101 Things You Wish You Knew Before Starting Medical School

333 Replies

Simple enough, here are 101 things you wish you knew before starting medical school.

  1. If I had known what it was going to be like, I would never have done it.
  2. You’ll study more than you ever have in your life.
  3. Only half of your class will be in the top 50%. You have a 50% chance of being in the top half of your class. Get used to it now.
  4. You don’t need to know anatomy before school starts. Or pathology. Or physiology.
  5. Third year rotations will suck the life out you.
  6. Several people from your class will have sex with each other. You might be one of the lucky participants.
  7. You may discover early on that medicine isn’t for you.
  8. You don’t have to be AOA or have impeccable board scores to match somewhere – only if you’re matching into radiology.
  9. Your social life may suffer some.
  10. Pelvic exams are teh suck.

  11. You won’t be a medical student on the surgery service. You’ll be the retractor bitch.
  12. Residents will probably ask you to retrieve some type of nourishment for them.
  13. Most of your time on rotations will be wasted. Thrown away. Down the drain.
  14. You’ll work with at least one attending physician who you’ll want to beat the shit out of.
  15. You’ll work with at least three residents who you’ll want to beat the shit out of.
  16. You’ll ask a stranger about the quality of their stools.
  17. You’ll ask post-op patients if they’ve farted within the last 24 hours.
  18. At some point during your stay, a stranger’s bodily fluids will most likely come into contact with your exposed skin.
  19. Somebody in your class will flunk out of medical school.
  20. You’ll work 14 days straight without a single day off. Probably multiple times.
  21. A student in your class will have sex with an attending or resident.
  22. After the first two years are over, your summer breaks will no longer exist. Enjoy them as much as you can.
  23. You’ll be sleep deprived.
  24. There will be times on certain rotations where you won’t be allowed to eat.
  25. You will be pimped.
  26. You’ll wake up one day and ask yourself is this really what you want out of life.
  27. You’ll party a lot during the first two years, but then that pretty much ends at the beginning of your junior year.
  28. You’ll probably change your specialty of choice at least 4 times.
  29. You’ll spend a good deal of your time playing social worker.
  30. You’ll learn that medical insurance reimbursement is a huge problem, particularly for primary care physicians.
  31. Nurses will treat you badly, simply because you are a medical student.
  32. There will be times when you’ll be ignored by your attending or resident.
  33. You will develop a thick skin. If you fail to do this, you’ll cry often.
  34. Public humiliation is very commonplace in medical training.
  35. Surgeons are assholes. Take my word for it now.
  36. OB/GYN residents are treated like shit, and that shit runs downhill. Be ready to pick it up and sleep with it.
  37. It’s always the medical student’s fault.
  38. Gunner is a derogatory word. It’s almost as bad as racial slurs.
  39. You’ll look forward to the weekend, not so you can relax and have a good time but so you can catch up on studying for the week.
  40. Your house might go uncleaned for two weeks during an intensive exam block.
  41. As a medical student on rotations, you don’t matter. In fact, you get in the way and impede productivity.
  42. There’s a fair chance that you will be physically struck by a nurse, resident, or attending physician. This may include slapped on the hand or kicked on the shin in order to instruct you to “move” or “get out of the way.”
  43. Any really bad procedures will be done by you. The residents don’t want to do them, and you’re the low man on the totem pole. This includes rectal examinations and digital disimpactions.
  44. You’ll be competing against the best of the best, the cream of the crop. This isn’t college where half of your classmates are idiots. Everybody in medical school is smart.
  45. Don’t think that you own the world because you just got accepted into medical school. That kind of attitude will humble you faster than anything else.
  46. If you’re in it for the money, there are much better, more efficient ways to make a living. Medicine is not one of them.
  47. Anatomy sucks. All of the bone names sound the same.
  48. If there is anything at all that you’d rather do in life, do not go into medicine.
  49. The competition doesn’t end after getting accepted to medical school. You’ll have to compete for class rank, awards, and residency. If you want to do a fellowship, you’ll have to compete for that too.
  50. You’ll never look at weekends the same again.
  51. VA hospitals suck. Most of them are old, but the medical records system is good.
  52. Your fourth year in medical school will be like a vacation compared to the first three years. It’s a good thing too, because you’ll need one.
  53. Somebody in your class will be known as the “highlighter whore.” Most often a female, she’ll carry around a backpack full of every highlighter color known to man. She’ll actually use them, too.
  54. Rumors surrounding members of your class will spread faster than they did in high school.
  55. You’ll meet a lot of cool people, many new friends, and maybe your husband or wife.
  56. No matter how bad your medical school experience was at times, you’ll still be able to think about the good times. Kind of like how I am doing right now.
  57. Your first class get-together will be the most memorable. Cherish those times.
  58. Long after medical school is over, you’ll still keep in contact with the friends you made. I do nearly every day.
  59. Gunners always sit in the front row. This rule never fails. However, not everyone who sits in the front row is a gunner.
  60. There will be one person in your class who’s the coolest, most laid back person you’ve ever met. This guy will sit in the back row and throw paper airplanes during class, and then blow up with 260+ Step I’s after second year. True story.
  61. At the beginning of first year, everyone will talk about how cool it’s going to be to help patients. At the end of third year, everybody will talk about how cool it’s going to be to make a lot of money.
  62. Students who start medical school wanting to do primary care end up in dermatology. Those students who start medical school wanting to do dermatology end up in family medicine.
  63. Telling local girls at the bar that you’re a medical student doesn’t mean shit. They’ve been hearing that for years. Be more unique.
  64. The money isn’t really that good in medicine. Not if you look at it in terms of hours worked.
  65. Don’t wear your white coat into the gas station, or any other business that has nothing to do with you wearing a white coat. You look like an ass, and people do make fun of you.
  66. Don’t round on patients that aren’t yours. If you round on another student’s patients, that will spread around your class like fire after a 10 year drought. Your team will think you’re an idiot too.
  67. If you are on a rotation with other students, don’t bring in journal articles to share with the team “on the fly” without letting the other students know. This makes you look like a gunner, and nobody likes a gunner. Do it once, and you might as well bring in a new topic daily. Rest assured that your fellow students will just to show you up.
  68. If you piss off your intern, he or she can make your life hell.
  69. If your intern pisses you off, you can make his or her life hell.
  70. Don’t try to work during medical school. Live life and enjoy the first two years.
  71. Not participating in tons of ECs doesn’t hurt your chances for residency. Forget the weekend free clinic and play some Frisbee golf instead.
  72. Don’t rent an apartment. If you can afford to, buy a small home instead. I saved $200 per month and had roughly $30,000 in equity by choosing to buy versus rent.
  73. Your family members will ask you for medical advice, even after your first week of first year.
  74. Many of your friends will go onto great jobs and fantastic lifestyles. You’ll be faced with 4 more years of debt and then at least 3 years of residency before you’ll see any real earning potential.
  75. Pick a specialty based around what you like to do.
  76. At least once during your 4 year stay, you’ll wonder if you should quit.
  77. It’s amazing how fast time flies on your days off. It’s equally amazing at how slow the days are on a rotation you hate.
  78. You’ll learn to be scared of asking for time off.
  79. No matter what specialty you want to do, somebody on an unrelated rotation will hold it against you.
  80. A great way to piss of attendings and residents are to tell them that you don’t plan to complete a residency.
  81. Many of your rotations will require you to be the “vitals bitch.” On surgery, you’ll be the “retractor bitch.”
  82. Sitting around in a group and talking about ethical issues involving patients is not fun.
  83. If an attending or resident treats you badly, call them out on it. You can get away with far more than you think.
  84. Going to class is generally a waste of time. Make your own schedule and enjoy the added free time.
  85. Find new ways to study. The methods you used in college may or may not work. If something doesn’t work, adapt.
  86. Hospitals smell bad.
  87. Subjective evaluations are just that – subjective. They aren’t your end all, be all so don’t dwell on a poor evaluation. The person giving it was probably an asshole, anyway.
  88. Some physicians will tell you it’s better than it really is. Take what you hear (both positive and negative) with a grain of salt.
  89. 90% of surgeons are assholes, and 63% of statistics are made up. The former falls in the lucky 37%.
  90. The best time of your entire medical school career is between the times when you first get your acceptance letter and when you start school.
  91. During the summer before medical school starts, do not attempt to study or read anything remotely related to medicine. Take this time to travel and do things for you.
  92. The residents and faculty in OB/GYN will be some of the most malignant personalities you’ve ever come into contact with.
  93. Vaginal deliveries are messy. So are c-sections. It’s just an all-around blood fest if you like that sort of thing.
  94. Despite what the faculty tell you, you don’t need all of the fancy equipment that they suggest for you to buy. All you need is a stethoscope. The other equipment they say you “need” is standard in all clinic and hospital exam rooms. If it’s not standard, your training hospital and clinics suck.
  95. If your school has a note taking service, it’s a good idea to pony up the cash for it. It saves time and gives you the option of not attending lecture.
  96. Medicine is better than being a janitor, but there were times when I envied the people cleaning the hospital trash cans.
  97. Avoid surgery like the plague.
  98. See above and then apply it to OB/GYN as well.
  99. The money is good in medicine, but it’s not all that great especially considering the amount of time that you’ll have to work.
  100. One time an HIV+ patient ripped out his IV and then “slung” his blood at the staff in the room. Go, go infectious disease.
  101. Read Med School Hell now, throughout medical school, and then after you’re done. Then come back and tell me how right I am.

333 thoughts on “101 Things You Wish You Knew Before Starting Medical School”

  2. Halgos

    Listen:

    Medicine is opportunity cost. The training is not worth the time and effort if the money out the back end isnt good.

    Sure, you premeds and pollyannas can whine about helping people, but a doctor will never help the health of as many people as those janitors. Why dont you go be janitors? Because youre looking for external validation, and an MD is how you do it. Get over it. Get real.

    Fuck obgyn too. Babies are gross.

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  3. Up and Coming

    Yea i completely agree with what Hyperbole says. My cousin immigrated to the USA from Iran to pursue med school at University of Maryland a while ago. She is now making 250K a year with a fucking GREEN CARD(she isnt even a citizen), and just gave birth to her third child. I looked at this site a while ago and showed it to her; she laughed her ass off, telling me that half the crap written here is complete bogus and exaggeration. I cant beleive this fuck-up of a site almost deterred me from pursuing medicine… lol. going to college next year, and i hope some retards wanting to pursue medicine come across this site and decide to do something else. Less competition, better for me.

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  5. ResignedYetOptimistic

    A couple reasons why, in spite of the difficulties, those of you who have chosen medicine might want to give thanks:

    -MANY, MANY people work 60+ hours per week in very shiteous working conditions for a LOT LESS money. For example, opting for what I though would be the path to “quick riches” + work/life balance, I went to work as an engineer in the semiconductor industry after school. While the pay was decent ($94k after three years), the job was pure, unattenuated hell. My first two years on the job, I was on the road 80% of the time, working 90 – 100 hour work weeks in fabs where devices are made, swathed head-to-toe in a Gore-Tex or polyester bunny suit with my nose and mouth covered in a surgical-type mask (12-16 hours in a Gore-Tex/polyester suit + face mask in a hot fab is very uncomfortable and in Asia they are too cheap to provide every visiting engineer with his/her own suit and only wash the cleanroom suits 1x/week, so you have to SHARE with other engineers – that is you are forced to wear a suit and booties that have been previously baptized in a stranger’s body and foot sweat), subject to deafening noise (the equipment in a fab is LOUD)and dehydrating, skin-parching constant laminar airflow, surrounded by hazardous, carcinogenic chemical vapors, separated by water and bathroom facilities by a half-mile or more (walk to go
    owning room, degown, empty bladder,re-hydrate, regown, etc…), bathed in light that is the color of the super-concentrated urine (found in litho areas to keep the photoresist from developing early – 16 hours in piss yellow light is unnatural and psychosis-inducing), I could go on but for the sake of brevity, I’ll stop. The salary in this profession maxes out at about $110-120k.

    -Assholes ABOUND in every profession because the ratio of assholes (AH) to non-assholes in this world is large and ever-increasing; therefore, it makes more sense to work in a profession that is (high-paying + AH) than one that is (lower-paying + AH). I’m sorry for being so cynical but after four years as a working professional and listening to the work-related anecdotes of friends in other professions, I firmly believe this to be true. In spite of degrees in both engineering and science, there was a very large learning curve I had to climb on the job. I had a panoply of personalites who helped make the climb as unpleasant as it could be: the experienced engineer who once cursed me out in a meeting and screamed that I was asking too many questions, the withholders – you know the type – ass-clenching grip on everything they know, heaven forbid they should crap out a little nugget of knowledge, won’t share any information with you; the scatter-brained manager who requests you turn left then critisizes you for not turning right, the lazy assholes who do 1/2 the work and take 150% of the credit, the saboteur, the oleaginous shitheads who can design amazing things but are so severely socially retarded that they cannot grasp the simple concept that sexually-suggestive comments (esp. those directed to unappreciative parties) are not appropriate at work.

    -MDs much less likely to be outsourced or laid-off.

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  6. Physician by Choice

    For those thinking about medical school but questioning if they can/want to “put up with all this” to be a Doctor:

    The list is entertaining humor but just that.
    Yes, there is a little truth in each of those choice items. Medical school is, for some, a game. Don’t hate the players. The only real competition is yourself. Life: your results may vary. Enjoy it anyway. The alternative is not as good. Really enjoy it if you can. Don’t like it? Change it. Work at it. Enjoy it.

    Ask me 10 times if I would be a physician again: Yes X 10. Ask me 100 times. Same answer. Yes.

    This profession:

    1. Let’s me use my brain for immediate improvement in another person’s life, whether it is now or an investment for their future.
    2. Is extremely interesting with more than you can learn in a lifetime/multiple lifetimes.
    3. Is always changing
    4. Has taken me all over the world
    5. Puts us in the top 1% of income in the US and even higher for that of the world. I don’t worry about money. Never have. Don’t need to. Don’t do it for the money, though. I don’t need the greatest car, just one that will get me where I want to go. Go into a Profession because you enjoy it. Go into it like it is an adventure. Because it is. Some adventures actually pay well too.
    6. Is an absolute GOLD CARD for meeting and working with other intelligent, effective and professional persons in a multitude of different professions outside of Medicine.
    7. Will bring you Good Karma when you do Good.
    8. Is VERY doable. You will feel like you are drinking from a firehose but you will get some of it and you will get what you need to do quite well.
    9. Gives you back more than what you put into it.
    10. You have the opportunity to use all your talents, your creativity, your ability to work hard, your thoughtfulness, your tenacity and your humor. All that for something good.

    Personally, I’ve been to every continent except for Antartica (next), faster than the speed of sound and got paid to do it, delivered many babies and attended good deaths, fixed broken bones, found disease early and treated it, had multiple people tell me I saved their life (and because I listened to what I was taught in school, I actually did have a hand in helping to save their life), learned new languages (Medicine included), played in multiple bands (now I can actually afford a good instrument) through school and residency, enjoyed medical school and now have a lifetime of other experiences that I am humbled by and that I know came to me because of folks giving back to me what I gave to them or vice versa. And I have (I hope) another 20 or so years of work (and good experiences from work) to go!

    Add in that most people hold you in high regard and actually listen to your advice. Add in that you can work in almost any location on the planet (with the proper arrangements). You don’t like the place? Move on. Want a change. Move. Like the place and people. Stay.

    Add in that your family will support you if you support them and that you will make many, many friends for life.

    Ask me again: Yep, sign me up again. Wouldn’t trade it for the world.

    You don’t want to do this? Hey, that is great. Whatever you do, do it well.

    Physician for 17 years now. 20+ years of excellent fun work to go.

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  7. Brad

    Of course its a lot of work.

    If it wasn’t a lot of work, everybody would do it.

    It being a lot is what makes it great!

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  9. Mike

    Another one: In your first patient interview as a first year medical student, trying to exercise too much compassion and asking the alert, non-distressed patient if he needs anything, will instantly turn you into the patient’s bitch. Conduct your interview, make non-descript compassionate statements or furrow your brow if necessary, and get the hell out of there!

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  11. happy path resident

    “House of God” should be required reading for all medical students…it’s the bible for all doctors.

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  12. William Osler

    The practice of medicine will be very much as you make it – to one a worry, a care, a perpetual annoyance; to another, a daily job and a life of as much happiness and usefulness as can well fall the lot of man, because it is a life of self-sacrifice and of countless opportunities to comfort and help the weak-hearted, and to raise up those that fall.

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    1. Hoover Post author

      Osler didn’t have to worry about decreased Medicare reimbursements or insurance non-payment.

      Osler got paid with two prized hens and one hog for saving a life. Physicians today get paid in US Dollars.

      Your argument is useless.

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      1. Mitra

        Hoover, why did you even go to medical school? Didn’t you know it will be challenging before you apply? But hey some people like medicine and some don’t.

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          1. Onegai

            Hoover – all these people who say otherwise are ignorant fools. a true medical student (which I am) will agree with you 100%. every point, specially #1, is dead on correct. #11 is pretty hilarious.. and sadly very true.

      2. Adam

        Doctors are some of the biggest whiners in the professional world. They all think they are under paid even tho they are the highest paid profession oh and news flash tons of people work long hours and despite how talented you think you are most likely you couldn’t make more money in a different profession so please either stop your whining or change careers

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          1. TDG

            Dear young-inexperienced-all-knowing-pre-med-undergraduate student,
            You can talk all you want about how great the medical profession is and how people you know are doctors and blah-blah-blah like every other young-inexperienced-all-knowing-pre-med-undergraduate student, but you have no idea what your in for. Good luck getting accepted and good luck when medical school beats every bit of self-confidence, sanity, joy and happiness out of your life.

        2. Onegai

          Dear young grasshopper,

          FYI – we ARE underpaid. If you do the math properly in considering how much annual salaries are versus how many hours residents work per day per week per month per year after year after year… we’re paid something like 40 cents an hour. Do the math youngling. Speak your mind after you’ve walked the path of a medical student. This is exactly why us doctors/medical students are in a world of our own – people will never understand until they’ve walked in our shoes.

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          1. liberated!

            it’s even worse in residency—it’s like 0.5 cents an hour (and like 50% of that is going back toward loans)
            DOES ANYONE KNOW HOW MUCH THE MONTHLY LOAN PAYMENTS ARE ON MED SCHOOL DEBT?????!!!!
            when I was pre-med I never even so much as investigated this. i was SUCH an idiot. DO THE MATH!!! Yeah, not in it for the money until you see how unbelievably yes, underpaid, you are. You make less than people in fast-food.
            A lot of schools now you will graduate with over 150K in debt (some are 320K in debt for four years!! 80K per year dammit!)
            that amounts to a 1500/month loan repayment program and the 7.9% interest KEEPS ACCRUING DAILY!! YOU DO THE MATH! (credit card interest is 12-22% mind you so this is a very high interest rate—a home loan is 3.4% right now!!)
            when you are in residency making 30K then how much money is left-over for your living expenses after making this monthly repayment?
            if you go into primary care—and you make 110K per year, dont forget that loan repayment over 20 years PLUS malpractice and all the other costs you will incur to stay in business.
            Honestly, you’ll make like 40K per year in your pocket for working 60-80 hours per week. And add to that all the stress of the job, which you can’t even put a value on.
            You can’t have kids you can’t afford them……PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE:
            DONT BE STUPID WAKE UP AND SMELL THE COFFEE!!!
            no wonder people are so miserable……..

    2. Osler

      You’re right. Having done it and had time to reflect, I’ve come to the conclusion that it’s not patients, lawyers, insurance companies, drug companies, or anything else that’s wrong with the system. It’s the little !%)_(@*$ maladjusted science geeks who grew up to be my colleagues and the system they created.

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      1. John C.

        Not science geeks. People who feel that they are not good enough unless they become a medical doctor perpetuates the system.

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  13. Anonymous

    Thank you, Hoover, for this list. As a cynic, I appreciate it for its mix of humor and tell-it-like-it-is reality. I was considering applying for med school, but after reading this and other blogs and forums about medical school, I’ve decided it’s not my calling.

    I don’t really care that other people are saying this was written by a pansy so no one should use it as a decision for or against med school, because honestly, for 1) I don’t think it is, and 2) I’m quite the pansy myself. I’m tired of reading stories about how rewarding everything is. No one enjoys doing rectal exams and digital disimpactions. So, thanks for this.

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  14. alexisme

    wow, you people are what shes talking about!!! i doubt all of you are over worked pre med students. relax and enjoy ungrad. like seriously, am i the only person that though half of these were funny? true but funny.

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  15. Natalee

    I’m doig med school in Jamaica, jah kno star…whoever wrote this article is bang on target….lots of laughs but the whole thing, sadly, is downright truthful….sigh…there are saner, less depressing, less traitorous, more grateful, less demanding ways of doing something with your life…..

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  16. Joe nurse

    Thanx alot of this, i ahve been very confused lately, trying to decide if i wnat to stay an Rn or get into med-school.
    This has helped me to review the rigors of med-school and then the profession itself. Its not worth it.
    Nursing is not any better either, u deal with people that are not happy being were they are, hosp, clinic, nursing home, usually as a last resort, have to deal with bitchy dr.s’, nurses, etc & stand on your feet for 8hrs/day for about 250$ /day? Then there’s cleaning up poop, vomitt, urine etc, iam gettting out of this ‘medical field’ deal.

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  17. Med Student 009

    First of all, saying the worst thing about being on call every other night is missing 1/2 of the cases is the douchey-est thing I’ve ever heard in my life.
    Secondly, this post is true. The reason med school sucks is that you are competing against the best students in the country who are willing to do just about anything to do better than you. What’s more is that med school is completely memorization…any concepts can be easily learned by just about anyone. This means the good students are the ones that obsessively study or have amazing memories. They may not be the smartest, but they are the best students.
    Another point is that while they are the best students, they are also mostly the most socially retarded people you will ever know. A lot of the residents and attendings are the same way. It’s hard to respect a lot of the people you contact on a day-to-day basis and it’s even harder to have to do what they say.

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    1. x med student

      From one x medical student to another you are dead-on accurate about most of everything you point out!!! I was extremely competitive as a college undergraduate student and when I found acceptance into a medical school (the year after I finished my undergraduate college) I first felt like heaven had sent me several of the closest stars to our planet. The bitter pill that I swallow almost every passing memory of my time spent in taking all of those tough classes and doing all of that work is that had I trusted my timing instincts, I might of had a little more fun my senior year of undergrad before going, and subsequent sucess in med. school; I quite possibly was a simple case of someone “burning” out of scholastic steam and psychological push and effort. I’m the person you mention in the medical school stories who flunked out of the program by the third year and it really is quite like you say and then some. Those who make it through really do deserve almost every dime that they can make by qualifying to be a doctor by going through all the med. school hell! In my humble opinion (roughly after second year to third year) smart to strongly above average college undergraduate students undergo a type of “personality transformation” into being so competivly driven by the required curriculum (and types of people that they are around) that they are not able to be idealistic as they originally planned before med. school. The personal feelings that are involved in this process must be experienced to be understood.

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  18. Alicia

    Thank you for this list! As a future medical student in highscool this really provided some insight into what to expect. However, after reading I can not imagine why people have such negative comments towards med school. So you have a little less time to waste, little less sleep, have to try harder to work with certain people; cry me a river!

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    1. Alicia

      By the way, I’m not saying this as a naive teenager thinking a life in medicine is a breeze. I’m saying this as someone who has experienced the “difficult” things in life and knows that some people have real problems. You may think it is “hell” having to work 12 hour days for 14 days straight, well atleast you are getting paid!

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      1. Andrea

        This may have been the most pessimistic post I have ever read. To anyone considering med school, take this with a grain of salt. Everyone is different and have different goals and values for their lives. I would also like to know where this person finished in his class as well as which field he pursued in the end. Oh and where he works because I would never want someone who has this kind of a view on life to be in charge of mine.

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        1. medstudent2

          thanks for the post! it’s hilarious! it’s written from a med student perspective, and it’s his reality. maybe Andrea is not a med student? if she was, she would be laughing out loud at some of these. most people start out wanting to “help people” but the sheer hell and torture of school for most of us hard-working students really sucks the life out of you. So good luck finding a doctor who didn’t have similar experiences during medical school. It’s part of the process of being a good doctor. if you aren’t suffering as a med student, i don’t want you as my doctor one day. ;-)

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      2. MDwithanAK

        1) You don’t get paid to be a medical student. Typically you pay about the salary of a nurse to be present.

        2) I’m a student coming in on the end of my 3rd year. I love medicine and want to do it.

        3) you are hoplessly naive. Don’t take this as a slam. It’s just that everyone thinks that they have had “adversity” in life. I did too. Then I realize I didn’t know what hard work is. You think a 12-14 hour day is what I worry about? If only life were so easy. I’m on 60 of the next 84 hours right now. I’ve held a retractor in place for 8 hours straight. There are things you simply do not know. Was all this worth it? yes. Do I love working in medicine? yes. Do I understand every person who wants to tell the attending to ram the retractor up their own ass and go home and never come back despite the weight of debt and wasted years? yes. I have never wanted to quit. I am an extreme rarity. I have not yet talked to any of my classmates who has not wanted to quit and most think I am lying if I tell them I have not had a similar experience at some point.

        4) this post was funny beacuse there was so much in it that is true. If you think it is pessimistic, then medicine is not the field for you. This is just a day in the life.

        Reply ↓
        1. MDwithanAK

          Oh and by the way, I think the reason that I have not thought of quitting is just because I have a good memory. I have had a much easier time that most people and have spent less than half the average time studying.

          Reply ↓
          1. J

            Bit of hope! I’m an undergrad with exceptional memory….that has helped me in school and I really hope it helps three years from now in med school…provided i get in!

  21. Jonar

    This is just so funny and true. Nearly finished first year of med school, can already see where ya coming from. Just hilarious!

    Reply ↓

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  23. sarah

    haha…i read this before i started (in 2005) and thought “geez, this guy is whack!” after reading it 5 years in (1 more year to go, its a 6-year program over here), i thought “omg, this is so true.”

    Reply ↓
  24. Bill

    man, this is so f*ckin true. i wish i knew these things before i went to med school. now i m stuck in here, i cant find enough courage to graduate and i cant get back my time spent in this freaking school. damn.
    if guys like me and like the author of this article, will ever save a life, it will be because we persuaded at least one or two guys not to go to med school.
    if you are smart enough to love and enjoy life, then freaking medicine is not for you.
    if your only way to make money is by memorizing thousands of pages and by talking to sick people about their farts and their urine, then you are tailormade for medicine. enjoy it.
    i know i wont.
    i just dont know how to get out of it now that time has passed.

    Reply ↓
  25. kasturi

    shud i quit from medical school???? will be thinking about it at least once????
    i think of it almost everyday… sometime i juz wake up in the morning wondering, what am i doin here…
    i even thot that i will never even grad, will never be able to plan managements….
    feel like the biggest idiot in the whole world when u juz cant recall the simplest facts in medicine…
    but i have no idea how i made it up to end of 4th year.. thinking of housemanship in another 1 year is DAMN SCARY….

    Reply ↓
  27. Ruwan

    great…… I am a surgical registrar(resident) from Srilanka.. This just reminded me of my med school life… almost everything is true….. That about surgeons tooo……………………………………………..

    Reply ↓
  28. graceeee

    lol pretty darn funny…
    it went from “horrible things about med school” to “do’s and dont’s”
    but still useful
    thanks

    Reply ↓
  29. joy

    even though most what u’ve said is true .. I would still choose the medical school .. a one smile of a poor patient ..worth it .. and this is what med school is about .. if u can give up ur whole life to this goal ..then its not the right place for u …

    Reply ↓
  30. John C

    Hate is love.
    Black is white.

    We live in an inverting universe.

    The way our sensory tracts target the opposite side of the brain is proof of this.

    So, those people who put on the white coats, thinking themselves to be protectors of life,
    They become the agents of darkness, dealing death through medical mistakes,
    and suffering to their patients through iatrogenic illnesses.

    There is a reason why God made medical training hard,
    Because he’s trying to tell you that what you sow in this lifetime, you will reap in your next life.

    If in this life, you put on the white coat and cause death, or deal unnecessary suffering (ie. recommending unnecessary and unneeded surgeries, giving out drugs which you have no clue as to the toxic effects that have never been studied), in your next life, you will suffer just the same under different white-coated hands.

    Reply ↓
  31. Jason

    Some of this true, with the blaring exception being that Surgeons are assholes. Surgeons are very focused, and sometimes don’t think about how things they do or say might be interpreted by sensitive medical students, including myself, admittedly, but to say that they are assholes is far from the truth.

    Reply ↓
  32. Michaael

    Dude, you are God! I agree with 99% of the stuff you mentioned. It IS TRUE people! I just finished med school.
    A few things from my experience.
    1. Either you or your classmates will match into a community program in an unknown desert and will tell your classmates it was your #1 choice.
    2. You will realize how little residents and doctors make once you are accepted into residency.
    3. you will have financial challenges at least once during medical school.
    4. you will either be ecstatic or pissed at God and your family for your match results.

    Reply ↓
    1. Mandy

      Too funny! I am a veterinarian and am changing fields to start medical school… I can atest from experience that surgeons are primadonas in veterinary medicine as well! Actually the MD surgeons I have met were far nicer than the vet ones.
      Now, just my experience, but even though one might think med school is sooo hard, the real hard deal is the day you are on your own out there and people’s lives depend on your quick acting/thinking. Leaving the academic support system and stepping into a practice where you are the decision maker (and must live with these decisions you’ve made) — that is far harder than medical trainning!

      Reply ↓
      1. Kim

        Mandy-
        Just curious, how long were you a vet and why the change to med school? I actually was accepted into vet school at age 21 and dropped out after my first year…totally mentally burned out and had depression, which made it hard to study. I do somewhat regret dropping out now and am thinking of re-applying. I was way too young and had undiagnosed anxiety at the time too. Just would like to know your experiences…I’m on the fence about reapplying, but it’s still drawing me back! Now that I’m 15 years out of school, I have much more ‘real world’ experience than I had at age 21.

        Reply ↓

  33. Pingback: Things You Wish You Knew Before Starting Medical School « Lil Bits of Life

  34. Guyus

    Whether or not you find this post funny, pay attention to and meditate on it because it is 95.04% true. Medical School is not like what it initially appeared to be but someone has got to do it. That might be you! so whether or not you like it, do your best and serve your country well… :)

    Reply ↓
  35. foo

    very true! and funny! i feel that even if i read this before medical school, like some of the young naive ones on the website that responded, i still wouldn’t have believed any of it. all the warnings in the world are given to you, but our pre- med school selves, the optimistic, ego driven crazies, persist despite it all. yes, the ego that should have perhaps considered other options of careers in medicine instead of the constantly revered doctor (not so much anymore as in the past…just perhaps by our families)! however, once you’re in, you feel trapped, and you allow the masochism to continue. med school is the hot boyfriend who tells you you’re too fat but you continue to run after…perhaps because you don’t know what else in the hell you’d do without him. your motivation to get through may become paying back the hoards of debt, expectations of people around you, and not quitting on yourself, because dammit, there’s only 3 more months until graduation! but then there’s…residency…bah….what are you gonna do? if you start this, you better finish it! and that’s much, much more difficult than it seems.

    Reply ↓
    1. Katie

      Hahahahaha, ” med school is the hot boyfriend who tells you you’re too fat but you continue to run after…” Love it. Not a medical student, but every time I consider it I read this blog to push some common sense back into my head.

      Reply ↓
  39. Student + dying = studying

    You should all read “house of god.”
    It covers all these topics, in a brilliantly black satirical humour kind-of-way.
    I love med school (am in my penultimate year), but (referring to points 92 and 98) obs+gyn was the most miserable rotation to ever exist!
    Thanks for the entertainment

    Reply ↓
  40. Amazing list

    This one gets me: “If there is anything at all that you’d rather do in life, do not go into medicine.”

    I am applying right now. Several years ago, I interviewed and was rejected and since then have waffled about trying again. Now I’m doing it again, but I can think of a lot of other things that would make me happy too. It’s only that I’ve put in so much damned work so far that it almost seems like not going into medicine would waste those investments in learning and skill.

    I have had so, so, so many of my brightest med student friends tell me to avoid this path it’s unbelievable. I think I will still go through with the rest of the application process…but I really don’t know if I’d take the acceptance if I earned one.

    Reply ↓
    1. 4thyear

      Medicine will not make you happy. If you are a happy person, you may be able to maintain your happiness despite medical school and residency. What you’ve invested prior to medical school is nothing compared to what investment will be demanded from you for the rest of your career. The learning curve gets steeper and steeper all the way through med school so make the decision now to do something else because you haven’t wasted much yet compared to what you would waste if you choose to leave or fail out of medical school.

      I’m not saying you shouldn’t do it. But doing it because you’ve already invested so much is one of the worst reasons I can think of to start med school. Best of luck!

      Reply ↓
  42. Katiesadiemadd

    Im a senior in hs… I really wanna be a doctor..but reading this honestly…im so damn scared !!
    What if i go nuts or something?
    Sometimes I wonder if I CAN do it????
    However, I still do enjoy my sciences and am still interested in going into this field..any advice for a
    spirited-younsgter?

    Reply ↓
    1. Daniel

      For you youngin’s, the best thing you can do is to take classes, pick your major, and choose your extracurricular activities based on what you enjoy, what interests you, and what inspires you. Have fun and learn a lot. Do things for their own sake. Take risks and do things that frighten you (that’s not the same as doing stupid things).
      Avoid getting locked into the idea that you know what you want to do when you graduate. Those students end up trying to do everything in order to position themselves for the future and miss out on all the fun in college – and in life generally. Those are the students who go to the soup kitchen in order to put it on their resume, and end up resenting having to spend a Saturday morning at a soup kitchen. Etc.
      Don’t shadow physicians or volunteer in a free clinic because you want to put it on your resume; do it because you want to see if you could be in medicine for the next several decades.

      Your advisers will most likely give you some sort of detailed recipe for how to get into med school. They may even tell you that you need to major in biochemistry or something like that. That’s totally made up. Here’s the formula to get into medical school: get good grades, do well on the MCAT, and complete all your science prerequisites. You have complete freedom over the rest of your life, including your major. Enjoy it!

      If you can’t succeed in your science classes (chemistry, biology, physics), you can’t succeed in medical school. Either figure out what you did wrong and how to succeed, or move on to another career path. If you do well in your science classes, you’ll know that you’re at least smart enough for medical school. Use that to answer your “Can I do it?” question.

      If you go nuts in med school, you can always take a year off. It’s called a leave of absence. Hopefully, if you lived your life to the fullest up through college and go into medical school knowing what you want out of life and what you want to do with your life, you won’t have as hard of a time in medical school. Still, everything Hoover said above is true, and it will be a lot of work. But that doesn’t mean you won’t enjoy your life.

      Reply ↓
  43. I heart surgery

    I just finished med school, and I am waiting for the match, and after reading this I was laughing but i have to agree that this list is 100% TRUE!!!

    Reply ↓
  44. Quynh

    I’m only a high school student, but my high school is base on Medicine. In your freshmen and sophomore year you take a class that is base on the human body and the bones and all of the basic things that any doctor needs to know. Then, in your junior and senior year you get a internship in a hospital (If you get accepted). I’m in the sophomore class for Medicine, but my friend has the internship, she said it’s hard and the smell is horrible. I want to become a family doctor. Can you tell me the average price and how many years it will be? I know it has to be more then 10 years, but what are some tips on family medicine that I should know?

    Reply ↓
    1. Mike

      The average cost of medical school is around 90-100k from what I’ve seen. As for the training to become a doctor, 4 years of medical school, 3-4 years of residency. I don’t know if you need a fellowship to become a family doctor. During residency you get paid so you don’t need to worry about paying more money.

      Reply ↓
  45. Florian

    Haha. I keep reading this 101 list from time to time, and it is so accurate. Only in 1st year of medical school, but people really do change with all the work and rigors.

    I used to be naive, always optimistic, idealistic etc, but in real life, it doesn’t work like that. There is a ton of work, and every single person (usually) is very smart. Once you enter medical school, you are in a new zone, in a big pond, and you realize you are amongst the smallest fish in it. (like a new level) Same with residencies.

    There is a doctor aura you can pick up, and you DO acquire it going through all of this. Sadly, if you don’t have photographic memory (I don’t), you will have to work long and hard. Get used to SLEEP CYCLES! (You can sleep less and still feel refreshed, in intervals of 1.5 Hrs, (3 Hrs, 4.5 Hrs is usually what I get), 6 Hours is luxury, 7.5 hrs (unheard of ))) Take every test very seriously because class rank counts for something.

    No matter what school, DO or MD, the material is very challenging and voluminous. Don’t be naive, but don’t be an ass either. Go for what you want/think you want, and work hard.

    F, 2014

    Reply ↓
  46. joeblow

    pick a lifestyle career, all the rest suck ass. im a resident in radiation oncology. best thing ive ever done in my life. i will prevail bc of it. all the other shitz suck!!!

    Reply ↓
  47. Eddy Gonzlaez

    I’m in med school right now and I have to say things are not as hard as I thought they would be when I read this blog. First, coming from an undergrad in biomedical engineering, I haven’t experienced anything in med school in terms of difficulty that I didn’t experience in undergrad. The only thing different is I have to re-wire my brain so I can memorize useless names and facts that most patients and physicans will just look up on the internet in practice. In terms of concepts, everything is pretty interesting and fun.

    Second, I’m not sleep deprived since I go to sleep everyday at 12 and wake up at 8 or 7 depending on when my morning classes are. Hence, I get 7-8 hours of sleep everyday. I’m able to keep up with all the workload, all I gotta do is do the lectures for that day and take notes. Then weekend comes, I review. Big whoop.

    Third, yes my social life sucks relatively. Whose social life in med school doesn’t suck that is doing well? Honestly, I can’t socialize with some moron that parties everyday and doesn’t understand that I just studied my ass off before I got there. I still got time to talk to girls, of course not date though. Wtf am I to do? A study date? haha don’t make me rape myself.

    I went through 4 years of hell already in undergrad, nothing is new except that in med school, there is less understanding and more memorization. I’m not used to taking tests with multiple choice. I’m not used to doing questions after questions without actually understanding concepts. I feel like a robot memorizing the dictionary. So yea, med school does suck, but is it any harder than undergrad? Hell no. Maybe your blog is meant for people who had an easy undergrad.

    Reply ↓
    1. Sooin

      Tulip, Mmmm gad godt lige komme forbi se5 :) Line, Det er nemlig meget neemmre end man lige umiddelbart tror. Jeg tager mig snart sammen og fe5r flere opskrifter pe5. Gle6d dig til Tiramisu :) Louise, det er en aftale og det vil ve6re en fornf8jelse at have dig til middag :)

      Reply ↓

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