Why is McMaster's medical school looked down upon?

[daftypatty]

From what I've gathered and heard from people, it seems as though a lot of people are saying that McMasters med school does not prepare students to be great physicians, is there any truths to this? I understand that it is a 3 year program and that it is PBL, but wouldn't one be able to have an education/training equivalent to other med schools if they were to put in the effort and have the self-initiative to become a great physician?... And I'm also wondering how this PBL at McMaster med exactly works..

 

Thoughts?

[Jaybird]

Can't speak to PBL, but I've heard that Mac students are considered to graduate with less experience and knowledge than the 4-year students have.

[kdsnipe35]

To answer this question, well, okay. If you are an undergrad science student at Mac, you will spend plenty of time in this building called MDCL. You will see how little effort med students put in. Also, talk to people who've already got in that aren't of the mindset "oh I'm going to defend my med school because it's where I go". Talk to unbiased students... I have and they tell me the same thing "we learn little to nothing and I am uneasy about going into residency because of it." I'm sure a lot of Mac Med students are going to come on here and destroy me but hey, these are examples of what I have heard from actual students in their 3rd year of medicine at Mac.

[uwopremed]

One of the greatest mysteries out there is that many practicing physicians are not happy with McMaster medical school in general, BUT the match rates for McMaster students is still very high overall. How can that be?

 

Because getting into competitive residencies is as much about social skills and first impressions as it is about knowledge and skill. A staff person may not be keen on McMaster students in general, BUT will treat an individual McMaster elective student as an individual and think of them as an exception when they make a good impression. Later on, however, staff are not impressed with first year residents that graduate from MAC.

 

To be fair, I think that residents that were MAC graduates usually catch up by second year. But ultimately it makes a lot of staff people not happy with how well MAC prepares it students for the first year of residency. But it won't really effect the match rates for MAC students much anyways because residency matches are heavily rated on personality/first impressions (and apparent adequate knowledge) - which MAC students are probably great at.

[kdsnipe35]

It's going to catch up to their match rates soon. The residency directors receives the negative feedback and lets the committees know about the trouble. In no time, their match rates will flounder.

[ygella]

Mac doesn't have traditional, strict 9-5 lectures. Students learn on their own and with their own pace. Therefore there is a lot of freedom and flexibility in mac's teaching/learning style. Because of this, it's easy for students to not put in a lot of time and effort into their studies; no one is pushing you to learn. I think mac thinks that if you have made it this far, you should have the work ethics and the dedication to govern yourself and be disciplined enough to study properly on your own. But of course this, isn't always going to be the case for every students.

As trojjanhorse once said, mac is a fantastic school for those who know what they wanna do and where they wanna go and are disciplined. The flexibility and the freedom makes it easy to gun for the specialty you want. However, if a student doesn't know what they want, then mac isn't an ideal place for them, because mac is not gonna be holding your hand through med school.

[Sarvish]

I volunteer under a few radiologists who frequently have med students/residents, many of them from McMaster. They always tell me that Mac students are really great apart from a few who are some of the worst they've had.

 

The fact is, the Mac system allows for students to just scrape by if they really want and these are the students that leave a bad impression. I have no idea how many of those would be in a class but I can guarantee you that it's not the majority.

 

IMO, you can have an amazing education from Mac if you know what you're doing and make a plan to get there. I have a decent idea of a few specialties I'm interested in and I'm 100% confident that Mac's system will get me where I want to be if I take the initiative. In fact, I think Mac gives me more opportunities than some other schools. As ygella said, if you're absolutely clueless and solely attend lectures, Mac is not going to help you along and you're better off going somewhere else.

 

"we learn little to nothing and I am uneasy about going into residency because of it." is not what I've heard from upper-years. Many of them are incredibly happy with the education they receive. A lot of people tell me they retain information better from PBL than they do from lectures and they're more likely to remember it when they're in clerkship.

 

I'm also of the opinion that match rates aren't a huge deal. UofT had a pretty bad year and no one's really worried. A few bad students can swing it by a few percentage points which is a lot when everyone's already in the 90s. Still, I don't think Mac is in any danger of having their rates "flounder"

 

There are current Mac students on here who can give you a better opinion as all of my knowledge is second-hand.

[uwopremed]

It's going to catch up to their match rates soon. The residency directors receives the negative feedback and lets the committees know about the trouble. In no time, their match rates will flounder.

 

In no time? As in it hasn't floundered after 40 years, but now it will in no time? No, MAC match rates will not flounder.

[TheBoss]

I never attended mac med, but I could see how less than stellar students could get through mac and leave a bad impression more than at other schools.

 

Let's compare mac to another med school that is well known for the freedom and flexibilty it gives it's students - Yale (the "yale system"). I don't know exactly how yale prepares it's students, but they publicize and are known for having almost everything be optional, little to no lectures, and no mandatory exams. That is, students could get through doing almost nothing if they wanted. However, yale doesn't have any reputation for underpreparing it's students, even among it's highly ranked peer group.

 

I suspect the difference is in checks and balances that exist at yale that aren't strong at mac. At yale, there's still inevitably the USMLE that students will want high scores on. As well, and more importantly, academics, including but not limited to GPA+MCAT, are strongly emphasized in yale's admissions system. The idea that students will be self-motivated is true if you get stellar students to begin with. This I expect is true at yale, considering their admissions and rank, but not as much at mac, where only GPA is considered for academics, and someone could squeeze in with a mediocre GPA or a good GPA having taken an easy undergrad (e.g. mac health sci).

[Lost&Found]

Wait what? I never knew MacMed had a reputation for being looked down upon? I mean, because of the 3-year program and PBL, I'd heard that it was often stressful for students to keep up but I didn't realize the quality of the education was in any way "inferior" (for lack of a better word) to traditional 4-year programs...?

[5th time the charm]

as a Mac grad, I attended another school for residency and was on internal medicine my very first rotation. I wish I was more prepared for it and could tell that some of the upper year med students doing their clinical rotation likely knew more than I did as a PGY-1 (it may have been also related to doing internal medicine as my first rotation as a clerk over a year before residency started, its not what I finished clerkship with) and seemed more confident in their clinical skills and writing orders. As a clerk we still had to have our orders co-signed.

 

Would I say now that I really know my medicine, yes and I agree it probably took longer in PGY-1 to get to where some students were already at.

 

At the end of the day for most, the LMCC's get passed, fellowship exams get passed and what really keeps your knowledge base up is lifelong learning and CME and ultimately learning from your patients, no matter where you did your undergrad.

[goleafsgochris]

I went to mac meds. The anatomy and pharmacology is taught atrociously. They need exams for this.

 

Otherwise, we do fine. As a 3rd year resident at Toronto, they do tend to know very well how to function on the wards, and generally come off as incredibly competent...just their anatomy and pharm blows lol

[A-Stark]

Mac doesn't have traditional, strict 9-5 lectures. Students learn on their own and with their own pace. Therefore there is a lot of freedom and flexibility in mac's teaching/learning style. Because of this, it's easy for students to not put in a lot of time and effort into their studies; no one is pushing you to learn. I think mac thinks that if you have made it this far, you should have the work ethics and the dedication to govern yourself and be disciplined enough to study properly on your own. But of course this, isn't always going to be the case for every students.

As trojjanhorse once said, mac is a fantastic school for those who know what they wanna do and where they wanna go and are disciplined. The flexibility and the freedom makes it easy to gun for the specialty you want. However, if a student doesn't know what they want, then mac isn't an ideal place for them, because mac is not gonna be holding your hand through med school.

 

Most schools don't have 9-5 lectures. Usually at Dal we had only one or two; maybe on a busy day there would be three. It's somewhat less in the new "CBL" curriculum, and I don't really know how 2014s just starting residency now will compare to prior year grads. I do think there is something very essential and necessary in teaching strong fundamental anatomy and physiology, but this is increasingly de-emphasized by med education types (many of whom have little or no relevant clinical background).

 

As for Mac, I can relate an anecdote from a staff I worked with recently who did his residency there. He said that Mac students are very "confident", and that this was manifested by a student one day in the OR whose anesthesia staff had left the room for the moment. The surgery team told her they were done, and the student's response was to pull out the endotracheal tube.

[deadlybutterfly]

the problem is that mcmaster accepts more health science students from mcmaster specifically and they do not do much in undergrad and then they come into mac med and can get away with doing nothing too.

[Aetherus]

Is McMaster the only school that has a slightly negative reputation within the medical community?

 

Do certain schools have amaxing reputations?

 

I was under the impression that all schools were essentially equal and would give you a good medical education.

[ygella]

All Canadian medical schools provide very similar quality of education. More than anything it depends on the student. A good student will prosper at McMaster or Toronto.

I guess McMaster just makes it a bit easier to get by with putting in less effort and this may or may not show up in the residency matching rates. If you look at the rates, most schools match pretty well, the difference is quite small.

[oldie]

One of the greatest mysteries out there is that many practicing physicians are not happy with McMaster medical school in general, BUT the match rates for McMaster students is still very high overall. How can that be?

 

Because getting into competitive residencies is as much about social skills and first impressions as it is about knowledge and skill. A staff person may not be keen on McMaster students in general, BUT will treat an individual McMaster elective student as an individual and think of them as an exception when they make a good impression. Later on, however, staff are not impressed with first year residents that graduate from MAC.

 

To be fair, I think that residents that were MAC graduates usually catch up by second year. But ultimately it makes a lot of staff people not happy with how well MAC prepares it students for the first year of residency. But it won't really effect the match rates for MAC students much anyways because residency matches are heavily rated on personality/first impressions (and apparent adequate knowledge) - which MAC students are probably great at.

 

..... a premed who have never even stepped a foot in the world of real medicine posting like as if he/she has seen it all... ridiculous if you ask me

[Sigmund Freud]

I'm rather new to this whole 'medicine/pre-med' thing, so maybe I'm wrong or not in a place to say this, but in my opinion, if McMaster really had anything wrong with its curriculum in terms of it producing 'mediocre' or 'unsatisfactory' MDs, then I suspect that the school would probably be put on probation by the accrediting bodies, which is not the case.

 

As others have said: just my 2 cents.

[rmorelan]

Is McMaster the only school that has a slightly negative reputation within the medical community?

 

Do certain schools have amaxing reputations?

 

I was under the impression that all schools were essentially equal and would give you a good medical education.

 

that is because that impression is correct (in my mind at least )

 

They idea that someone can wow the program directors and get in without appropriate skill is a little dismissive of the skills of program directors and the entire selection process. Also a bit dismissive of the importance of social skills (having good social skills directly makes you a better doctor for that matter. Communication is a core job skill)

 

Mac tries new things, and sometimes people that try new things are frowned upon. That is part of it I think. Also sometimes your run into a Mac student early on their training on away electives (not sure if they changed that - I ran into a very early on Mac resident at Western on gen surg - not a good mix). That created a false picture of skill as few other schools do electives prior to completing significant amounts of core clerkship. That doesn't mean the mac students are worse, just that they are early on. First block clerks anyway are not that great - it is a learning process.

 

Do I prefer standard systems to Mac compressed approach - I do I think. However I think Mac students have a program that if they apply themselves well do become excellent candidates for residency programs (where to be honest most of your real training will take place). The match statistics are a reflection I think of the calibre of candidates, and not some sort of a fluke

[rmorelan]

I'm rather new to this whole 'medicine/pre-med' thing, so maybe I'm wrong or not in a place to say this, but in my opinion, if McMaster really had anything wrong with its curriculum in terms of it producing 'mediocre' or 'unsatisfactory' MDs, then I suspect that the school would probably be put on probation by the accrediting bodies, which is not the case.

 

As others have said: just my 2 cents.

 

well you do have to be careful about that - accreditation only says anything is at minimum standards to continue or higher. It doesn't mean that there isn't variablity of importance in accredited schools.

 

For instance every US school is accredited. Not every school is as good as Harvard or John Hopkins

[Arztin]

Is McMaster the only school that has a slightly negative reputation within the medical community?

 

Do certain schools have amaxing reputations?

 

I was under the impression that all schools were essentially equal and would give you a good medical education.

 

In Quebec, no idea why, but Sherbrooke has somewhat of a worse reputation than the other 3 schools.

The way most people think is that Mcgill is better than UdeM, which is better than ULaval, which is in turn better than USherbrooke.

[mountainaxe46]

I remember having a discussion with an x-ray tech and asked about Mac's reputation. She said that attending and other residents generally view Mac residents as possessing less knowledge. However, she went on to tell me that the patients generally like Mac residents more .

 

I am sure both are anecdotal and pure generalizations.

[NLengr]

The few Mac grads I have in my residency program have done well. It's a small sample but the outcome is positive.

 

Now we are the most desirable program in a competative specialty, so we match our top choices consistently. We aren't gonna rank anyone who isn't outstanding. For less competative programs/specialties where they may have to settle for who they can get, the experience may be different.