Using YouTube for Revision

Just a short post today because I've been a lazy slob and need to crack on with revision for the Humanities section.
I am also using youtube videos for my revision of the physics concepts, why? Because I find it so much easier when I have someone explaining it to me, and going through the calculation step by step. If I read it in a book, I just get lost :(

The channel I am using at the moment is brilliant, its called Khan Academy

http://www.youtube.com/user/khanacademy

 and has videos for biology, chemistry and physics and the guy that goes through the calculation is AMAZING! I hate maths and physics with a burning passion, but he makes them easy and quite enjoyable!
Now I'm off to learn quotes! Huzzah!




Illustrates my current sleeping pattern quite nicely

Summer Work Experience (woop woop)

Now time for the fun stuff!
I've been really lucky in managing to gain 3-4 weeks work experience at a GP's surgery about half an hour from where I live, doing a variety of things, sitting in on consultations, working with the district nurses, helping with the diabetes clinic, observing minor ops and sitting in with the "lumps and bumps Friday" clinic (which I'm looking forward to the most, pussy wounds and all that jazz haha!)

So I had my first day yesterday, woke up bright and early to find it would be a bad hayfever day, so I spent the day trying to be professional and friendly whilst snotting and sniffling in front of everyone, which a was great...
I sat in on consultations all day and the Dr that is supervising and helping me apologised for a "boring day", poppycock, it was so interesting! I'll just go over a few things I  observed during the day.

A patient came in with a throat infection, but, he also had apparent sun damage on his scalp, and so his scalp was checked for rough patches - Actinic Keratosis, which are patches of thick, crusty skin, common in fair skinned people. They can be considered pre-cancerous, but the patient had a lovely smooth scalp! :) However he was concerned about a small sore red patch on the side of his scalp. It was red, and had an ulcerated centre. This turned out to be a BCC, a Basal Cell Carcinoma, which is the most common cancer, apparently you could leave it alone for a few years and it wouldn't cause you any harm, however it is still considered malignant and so the patient was referred to the hospital for further tests etc. The photo is just an example of sun damage commonly seen in the elderly!

Next was a a case of fluid retention in the ankles in an elderly woman with chronic kidney disease. This is due to the kidneys no longer being able to filter out fluid from the blood and turn it into urine. The patient was told to elevate her legs when sitting, but she didn't want to, poofs aren't her thing! The patient just wanted reassurance on when to take her water tablets! :)

Spot of fluid retention around the ankles on the right there!



Next was a 26 year old male who had what presented as type 2 diabetes, which is really uncommon in a man his age. He was a big lad, 140kg, and his weight was increasing despite him telling us he ate 3 healthy meals a day.The previous night he experienced confusion, "not making sense" and felt muddled. Turns out he had a blood glucose level of 22.4! 5 hours later it was back down to 5, so he must be producing his own insulin for us to see that much of a change. So it was thought he might have Maturity Onset Diabetes Of The Young, but he has been referred to a diabetes specialist at the hospital.
Also saw some polyps which was really interesting, a nice scar from where a man had his pancreas and spleen removed, spot of tennis elbow and a very large boil on a mans behind that needed to be removed and packed at the hospital.

All in all, it was a nice start to my work experience, the majority of patients that were seen were elderly and there was more focus on the management of age related changes. I'm back in on Monday where I'm going down to the minor ops clinic! woop woop!

My New Best Friend For the Summer - Mr GAMSAT

I was sitting at my desk the other day and I had NO IDEA where to start with revision and preparation for the GAMSAT. So I had a search around the internet at lots of sites written by people who had already sat the GAMSAT and had written about their experience. These are a list of the sites that have saved my life:

http://e-gamsat.com/  - e-gamsat is a beauty, it has tips and information about each of the sections, what to expect and some helpful hints and tips for each of them. It then also has a huge section on revising for the science part of the test, and gives you a list of topics you should probably cover for the Chemistry, Physics and Biology parts.

After looking online, the tip that seems to come up the most is to do as many practice questions as you can, so you can become familiar with the GAMSAT style of question.

Tip=DO LOTS AND LOTS OF PRACTICE QUESTIONS

Many websites offer practice questions you can download as an e-book for a price and some websites just charge a silly amount for practice questions. But if you dont want to fork out your monies,they also have a section that you can use your email address to sign up for a sample of some practice questions, so it is worth doing that as well.
So here is a list of sites that you can sign up to, or already have questions on their websites that are FREE

http://www.medprepinternational.com/?gclid=CIuG9NvKhrgCFYXMtAodjlUAgQ

http://www.slideshare.net/akspar/gamsat-practice-test-v015

http://www.gamsatsamplequestions.co.uk/

http://www.gamsatpreparationcourses.co.uk/free-GAMSAT-practice-test

http://prepgenie.co.uk/gamsat/free-quiz/

ACER (the official peeps for GAMSAT) also offer booklets of practice questions at a fairly low cost, which is cheaper than buying the hugely expensive book they also sell.

As a science student, I obviously feel more confident going into the science section (even if my physics is a little rusty), and although I studied English Lit at A-Level, I haven't had to write an essay or deal with poems for a good 3 years.

Tip = Work out your strengths and weaknesses within the test and use this to structure your revision.

So I'm gunna be spending a lot more time on brushing up on my physics skills and practicing the humanities and written communication sections.

Books To Use

After my nosey around online, I have come to one conclusion, books for the GAMSAT are bloody expensive. The one book that they officially endorse costs £90 to buy from Amazon....
So after a nosey around online, these are the books I will be buying to help with my revision:

Griffiths GAMSAT Review - £62 They offer different bundles at different prices, depending on what you want, but I'll be buying the review and practice questions
http://www.gamsatreview.com/Gamsat_Review_Order_Page.html

ACER Practice Question e-Book - £30 per book  These are the only official materials that GAMSAT advise you to use, so I shall buy these ones as well!
http://gamsat.acer.edu.au/prepare/preparation-materials


The Gold Standard GAMSAT Preparation Book - £90 This is the big daddy of GAMSAT revision, from what I have read about it, it has EVERYTHING you need in here, practice questions, mock exam, all the science you need to revise etc etc. But its soo much money for a book! UH
http://www.amazon.co.uk/tag/gamsat%20books/products

A Dummies Guide to Sociology - £10 As I am really struggling with the whole underlying social themes thing, I read online that this was a really useful book that summarizes main concepts and ideas etc.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Sociology-For-Dummies-Nasar-Meer/dp/111999134X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1372418429&sr=8-1&keywords=dummies+guide+to+sociology

A Dummies Guide to Philosophy - £10 I do enjoy reading philosophy books, but I dont feel I have read anywhere near enough to excel on the written communication section, so this book will summarize the main ideas I need to know from history.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Philosophy-Dummies-UK-Martin-Cohen/dp/0470688203/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1372418520&sr=1-1&keywords=dummies+guide+to+philosophy

I will also make a lot of trips I'm sure to my library in town, to read as much as I can! The advise given is to read widely, remember and write down quotes to use in the written communication section, read newspapers, online articles, anything! Obviously you have to make sure you've read your classics, 1984, Great Gatsby, Day of the Triffids, Great Expectations etc etc, as they will come in handy.

 Must resist the temptation to watch the Great Gatsby film and call it revision! Leonardo doesn't give a crap about your GAMSAT Hannah.

Uni Exams Over - SUMMER TIME!!

So after slaving away in the library for hours and hours and hours, exams are now all done and I've finished my second year of uni! (Now the med school work begins!)

Note about grade requirements: All the med schools I am applying to all ask for a 2:1 or higher, so this is what I am aiming for. I achieved a first in my January exams, so I've just got to maintain that for the next year! 

I spent the first day or two or holidays doing naff all and catching up on sleep and food (as you do), but now its time to CRACK ON!

Task 1 to Crack On With = EXAMS!!

This summer I am sitting 2 medical school exams, these are the GAMSAT and the UKCAT.

GAMSAT - Is a graduate medical school admissions test set out by the Australian Council for Educational Research. It aims to test the abilities and skills you have gained through your degree, and tests your understanding of basic science concepts as well as problem solving, critical thinking and writing.
The exam is split into 3 sections, Humanities and Social Stuff, Written Communication and a Science Section.
Humanities-MCQ questions, based around anything ranging from a poem, quotes, cartoons, pictures, with an underlying social theme.
Writing - Asks you to write 2 30 minute essays (or 2 essays in 1 hour if it makes it sound better) and these essays will be based on quotes that will be provided. The quotes will have an underlying theme like love, friendship, humour, courage etc, and its up to you to write an imaginative essay that may argue for your against the theme.
Science-MCQ questions, split into 40% Biology, 40 % Chemistry and 20% Physics. The questions may use tables and graphs that you have to understand and extract information from.
The exam costs £228 this year (HOLY MOLEY) and the everyone in the country takes the exam in a few test centers on the same day, and the process is from 8am-4pm. It will be a long day! My closest test center is Bristol so I will be heading there!
http://www.gamsat-ie.org/

UKCAT - Is the UK Clinical Aptitude Test, on the UKCAT website they say that the exam cannot be revised for....(good one) and tests the "cognitive powers of candidates"
It is split into 5 sections, Verbal Reasoning, Quantitative Reasoning, Abstract Reasoning, Decision Analysis and Situational Judgment. The exam costs £65 to take and you can book when you take your test and the nearest test center to you.
http://www.ukcat.ac.uk/

There is a LOT of advice on their official websites as well as elsewhere on the internet about how to prepare for these exams, so I will do another section on that because this is the part that I'm pretty worried about.
I'm feeling pretty overwhelmed at how much revision and preparation I have to do for the GAMSAT, in particular the written and humanities section as they could have political and historical underlying themes which I know NOTHING about.

Wish me luck on my road to revision...
Gunna have to make time fo that!

So...Where Do I Start?!

Towards the end of my second year of Uni I had a spare evening, I sat at my desk and thought HOLY CRAP WHERE DO I START I HAVE SO MUCH TO DO FOR MED SCHOOL. Rang my Dad, ranted for a little bit, then made a beast of a list of things I had to do by the time I had finished my second year exams. 

1- Come up with a definitive list of my med school choices

I'd always wanted to go to Warwick and Kings (tied top place) so they were going to be in the list, and after spending my undergrad times in Loughborough, I've actually grown to really like the Midlands area (I'm from a little town in Cornwall so anywhere seems more exciting than home!) It took me quite a while to decide where I wanted to go.
 Take a look at how they teach the course. Nottingham's med course places a big emphasis on PBL (problem based learning), other courses like Leicester ask for a years paid work in a health related field before you even think about applying! So always looks through all the course requirements, some take your A-Levels into account, others don't. 

2- Work Experience for the Holidays

This is a huuuuuge part of applying for med school. They all ask for qualities in applicants such as the ability to empathise with patients, organise and problem solve,work well as part of a team, and they expect this to come from a significant amount of work experience/volunteering. So get looking on your local volunteering website, the local paper, e-mail groups that you know of within your area that might be looking for volunteers, tell them a bit about yourself and let them know your interest in becoming a volunteer with them. An obvious piece of advice is do something you are interested in! (duh) So this summer I looked into gaining volunteer work in working with young adults who are on the Autistic Spectrum, as well as volunteering with people suffering from Dementia. You have to be really proactive when looking for work experience and volunteer work, send out emails, make yourself available and learn from the experience! Take notes, record your experience, so you are able to talk about it in your interview when your asked about it. 

Getting work experience in a GP's surgery or hospital is difficult due to the massive amount of people wanting to get placements there. So let them know you are interested early! I've managed to gain experience at a GP's surgery for a month, sitting in on consultations, minor ops, diabetic clinic etc, as well as a Hospice. So I'm looking forward to the holidays! 

3-Looking Into the Monies
I'm a student, I'm always poor! Haha! Obviously as an undergraduate (in the UK) you are eligible for a loan from Student Fiance, and a grant based on your household income which is a massive help at uni. You may also be eligible for an additional bursary from the Uni based on your household income. You are also able to get a tuition fee loan from Student Finance for only PART of your tuition fees I think as obviously the fees are now £9000 a year :(. I still need to do a bit more research on the whole monies side of things! (put that back on my to do list) 

4-Entrance Exams
MORE EXAMS YOU SAY!? Oh hell yeah. Depending on what med school you apply to, they will ask you to either sit the UKCAT or the GAMSAT, your score will then be used to assess your application and whether or not you will be called in for an interview. Make sure you look into what these exams involve and the prices, but I'll do another post on entrance exams because exams are super fun....

  "IVE GOT SO MUCH TO DO FACE"