Preparing for the MB ChB

Congratulations to all of you who have recently received your offers to study at Warwick. Before I got mine I remember anxiously scrolling through the student room desperately waiting to find out when I’d be receiving my offer, or most probably my rejection. Anyway, the wait is over and you can finally relax! Whether you’re working or still studying you can finally look forward to starting your medical career in September, which you’ve no doubt been working extremely hard towards for quite some time. Before getting here it’s tempting to think that there’s loads of work to do and things to sort out and whilst there may be some truth in that, I think it’s really important to enjoy the summer - you’ve worked hard, it paid off, you deserve it!

Here are some tips to make the “Big Move” a little bit easier.

• Go to the house hunting day - MedSoc will organise a day where next year’s students can come to Warwick for an informal “getting to know each other” day. This is your opportunity to find a group that you fit with. Granted, you probably won’t get to know each other’s deepest secrets or be taking anyone home to meet your parents after one day (or you might but I’d probably advise against it), but you can get a good idea of what people are like and whether you could see yourselves getting along for the next year. Choosing housemates is really important, particularly if you are going to live with fellow medics. Having the same timetable will mean that you will be spending A LOT of time together and that might mean little problems that wouldn’t have been an issue in another life become the most unbearable thing you’ve ever had to deal with. Facebook is a wonderful way to have a chat with someone and a little Facebook stalk never hurt anyone.

• Don’t buy textbooks before you get here - It’s tempting to buy loads of stuff you might think you need before you get here in an effort to hit the ground running but it’s better to leave it a while until you’ve identified what kind of textbooks you learn best from. I have a huge, expensive physiology textbook that I still don’t understand a word of so it’s serving its purpose as an effective doorstop at the moment. If I’d taken the time to have a look at books from the library I might have saved myself some valuable beer money.
• Buy a fresher’s pass/band - Definitely indulge in the first week. It’s so important to get to know your coursemates, your housemates in particular, and to have a bit of fun. You’ve probably been working super hard for the past few years and you’ve a lot of hard work coming up so enjoy fresher’s week to the full. Remember fresher’s week when you were 18 (you might not if it was particularly indulgent)? How lucky are we to get to do it twice!
• Be humble, ask for help and just admit if you don’t know - we already know you’re amazing. You’re here and you’ve already got some stellar academic credentials under your belt, but then so have all of your classmates, and you’ve still got a long road ahead. You can learn something from everyone whether it’s lecturers, fellow students, doctors, nurses or even your patients. If you’re like me you’ll spend the first semester not knowing anything about anything and that’s OK, for a while! The patients that you meet will be nice to you and are only talking to you because they want to. It’s not compulsory for ill people to have the same conversation over and over again with various groups of nervous medical students. Listen to them and enjoy it, they’re more often than not an expert in their condition and it might just make all the pieces fit together for you.
• Finally and most importantly, I think, is to remember to do it your own way. Everyone will approach things differently. It’s really easy to get bogged down with thinking about how much more work other people are doing or how much better their learning style is. Before exams, when you’re laid in bed and the fear descends over you try not to forget how far you’ve come and how much you’ve achieved already. You’ll do it again. You’ll make it.

Amy

Sarah Hill : 14 Apr 2014 14:47 |  Tags: Amy Classmates Freshers Housemates Mbchb Medsoc Student Textbooks Warwick Wms |  Comments (0) |  Report a problem