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Author Topic: LIZ's JOURNEY OF GRADUATE MED-ENTRY (+RESOURCE LIST)  (Read 4288 times)  Share 

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Elizawei

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LIZ's JOURNEY OF GRADUATE MED-ENTRY (+RESOURCE LIST)
« on: January 02, 2020, 01:00:09 am »
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Around one or two years ago, I remember reading an AN guide about getting into med, and I promised myself that I’d write something like this too when I got in. I’m super grateful for the guide and I remember reading it in second year, and getting some comfort (and maybe even motivation? So here it is! Please scroll down to bottom for a summarised version (with resources list). If you have any more questions, message me on FB: Elizabeth Hu (as I am unlikely to respond on AN PMs sorry). I’ve also written a neuroscience major review, and you can check it out here: https://atarnotes.com/forum/index.php?topic=43031.msg1151443#msg1151443

For me, it’s been quite an interesting journey to postgrad medicine. All throughout high school I wanted to do commerce, which was partially influence by my parents. After doing Bio ¾ in Year 11 I wanted to do bioengineering and enrolled into Bachelor of Biomedicine Bioengineering stream right out of high school. It was only through uni that my passion for med really developed, especially through being involved with volunteering. HUGE TIP – try volunteering at a hospital to find out if you like the environment, and to see a better insight of what the healthcare system is like in action.

One week in, I realised I’m stupid for taking bioeng path when quite frankly, maths was never my favourite subject. Doing some last minute changes, I unenrolled out of the stream and went back to the normal stream within the first week. For those of you who are still unsure of what to do, these three years is an amazing opportunity to play around, discover your actual passions, and really find your true calling.

First year
Damn, looking back at first year, I can safely say that I was a dumb jaffy. Despite feeling like I’ve studied quite a bit, my grades certainly took a toll. Chem for biomed was a huge shock, and organic chem was hard (til this day I still don’t know how to do nucleophilic attack :’(). The two bio cores were very good, and found it enjoyable. Physics, maths, and EDDA were equally terrible. In VCE, I binged practice exams, which allowed me to get enough practice. However, in uni, few if any subjects offer past papers, and they were no longer a good method of revising. Throughout high school, I’ve never written notes, and found it extremely difficult to pick up that habit in uni. However, it became a necessity to have notes, as the sheer amount of content was impossible to cram or to memorise just from the slides. 

Second year
Ahh, the year of GAMSAT. The year of MCB, the year where we finally settle in biomed, and realise that it’s not that subjects get easier, it’s just that we get better at managing and learning. Despite what most people say, I felt studying for GAMSAT wasn’t as bad I expected. I am a crammer, and I can’t bring myself studying for GAMSAT months before the actual thing, so I began studying about 1 month out of the actual thing. In the end I did GAMSAT twice, getting 71 on my first sitting, and 69 in my second sitting (oof lol so I ended up using my first-time score). The first time I sat my GAMSAT, I felt vastly underprepared, and with everyone raving on about their practice courses/company programs, I did not feel ready. (For those debating on whether to take a commercial course, my opinion would be that it’s situational and certainly not effective for everyone. For me personally, I didn’t attend any GAMSAT prep program, but got some resources and did practice questions/essays. However, some of my friends benefitted greatly from courses, so it really depends on which type of learner you are).

Section I was a nightmare (still is TBH), and even though I felt fine after coming out of S1, my S1 was consistently my lowest score. My S1 did pick up in the second time sitting (after doing a lot of S1 practice questions and reading poems), but my S3 dropped so much that I didn’t use my second time score :’). My tips for S1 would be to read a lot of traditional texts, old novels, poems, and try to analyse their core theme/motif.

Section II on the other hand, was always my best section. For those of you who did VCE English before class of 2016, writing in a “context” style was exactly what you needed for S2. I had quite a regular structure for my gamsat essays, and I would use the same structure for both task A and B. I always wrote in an expository style, no matter which task it was. My biggest tip for this section is to add in tonnes of real-world/literature examples that relate to the theme. I did a bit of research and reused a lot of the Yr12 English content I had, so I had examples that I could use in almost any theme. My favourites were Galileo, Anti-gun movement in the US, Lindt Café incident in Sydney, climate change & the pope, and the metro tunnel project (hehe bit niche but writing about local issues is a bit of a meme). For practice, I wrote one essay a day in the month leading up to the gamsat, handwritten and timed. Sometimes if I’m able to sit down on the train home from uni I can finish an essay on the train. At the start it’s okay to type some essays, but certainly you need to handwrite to get used to the speed (and the hand cramps) in the real thing. All together I think I wrote around 60 handwritten essays in total from the two GAMSATs I took in 2018. I’ll also attach some of my typed essays here (not the best though since I only typed earlier on, but you can see the general structure/approach I took).

Section III was the unloved child that I never paid much attention to, unfortunately. I naively hoped that my biomed background would carry me in SIII, but it didn’t. My scores for SIII were always mediocre. The only practice I did were some practice questions that I had from Des. I personally found that SIII did not test any prereq knowledge, but rather the speed that you were able to interpret information and apply it to the question/graphs. Provided enough time, everyone will be able to do all questions. However, as SIII in in the afternoon and we are all cooked after the onslaught of S1/SII in the morning, pushing through SIII was a real test of stamina and I worked with slower efficiency in the morning.

Funnily enough, in both times sitting the GAMSAT, I had terrible period cramps in both times, and had neurofen on my desk (that I didn’t dare take in fear of it being sedative). Hot tip- pack a protein rich lunch for the break between S1/S2 – S3, and light in carbs to avoid feeling sleepy in SIII. I guess looking back, GAMSAT wasn’t the scary monster that we all make it out to be, but it’s certainly an exhausting marathon, the rite of passage for those on the med grind.

March 2018: 71 (61, 78, 72)
September 2018: 69 (64, 74, 67)

Third year
Before I knew it, it was third year. At the beginning of third year, I experienced a breakup of a 2 year long relationship, and it took a big toll. However it was both helpful and detrimental at the same time in terms of uni lol. On one hand, I went to uni way more, and dived deep into extra-curriculars and volunteering, working myself to the ground. The downside was that I was overworking in extra-curriculars, to the point that I felt exhausted and not well-rested, with a low level of constant anxiety. However, the plus was that I was so busy that I never experienced negative emotions (which is both unhealthy and weird). I gradually recovered, but still found myself cramming last minute for all my MSTs and exams (a habit that I must fix for next year hehe).

I also applied for University of Sydney, as it is a non-GEMSAS med school, and its interview is much earlier (in july). It was an amazing practice opportunity, and a backup plan, which alleviated so much pressure and anxiety when I was going in for the melb uni med interview. For first sem, I did principles of neuro, neurophysiology, molecules to malady, and music in everyday life (the easiest and best breadth I’ve done in uni tbh!). M2M had got to be the best biomed subject in the entire undergrad, and I thoroughly enjoyed it.
Another huge tip for those who might be interested in ethics (super useful especially for interview prep) is to go to the national paediatric bioethics conference at royal children’s hospital! It’s held every year, and it’s free to all unimelb students (it’s $800 if you’re a participating adult oof). I even ditched class for 3 days straight to go (hahahah ditching all my paid classes to go to free lectures). It was super eye opening and it actually opened up an insight to what paediatrics was like, in a real-life setting. I could rave on all day about the paed bioethical conference, so please go! After interviews, I thought I could relax, but almost had huge panic when studying for the end of sem exams. I did viscera and visual neuro as my major core subjects, and I legit thought that I would drop below the tolerable GPA drop (0.3 drop of GPA is acceptable in the final semester results). I swear third year was the fastest year I’ve experienced in life, yet also the slowest year too.

Interviews
I started doing interview prep for Usyd about 3 weeks before the usyd interview, and about the same for the unimelb interview later in the year. I’ll briefly write down my experiences for the two unis, as they were quite different. I didn’t use any interview prep course, as I felt it would not have been effective for me. Throughout third year, I picked up more volunteering than ever, and looking back, although it felt like they were huge time sinks that took away time for studying, they were invaluable interview practice in disguise. Throughout all of the volunteering experiences I had at hospitals, in secondary schools, and in the communities, I was comfortable in conversing with anyone.  I highly recommend everyone to take up volunteering during your undergrad years, not only because we should give back to the community, but it’s also an invaluable opportunity to develop important communication skills. For interview prep, I used free resources online, as well as practicing with my friends and peers. I will make a list of all the resources I’ve used online at the bottom of this review.

Usyd
Highly recommend to apply for usyd too, even just for practice! I genuinely would have went to usyd med if I didn’t get into unimelb, and the entire application/interview process was easy and (relatively) stress free. Usyd interview system was so kind to let us choose a time we preferred in a first-in best dressed system, and I was able to get a time that was convenient to fly over. Usyd interview generally run in the last two weeks of winter break and the first week of semester 2. I chose the middle week, a few days before s2 began. The usyd interview comprised of 5 stations, with 7 min per station. They were all ethical scenarios, with no personal questions. I personally wasn’t a fan of this because I couldn’t talk about my personal experiences, but I suppose it’ makes the interview very fair and easy to rank interviewees. I prepared for these interviews by starting off by video recording myself and then watching it after (which was cringe-worthy, but a good exercise. I eventually gave this up as it felt dumb rip). There is a wealth of past exams on pagingdr, and even online if you search for MMI ethical scenarios. In the actual interview, there were generally no surprises except for a few new questions that surprised me. When it comes down to interviews, there is actually so much that can tip the perception of the interviewer. Non-verbal communication I feel is one of the most important things in the interview. Often it’s not what you say, but rather how you say that’s important. I felt like I said some wack stuff in one of the stations, and felt terrible, but it ended up being fine. I think one of the key points in answering ethical questions is to consider the emotions involved, the human aspect of the question. Too often we’re caught up in answering and giving solutions, and we fail to recognise the heightened and confronting emotions that is present in the situation. Whenever addressing the situation and starting your response, it’s certainly good to first acknowledge that it is a complex and often distressing issue, to show respect to the emotions that may be at hand. I think most interviewees will jump straight into breaking down the key players, the problems etc, but to stand out – recognising that there will be upset/anxious/stressed/devastated emotions will set you apart. Another tip for when practicing would be to recognise that there is actually less than 7 minutes at every station. Upon walking in and shaking hands with the assessor, the assessor will then read the scenario out to you, sometimes very slowly (HAHAH maybe it’s a test for patience… jk… unless??).

Waiting for the interview was the worst part, but I chatted to those around me and cracked a few jokes to break the stress (I hope). The administrative person who checked us in was super lovely, addressing us as Dr (surname) and displaying tractors and agriculture machinery (yea, wtf?) on the lecture hall screen to lighten the mood.
When finishing the interview, the assessors will often ask if you have anything to add on – you should always ask them if you can consider it for a moment, before you say either “yes” or “no”. This will show that you have considered it carefully, not just blindly adding on extra info (that will show that you didn’t plan out your response well enough), and saying no off the bat might make you seem too cocky. There is water and mint mentos provided in every station, but I sure didn’t have the luxury of time to take any. There is also a clock in the room, but you cannot look at it (even though some were a 0.5m HUGE clock HAHAH). If you practice enough, you can have an internal timer to recognise how much time have passed. For my Sydney interviews, I always finished early for around 10-15 s, and only added more info on one station. Coming out of the interview, we had to do a questionnaire (we were the pilot cohort, but the questionnaire could become a part of assessment for the future) about ethical scenarios. You had to choose from a range of strongly disagree to strongly agree. My friends and I coordinated together to fly up and stay together in an Airbnb, so it was a lovely 1-night trip, before flying back the evening of the interview. We booked an Airbnb near usyd, and had supermarket breakfast before arriving more than an hour early. Overall, if you can, certainly apply for Usyd med, because it alleviated so much stress for me for my Melbourne interview. The intense stress and sweaty palms I experienced when waiting for my time for the usyd interview was greatly reduced when I did the unimelb one. Highly highly recommend applying, it’s a nice short trip with friends too 

Unimelb
Unimelb med interviews always falls in the midsemester break for uni in semester 2. We are allocated interview times and must submit a form to confirm if we can attend or not. I started preparing for the Melbourne interview informally from 2 months out and started practising with other students around 2-3 weeks away from the interview. Through all the preparation and everything, I found running timed practice with friends the most useful. It’s also super good to find peers to practice with, who you might not be too close to, because I’m always super chill with my friends and can’t experience the stressed feeling of practicing with someone I’m not too familiar with. Melbourne MMI has 8 stations, with 5 minutes per station, but in the real interview, I only had about 4 min due to handshaking/intro time. Stations covered ethical scenarios, detech, video (I didn’t get one but some people did), giving instructions to the assessor to draw a diagram, motivation for medicine, extra curriculars etc. There was also an intro email that was sent in the email offer that detailed the content that they were looking for – please read the email carefully as it does outline all the qualities they will be testing for in the interviews! About 1 week away from the interview, I would practice for 30min or 1hr with each person, in project rooms in uni or at my fav café, Dr DAX. I think the record was practicing with 6 different people in one day – but I lost my voice at the end of that (and all concentration – could not answer anything in my last practice round). Whenever we practice, we’d time each other, and jot down feedback to give to each other. I found it super effective because my amazing friends and peers would pick up things or bring up points that I have never considered before.

The actual interview came around faster than we expected. A lot of people stress about what to wear to the interview. Boys really have it easy, but for girls there are so many choices. Like what most people say – definitely go for what you feel most confident in. I wore a knee length medium sleeve black pencil dress, with black tights. Suit pants and a blouse/formal shirt is also a popular choice. I took the train into uni and got there 1.5 hours before my interview lol, and chilled outside in the ground floor area. Around 30min before the interview, we were ushered inside Sunderland theatre, and given our sticker, which gave us what time slot we were in and which location. The email letter in interview offer only gave a rough time, and at the actual interview we were sorted to two different groups, the earlier one and later one (I’m lucky to get the earlier one so less waiting around oof). The later group ones in the same email timeslot had to wait for us to finish before going in. The first station of the MMI is always the same – why med? In my second station (acting one), I did a major screw up and left my sticker sheet with the remaining stickers for the next stations inside the room for the second station. When I got into the third station, I realised that I had forgotten my sticker sheet, and wasted ~1min trying to get it back, as the station has already started. I got a bit flustered in the third station in the beginning, but managed to crack a joke to reset the mood with the assessor (so I think it was okay?). However I certainly ran out of time for this station. Actually, I ran out of time for every single station except for the detech station and was interrupted by the bell almost every single time. In my last station the assessor even skipped an entire question. The detch station I felt was probably the worst one, because even though during practice I had a good structure (brief overview, where could we find the thing?, and how is important to us?), the words I got in the MMI was momentum and fermentation, which weren’t words I prepared earlier. Overall, I wasn’t as stressed for the melb interview as I was for the Sydney one, and everything went smoothly (aside from my oops with the stickers). All assessors were nice and shook my hands in each station, but some were more poker-faced than others. At the end of the station, if you can, thank them with their name (except I’m terrible with names and only remembered the name for one assessor HAHAHAHA).
However, I just wanted to touch on quickly about mental health. It’s insane how many biomed/science students experience lowpoints during their grind in undergrad to get into graduate medicine, and I certainly want to acknowledge that it happened to me too. During second year it might have been some of the lowest points in my life, especially after GAMSAT results were released. Perhaps it’s the sheer competitiveness of the degree, or the huge stress that comes with med-entry, but in second year, I felt like I often wasn’t enough, and that although I did well, my “well” still wasn’t enough. Mental health is so important, and it’s important to find a way where you can recover, whether that’s ranting to friends over brunch, reading with tea, or doing the things you love. I have to admit I’m still working on this, trying to find a way where I can best recover from low points. Until now, my coping mechanism had been to load myself with more extra-curriculars until I don’t have the time to think about stress or process negative emotion, which is an absolutely terrible method. I’m actively trying things out, and I hope I will find my coping mechanism this year.

To those of you still reading, I’m impressed that you’ve read through this huge document! I wrote this out on an airplane sleep-deprived, so please forgive if some parts are vague and don’t make too much sense! I will be making lots more edits to this document as I have more time, currently travelling atm and can’t attach all of my documents yet.

 To all of you reading and hoping to get into graduate medicine, I was in the same situation as you too, not very long ago. I understand your frustration, your anguish, and grind and hard work that you have put towards your dreams and future. As corny as it sounds, the grind is all worth it in the end. Life may not go in the ways you wish it go, and there certainly will be times where challenges and dark times come, but if your passion for medicine burns strong in your heart and you remain firm and soldier on, you will become the best doctor there ever will be.

All the best,
Liz 

ONLINE RESOURCES I USED

GAMSAT:
https://www.scribd.com/doc/287177418/Practice-Test-Des-O-Neill
https://www.scribd.com/document/354483041/Des-O-Neill-Section-3-GAMSAT
http://gamsatstudy.blogspot.com.au/2015/11/more-free-gamsat-study-resources.html
https://www.slideshare.net/akspar/gamsat-practice-test-v015
https://www.acegamsat.com/gamsat-quote-generator/
http://www.mcatquestion.com/
http://flavorwire.com/217118/10-poems-everyone-needs-to-read

For building vocab:
http://www.merriam-webster.com/word-of-the-day/calendar
https://www.dictionary.com/e/word-of-the-day


INTERVIEWS:
https://healthinfonet.ecu.edu.au/healthinfonet/getContent.php?linkid=612405&title=Summary+of+Aboriginal+and+Torres+Strait+Islander+health+status+2017
https://journalofethics.ama-assn.org/cases
https://www.gmc-uk.org/gmpinaction/characters/index.asp
https://www.medicalboard.gov.au/Codes-Guidelines-Policies.aspx
http://forums.premed101.com/forum/53-medical-school-interviews/
http://forums.premed101.com/topic/81464-mmi-guide-by-arztin/
https://www.princetonreview.com/med-school-advice/medical-school-interview-questions
https://www.rcseng.ac.uk/careers-in-surgery/careers-support/applying-to-medical-school/interview-questions/
https://capd.mit.edu/sites/default/files/grad/files/sample-med-school-interview-questions.pdf
https://boredofstudies.org/threads/medicine-interview-preparation.385792/
https://depts.washington.edu/bhdept/ethics-medicine
https://bemoacademicconsulting.com/blog/sample-mmi-practice-questions

Great videos to watch to help with MMI:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ggpYVhzizbs
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EvqOS3qFTR8
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OLxz4pCBXKo
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xCBQUGvZU7k

My own documents:
[will attach more when i get back from overseas]






« Last Edit: January 04, 2020, 01:41:17 am by Elizawei »
ATAR: 99.70
2017-2019: Bachelor of Biomedicine
2020-2023: Melbourne MD

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Offering  Chemistry/Bio 3/4 tutoring for 2019! [raw 49, 47] PM me if interested :)

K888

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Re: LIZ's JOURNEY OF GRADUATE MED-ENTRY (+RESOURCE LIST)
« Reply #1 on: January 02, 2020, 10:35:55 am »
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What an amazing post! Thanks so much for writing this, Liz, this is a fantastic resource for all those postgrad med hopefuls out there :D

Elizawei

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Re: LIZ's JOURNEY OF GRADUATE MED-ENTRY (+RESOURCE LIST)
« Reply #2 on: January 04, 2020, 01:42:11 am »
+3
What an amazing post! Thanks so much for writing this, Liz, this is a fantastic resource for all those postgrad med hopefuls out there :D

Thanks so much Kate! Hope all is going well with you <3
ATAR: 99.70
2017-2019: Bachelor of Biomedicine
2020-2023: Melbourne MD

Founder of Folding Our Futures
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Offering  Chemistry/Bio 3/4 tutoring for 2019! [raw 49, 47] PM me if interested :)

Sine

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Re: LIZ's JOURNEY OF GRADUATE MED-ENTRY (+RESOURCE LIST)
« Reply #3 on: January 06, 2020, 12:12:20 pm »
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Brilliant guide!!

I'm sure this will be able to help so many students in the future  :D

TurtleQuest

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Re: LIZ's JOURNEY OF GRADUATE MED-ENTRY (+RESOURCE LIST)
« Reply #4 on: January 08, 2020, 06:37:31 pm »
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Great post Elizabeth!
Thanks for all the guidance and support, and good luck for med!

psyxwar

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Re: LIZ's JOURNEY OF GRADUATE MED-ENTRY (+RESOURCE LIST)
« Reply #5 on: January 30, 2020, 08:11:40 pm »
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Wow congratulations, Eliza! Glad to see you made it into med :)
VCE 2013-2014
MD/BMedSci 2015-2020