Since Windows Live Spaces is closing down soon I thought I'd salvage this wall of text I put together last year. Sure it's a bit outdated now but I think most of the stuff in there is still relevant. For those of you who haven't seen it before, enjoy.
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~The Road to Med School~
"Don't go up that road!" - Civilian, Liberation Day (Starcraft 2: Wings of Liberty)I have been told, on numerous occasions, the reasons one would pursue a career in the field of medicine, and no, it’s not just about the money, as some would like to think. Firstly, it’s all about the job security. Medicine is one of the few professions which offers a job which society needs and always will need. Doctors will have their work cut out for them so long as people keep getting sick, and I can assure you, even with my limited knowledge, that this will not change anytime soon (at least not in our generation, anyway). This gives rise to the option for travel. People don’t just get sick in New Zealand. Wherever you may want to go, I can assure you there will always be people getting sick and there will be work for you. Even if there is enough GP coverage in an area, doctors need holidays now and then. Unfortunately, viruses, bacteria and disease don’t go on holiday. There’s your work.
On top of this is the nature of the work. Doctors help people in their time of need and use their knowledge to overcome their grievances so that they can get on with their life, whether they be a humble dairy owner or the chief executive of a major corporation. Dealing with people and helping them overcome their troubles would naturally bring one great satisfaction, though the great responsibility associated with such a career could place a reasonable amount of stress upon an individual at times.
A satisfying job which involves you with the lives of those around you, a secure career society will always need, with the flexibility which lets you travel the world...and of course you will be paid well. A nice little package, isn’t it? Perhaps this is the winning combination which draws so many to this profession. However, training doctors is incredibly costly for the government, and universities have to limit their intake of medical students. Only about 140 are taken in each year at the University of Auckland, and only slightly more in Otago University. This limitation places great pressure on prospective students to perform, which gives rise to a large amount of competition among peers. I personally dislike competition, but alas, it is the only way one can hope to attain this highly desirable career.
So, how does one go about getting into Medicine? Both universities require you to complete one year of undergraduate study before applying for Med School; so naturally this is where the competition lies. Getting into first year or “Pre-Med” from high school isn’t too hard; it’s pretty much open-entry for Health Sciences First Year (HSFY) in Otago but in Auckland prospective students for first year Health Sciences or Biomedical Science are ranked according to their best 80 NCEA Level 3 credits in 5 “approved subjects” (science subjects like biology and chemistry) so you’ll need to make it above the cut to get in. If I can recall correctly, the intake for Health Sciences in Auckland is about 200, whereas the intake for Biomed is 400 (it’s not too hard to get in; I got invitations to both courses, and I only achieved NCEA L3 with Merit).
So you got into one of the 3 pre-med courses, now what? Now the competition begins. Regardless of which one of the 3 routes you choose, you’ll have to sit for a nasty exam called the Undergraduate Medical and Health Sciences Admission Test, or the UMAT. The first thing you should know about the UMAT is that it is all relative. It’s like the Australian Schools Competitions you might have sat for in high school; your score is compared to all the other students’ scores and given a percentile ranking. Competitive? Yes. Just like the Australian Schools Comps. Except THIS TIME IT COUNTS. The second important thing about this test is that it is strictly timed, and you only get one shot at it each year. You can actually sit for this test in year 13, since scores are valid for 2 years after you’ve sat them, but your most recent score is the one that counts. So if you got 99th percentile in year 13 and for some absurd reason you sat for it again in first year uni and got 39th percentile, your 39th percentile score would be the one they looked at.
What exactly is this UMAT? Basically, the test is broken down into 3 sections; “Logical Reasoning”, “Understanding People” and “Non-Verbal Reasoning”. The “Logical Reasoning” section judges your ability to draw valid conclusions from various stimuli without making any unnecessary assumptions and basing your reasoning only on the information provided. It also tests your ability to analyse things like graphs and interpret other sorts of data in order to answer questions. In “Understanding People” you’re given various scenarios where you have to answer questions based upon your understanding of various characters’ emotions and feelings throughout the passage. It more or less tests your ability to put yourself into somebody else’s shoes and identify their emotional state in the given context. “Non-Verbal Reasoning” is a section where you’ll be given several shapes or numbers and told to choose the next one in the sequence, arrange them in a logical sequence or pick the odd one out. These questions are quite similar to some of the ones you’d find in a standard IQ test.
All the questions in the UMAT are multiple-choice and each section is timed separately, meaning that you can’t move between sections or allocate your own time to each section. The whole test is 105 minutes; 40 minutes for Section 1, 35 minutes for Section 2 and 30 minutes for Section 3.
Well, that’s the UMAT for you in a nutshell. Ideally you’d want to get a percentile score of 80+ if you want a decent shot at getting into Med School (especially in Otago). Preparation? They say you can’t prepare for the UMAT, but you can (“they” being ACER, the Australian company who run these tests. As a side note, you have to pay NZ$140 each time to sit the UMAT). Obviously you can’t actually study for the UMAT, but there are several prep courses available (for a price) which give you the single thing which will help you most: PRACTICE. Practice builds up your accuracy, confidence, speed and endurance – things which will help you immensely when the time comes.
Your UMAT score will be weighted differently depending on which Med School you go to. For Otago, Med School applications are based upon 1/3 of your UMAT and 2/3 on your grades in the 7 HSFY papers. For Auckland students, UMAT only counts for 15% of your score whilst grades count for 60% and the remaining 25% is based on your performance at the interview.
In terms of your papers, I’ll have to take you down the Auckland route, since that was the one I went down. Regardless of whether you take Health Sciences or Biomed (I did Biomed) you’ll have to do 4 overlapping papers which are identical in each course – CHEM110, BIOSCI107, POPLHLTH111 and MEDSCI142. Each of these papers counts 15% towards your score for your med application, so they are the ones you want to be concentrating on most during the semester. Here’s a bit of an overview on each of the papers:
CHEM110: Chemistry of the Living World – Take 7th Form organic chemistry and bring it to the next level. Along with the basic naming and drawing out of structures, you’ll be expected to complete complex reaction schemes and do some calculations. Don’t expect to get away with rote-learning everything, as you’ll need to be able to apply certain concepts to new situations. Labs are worth 20% of your grade, so prepare for them well ahead.
BIOSCI107: Cellular Processes and Development – Quite a challenging paper. 7th Form biology knowledge is assumed and you’re thrown into the world of the cell and its functions in relation to the human body. A bit of anatomy here and there with some cellular metabolism and histology thrown in, it makes quite an enjoyable paper if you find it interesting. Labs are also worth 20%, so prepare well.
POPLHLTH111: Population Health – Students are generally divided into 2 camps: the ones that love this paper and the ones who hate it. If you want to apply for Med School you’ll need to choose this as your elective. Basically, it’s the study of populations and their well-being and how to improve it. A bit of epidemiology, demographics, studies on different approaches and strategies to improve the health of a population and a couple of case studies. Much of the course can be rote-learned.
MEDSCI142: Organ Systems – Ah, this is where you start to get a picture of the guts of things (sorry, bad pun). This is more or less an overview of the anatomy and physiology of the human body including the nervous, circulatory, reproductive, digestive, and urinary systems. You’ll be dissecting things in the labs, watching videos on heart valve operations and viewing life-scarring images of sexually transmitted diseases. It’s a challenging paper, but it’s definitely not boring like some may find Population Health.
And there you have it. Idealistically you’d want to be going for all A+ in those 4 core papers, but realistically, an A- to A average will get you an interview at the very least. Although the university states you only need a B+ average to get one, the university interviews only twice as many applicants as they have positions (maybe about 300 or so get interviews from both Health Sciences and Biomed combined) so the cut-off point is a bit above B+ and more into the A- to A range (apparently your UMAT score plays some role in the selection process for interview, probably counted as another paper they weight as well as your grades).
Made it this far? Congratulations! You’re 75% of the way there. The last bit is the interview (Otago doesn’t do interviews for Med School, but they do for dentistry), which will account for the last 25% of your final score. I’m no expert on interview technique, but I do know it’s good to prepare. If you’re like me and this will be your first interview, it would be wise to take an interview training course so you have an idea of how to approach it. Some things they’re looking for are maturity, communication skills, certainty of career choice and friendliness among other things. Basically they’re just checking your suitability for the job and that you’re a well-rounded enough person. You’ll have to write up a supporting statement to submit before your interview, so make sure you’re prepared to answer questions based on that.
A thing I forgot to mention was that the intake of approximately 140 students for Med School in Auckland is broken down into 3 cohorts, the general category (100 students), the rural category (20 students) and the Maori and Pacific category (20 students). The general category is the cohort most of us would fall into, while the rural category (the Rural Origin Medical Preferential Entry or ROMPE scheme) is for students of rural origin and the Maori and Pacific category (the Maori and Pacific Admission Scheme or MAPAS) is for students of Maori or Pacific Island descent. Otago also has a ROMPE intake of 20 students, but I’m not sure if they have MAPAS. If you’re eligible for either ROMPE or MAPAS, great! Your chances of getting into Med School have just become significantly better, as you’re competing against a much less competitive cohort than the general category. Most students applying under the general category are students who are the top scholars from Auckland’s top grammar schools which pose significant competition; whereas under ROMPE and MAPAS the competition is generally lighter although I’ve been told ROMPE can still be quite competitive. You’ll still need to get a B+ or better average though.
I think that’s about everything I need to say about entry into Med School in Auckland. If you’re looking for information on Otago you’ll have to look elsewhere unfortunately. The Auckland and Otago Med Schools are both fully independent of each other in terms of undergraduates, and it’s impossible to switch from one to the other once you’re in. Even if you’ve done pre-med in Auckland and want to do HSFY in Otago, they won’t let you. Which med school is better is a subject of much debate. Auckland seems harder to get into due to the competition posed by high-achieving Auckland students, but Otago places much of their weighting on the UMAT which I find is a bit of a dodgy test in the way of selecting our future doctors. Whichever route you decide to choose, hard work will inevitably be up ahead, but at the end of the journey, a rich, rewarding and fulfilling career awaits the next 40 or so years of your life.
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