Attending Medical School

Attending medical school was my lifelong dream, but attending the University of Maryland School of Medicine has been so important that that I have been preparing for it since I started going to college. Getting in to medical school requires an outstanding academic excellence and other extracurricular activities, and I as well as other premedical students work very hard to attend one, but many of us do not know what the life of a particular medical student looks like. Medical students undergo the most rigorous and exhaustive educational training for as long as 10 years. A day in the life of a medical student is very dynamic that changes as he or she progresses from semester to semester and from year to year. After a student is accepted by the school, there is a six weeks prematriculation summer program that is designed to help freshmen students to integrate to the medical school environment before their first day of class.
During this program, students learn basic sciences and medical school test taking. When I was at New Jersey Medical School for undergraduate summer program, freshman medical students were attending the same prematriculation summer program, and one of the students told me how unprepared one could be without the program. During their first two years, medical students do not have an active interaction with patients; instead, they have lots of lectures and examinations.
Therefore, students spend most of their time in lecture halls, laboratory and studying. According to a student I talked to, the semester long coursework at undergraduate college is cover in about two weeks at a medical school. This fact shows how effective and efficient one student has to be. He also told me that it is how quickly you can learn and relearn not how much you can memorize that is important. I am not sure how many students know that medical students have only their first full summer break. Learning consistently with only two weeks break for the last three years requires huge physical and mental determination. At the end of their second year, students have 5 weeks to study and pass the step one of USMLE. Based on many students experience, this test has been the scariest examination for most medical students, and students cannot start their junior year before passing the
examination. After the two years extensive lecture and examination, medical students are more relaxed, but it does not mean that the course work is reduced; instead they have acquired a lot of knowledge from their two years study, so they are familiar with most of the material. In addition, this is the point of their transition from being just a student to taking physician role. The amount of time they spent in a lecture hall is much less, and the amount of time they spent with patients is more. Medical students now have rotations in each medical department from 4 to 8 weeks. During their rotation under the supervision of physicians, they practice medicine and build their relationship with many patients. This the time when they have to use their intellectual, social, emotional, and physical abilities to affect the health of struggling people. The fourth year at UMD School of Medicine is similar with the third year except that students have narrowed their focus. This is a transition from a medical student to a residency, so students are applying for different schools to pursue their residency. The day in the life of a medical student is full of stressful work, interaction with different people and less time with family.