Just a Thought About Prestige

[NLengr]

I said this before already. Nevertheless,

 

Toronto and McGill are consistently among the Top 20 schools in the world and arguably the best two schools in Canada. There is a reason why UT and McGill are household names for where I come from originally. Both schools' medical schools (and law schools) rankings are also in the Top 20 in the world, if not in the Top 10.

 

This prestige, however, is mostly built on research (30-50% of global rankings). For the majority of students who aren't interested in academic medicine (research), the ranking becomes irrelevant. Further, I would very much dislike a doctor having a fake sense of elevated prestige when he/she hasn't even contributed to research.

 

Further, no one, quite frankly, care where a student goes for medical school. This is even more pronounced in Canada because people, for better or worse, generally don't see a tiering in our universities. What really matters is where you do your residency. Medical school does NOT train us to be independent doctors. Residency does.

 

I think U of T and McGill being in the top 10 medical schools in the world is a bit of a stretch. They're fine schools, but they aren't Hopkins or anything.

[jerkstore]

Didn't some recent world rankings put Mac ahead of UT?

 

http://fhs.mcmaster.ca/main/news/news_2011/the_world_university_rankings.html

[jerkstore]

I think U of T and McGill being in the top 10 medical schools in the world is a bit of a stretch. They're fine schools, but they aren't Hopkins or anything.

 

Why what does Hopkins teach that McGill doesn't?

[NLengr]

As per HEEACT Ranking, UT's overall (and medicine) rankings are consistently in the Top 10. UToronto was 5th in 2010. Fell to 9th in 2011 I believe... Can't remember.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Performance_Ranking_of_Scientific_Papers_for_World_Universities

 

 

However, as per my post earlier, none of this matters for the majority of medical students. Ranking is mostly (30% or so) based on research. It does not assess the diagnostic acumen or interpersonal skills of fresh-minted MD graduates from a given school. As Jerkstore said, "what does Hopkin teach that McGIll doesnt?" I interviewed at many top American schools for med this year, and the my answer to that is nothing.

 

Having said that, Canadians really need to learn to stand up for themselves. We need to learn to understand/acknowledge how good some of our universities are.

 

You're right about U of T. Didn't realize they had moved up that high in the past few years. McGill isn't even listed for clinical medicine. UBC actually is ranked higher in overall universities.

 

As for what Hopkins teaches that McGill doesn't, you're right, the difference is nothing. But in the same breath, U of Ottawa, Dal and Sask also teach the same stuff.

 

Not that it matters at all for clinical education because 100% of the results are based on research (impact, productivity and excellence). Also due to disagreements about methods and results, they have stopped doing them for 2012.

[LittleDaisy]

Thank you Nlengr for enlighten us about the point of prestige:D

 

Personally, I care more about being a good clinical physician than being an impressive researcher...The prestige of the top 3 med schools in Canada are assessed mainly by their innovative researchs, by no means it measures the clinical side of its med students coming out, which is the most factor according to me. For ex, UdS in Quebec is ranked much further than McGill or UofT, but it trains great physicians who have adaptive bed manners because its early clinical exposure daily and its problem based learning...and btw, Mac is a wonderful med school too, even though it doesn't have many years of history...but it's the med school that invented the MMI:p

 

 

You're right about U of T. Didn't realize they had moved up that high in the past few years. McGill isn't even listed for clinical medicine. UBC actually is ranked higher in overall universities.

 

As for what Hopkins teaches that McGill doesn't, you're right, the difference is nothing. But in the same breath, U of Ottawa, Dal and Sask also teach the same stuff.

 

Not that it matters at all for clinical education because 100% of the results are based on research (impact, productivity and excellence). Also due to disagreements about methods and results, they have stopped doing them for 2012.

[AtomSmasherXVIII]

I looked at the numbers again. These numbers include the percentage of students from each school that got into Optho, Derm, or PRS last year (the top 3 competitive specialties).

 

UT 3.9%

UBC 3.9%

McGill 5.2%

 

Average: 4.333%

 

MB 3.7%

MUN 0%

SK 2.6%

NSOM 0%

 

Average: 1.575%

 

That's like a 3x better chance. If you want a really good specialty, go to a good school. Also, NSOM is crap. That's the moral of the story.

[Typical Premed]

The sample sizes are way too small for these specialties to make any sort of meaningful comparison between schools. For example, at MUN last year nobody applied to derm or ophtho and only 2 applied to plastics.

I looked at the numbers again. These numbers include the percentage of students from each school that got into Optho, Derm, or PRS last year (the top 3 competitive specialties).

 

UT 3.9%

UBC 3.9%

McGill 5.2%

 

Average: 4.333%

 

MB 3.7%

MUN 0%

SK 2.6%

NSOM 0%

 

Average: 1.575%

 

That's like a 3x better chance. If you want a really good specialty, go to a good school. Also, NSOM is crap. That's the moral of the story.

[Milk Carton Mugshot]

I looked at the numbers again. These numbers include the percentage of students from each school that got into Optho, Derm, or PRS last year (the top 3 competitive specialties).

 

UT 3.9%

UBC 3.9%

McGill 5.2%

 

Average: 4.333%

 

MB 3.7%

MUN 0%

SK 2.6%

NSOM 0%

 

Average: 1.575%

 

That's like a 3x better chance. If you want a really good specialty, go to a good school. Also, NSOM is crap. That's the moral of the story.

 

Interesting statistics, but horrifically amateur conclusion. You can't draw that conclusion from those numbers alone. A better comparison would be to compare the success rate (# who got optho derm or PRS/# who ranked optho derm or PRS first) among various universities. Even that wouldn't account for home-school advantage since some of the above schools don't even have optho, derm or PRS residencies so you couldn't conclude that the quality of clerk emerging from those programs is poorer. Not to mention the tiny sample size available.

[AtomSmasherXVIII]

Interesting statistics, but horrifically amateur conclusion. You can't draw that conclusion from those numbers alone. A better comparison would be to compare the success rate (# who got optho derm or PRS/# who ranked optho derm or PRS first) among various universities. Even that wouldn't account for home-school advantage since some of the above schools don't even have optho, derm or PRS residencies so you couldn't conclude that the quality of clerk emerging from those programs is poorer. Not to mention the tiny sample size available.

 

The sample sizes are way too small for these specialties to make any sort of meaningful comparison between schools. For example, at MUN last year nobody applied to derm or ophtho and only 2 applied to plastics.

 

Woah, looks like my post had more than one person running to their Statistics 101 textbooks.

 

You'll find that if you look through the previous years, that the pattern that I noted has repeated itself. It supports the point that better schools give you a better shot at good residency programs, but does not prove it..

[A-Stark]

But the world *is* like that - it's just that the level of statistics knowledge taught in most medical school EBM courses can only charitably be referred to as "basic".

 

Anyway, I disagree that going to the biggest schools necessarily conveys the greatest opportunity (especially when large schools like UBC distribute out their students to much smaller centres). There is a certain tradeoff when a larger class can make it more difficult to get observership/research opportunities, especially in pre-clerkship.

 

The numbers quoted above are problematic mainly in that they don't reflect the number who applied to those programs each year. At my school there have been years where no one even applied to FRCPC Emerg or Ophtho so, understandably, no one matched to them. But this year 3 applied to Plastics and matched to it - about 3% of the class right there!

 

I'm sure that the school you go to has some impact on where you end up going for residency, but much of this is self-selection and the rest is too dependent on individual factors that fluctuate a lot from year-to-year.

[Milk Carton Mugshot]

Woah, looks like my post had more than one person running to their Statistics 101 textbooks.

 

You'll find that if you look through the previous years, that the pattern that I noted has repeated itself. It supports the point that better schools give you a better shot at good residency programs, but does not prove it..

 

I hope you didn't use these stats: http://www.carms.ca/pdfs/2012R1_MatchResults/17_Match%20Results%20of%20Canadian%20Graduates%20by%20Medical%20School%20and%20Discipline_en.pdf

 

You cited that in your first attempt at statistics. That chart says nothing about school of graduation. Its a chart of match results by school of RESIDENCY and discipline. The reason why the numbers are so low for the "crap schools" is because they have very few spots for PRS/derm/optho. All you've shown is that larger medical schools in canada have more residency spots than smaller medical schools. Well done.

 

I wanted to look at the success rates of various schools but i couldn't find any data for match results by school of graduation and discipline on the carms website.

[NLengr]

I'm sure somewhere, some famous stats guy is beating his head off a wall.

 

The main point people need to understand is be better than the competition and you don't need to worry about your medical school. Honestly, being in the top 25% of applicants is way more of an advantage than attending x school.

 

I've seen an equal amount of useless students come out of every school.

 

As I said before, Atomsmasher is a troll, I'm not sure why you would argue with him.

[Milk Carton Mugshot]

I'm sure somewhere, some famous stats guy is beating his head off a wall.

 

The main point people need to understand is be better than the competition and you don't need to worry about your medical school. Honestly, being in the top 25% of applicants is way more of an advantage than attending x school.

 

I've seen an equal amount of useless students come out of every school.

 

As I said before, Atomsmasher is a troll, I'm not sure why you would argue with him.

 

 

Yeah this is the best advice anyone could get on the question. I'm arguing with him because there are a lot of people who read these threads without ever posting (usually me) and it's important to make sure that people aren't mislead by bad statistics which can often seem more compelling than good rhetoric. The OP's dilemma isn't likely to be unique among premeds. If it is true that attending more prestigious medical schools increases ones odds of matching to a competitive specialty then we should honestly say that but, since there is no evidence at all to suggest that students from smaller medical schools do worse, we need to make sure than no-one forgoes the opportunity to attend a less prestigious medical school believing that only students from larger schools have a good chance of matching to what they want.

[1234]

I looked at the numbers again. These numbers include the percentage of students from each school that got into Optho, Derm, or PRS last year (the top 3 competitive specialties).

 

UT 3.9%

UBC 3.9%

McGill 5.2%

 

Average: 4.333%

 

MB 3.7%

MUN 0%

SK 2.6%

NSOM 0%

 

Average: 1.575%

 

That's like a 3x better chance. If you want a really good specialty, go to a good school. Also, NSOM is crap. That's the moral of the story.

 

You should probably change your career pursuit to something more achievable for someone of your intellectual capacity, like shovelling **** or something.

[leviathan]

Woah, looks like my post had more than one person running to their Statistics 101 textbooks.

 

You'll find that if you look through the previous years, that the pattern that I noted has repeated itself. It supports the point that better schools give you a better shot at good residency programs, but does not prove it..

It neither proves nor supports it. You are using incorrect data and drawing conclusions from it that aren't logically related.

[jbm10]

I looked at the numbers again. These numbers include the percentage of students from each school that got into Optho, Derm, or PRS last year (the top 3 competitive specialties).

 

UT 3.9%

UBC 3.9%

McGill 5.2%

 

Average: 4.333%

 

MB 3.7%

MUN 0%

SK 2.6%

NSOM 0%

 

Average: 1.575%

 

That's like a 3x better chance. If you want a really good specialty, go to a good school. Also, NSOM is crap. That's the moral of the story.

 

I never heard of 'NSOM', but I was under the impression NOSM has had a 100% match rate every year....so none must have applied to those specialties.

[rmorelan]

I never heard of 'NSOM', but I was under the impression NOSM has had a 100% match rate every year....so none must have applied to those specialties.

 

sure - NOSM courts students who are more likely to take specailities that are in demand in rural areas. There is a selection bias therefore that goes against comparing the number of their graduates going to the specialities mentioned. Does that mean that NOSM is an inferior school - of course not, it just means that students hoping to do there have different goals

[AtomSmasherXVIII]

You should probably change your career pursuit to something more achievable for someone of your intellectual capacity, like shovelling **** or something.

 

Way to handle this in a calm, collected manner.

 

I make a mistake reading a chart and everyone goes insane. If I was trolling, this would be gold. Haha.

[apache]

looks like ill have to go back to my spss for doing stats on psych papers being sent to scientific journals… oh shoot, stats isn't even relevant here… this is research methods, you need a psychologist, epidemiologist, or statistician pronto, they deal with the nebulous stuff where you need 400 level courses in research methods/stats… lol, sorry I'm kidding, but be nice, it's not hard, believe me, there'll always be someone who knows more than u do… lol, i laugh at how bad most people are with research methods yet an epidemiologist, statistician would probably think i'm a moron, and comparatively, be right.

 

i'll use a word for proposition 1: self-selection

 

proposition 1 means no random distribution, which means it doesn't even "support" your idea, remember if b follows a, a's appearance means there must be be, but b's appearance doesn't necessitate the predicate, since many other things could also cause b, maybe another rule is if c exist's, b will follow. in english: students going to good schools is the a, matching better is the b… self-selection could be the c… so maybe the appearance of b is caused by self selection, and not a, the school.

 

wow, formal logic is useful… i didn't even have to write an essay… btw original guy was right, look up "statistical power"… there are so many other confounds too, the varying time periods of each group of 2…

 

for that last point, an example we could look to learn from is the flynn effect and iq testing, lol.

 

that concludes class, cheers.

 

Woah, looks like my post had more than one person running to their Statistics 101 textbooks.

 

You'll find that if you look through the previous years, that the pattern that I noted has repeated itself. It supports the point that better schools give you a better shot at good residency programs, but does not prove it..

[apache]

haha, i missed this, i try and be succinct, but i suck, thoughts just keep coming to mind... i should just send my posts to u and u can chop 80 percent out

 

sure - NOSM courts students who are more likely to take specailities that are in demand in rural areas. There is a selection bias therefore that goes against comparing the number of their graduates going to the specialities mentioned. Does that mean that NOSM is an inferior school - of course not, it just means that students hoping to do there have different goals

[aaronjw]

I was deeply afraid to enter this thrad when I saw muse was the last poster for fear of giant wall of unrecognizable text but I was pleasantly surprised

[NutritionRunner]

sure - NOSM courts students who are more likely to take specailities that are in demand in rural areas. There is a selection bias therefore that goes against comparing the number of their graduates going to the specialities mentioned. Does that mean that NOSM is an inferior school - of course not, it just means that students hoping to do there have different goals

 

I was just about to post this myself. NOSM attempts to select students who are more likely to practice in rural areas. As a result NOSM students are more likely to be interested in rural medicine and the specialties required in those areas.

 

From what I understand, NOSM's match rate has been 100% for many years, so clearly their students are successful at matching to specialties of interest to them.

 

Not everyone wants a ROAD specialty, or any of the other competitive specialties.

[A-Stark]

Well, no, because nothing in probability or statistical theory requires the assumption that humans operate according to known and robust deterministic principles or that individual variation is negligible. The problem, arguably, is that clinical epidemiologists and physicians lack the depth of knowledge of guys like this. The level of stats taught in med school is almost impossibly superficial and I could frighten half my class simply by writing an integral of an arbitrary function on a white board.

 

It's certainly true that some questions are not amenable to randomization or controlled trials of any kind for ethical or practical reasons, but that's not the real problem with EBM. The real problem is that many physicians are innumerate, at least somewhat due to the amount of complaining they do as students at having to learn any level of statistics.

[apache]

I /3 you, lol. Medicine changes, being able to interpret change means you'll still know medicine 15 years after grad .

 

The problem, arguably, is that clinical epidemiologists and physicians lack the depth of knowledge of guys like this. The level of stats taught in med school is almost impossibly superficial and I could frighten half my class simply by writing an integral of an arbitrary function on a white board.

 

It's certainly true that some questions are not amenable to randomization or controlled trials of any kind for ethical or practical reasons, but that's not the real problem with EBM. The real problem is that many physicians are innumerate, at least somewhat due to the amount of complaining they do as students at having to learn any level of statistics.