time will appear. there is free time, you just need to take advantage of it while you can (pre-clerkship) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aaronjw Posted May 4, 2012 Report Share Posted May 4, 2012 Clerkship. You want a good school, you go to a school with a solid clerkship program. 1st two years matter s*** all. You can be doing videoconferencing, live lecture, doing pbl whatever - clerkship defines your experience. Getting your top choice residency is about being self-directed. You pick the school that will enable you personally to become competitive, not a school that has historically good match rates on paper. how does one evaluate this from a perspective student POV in deciding where (if given choice) to go? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
holiday1001 Posted May 4, 2012 Report Share Posted May 4, 2012 a concern I have is that due to the lack of summers, how do Mac students get research in? it's difficult to do research without full-time committment for a few months Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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