Scariest Thing Ever

On a scantron test, you just put three of the same answer choices in a row (say for example, D), and you get to the next question, and the answer choice you're leaning toward is the SAME as the last three. Do you put it, or do you second-guess yourself into choosing a different letter?

Things Could Always Be Worse?

This exam week is really the exam week to end all exam weeks (hah, just try using "exam week" more times than me in a single sentence). Yesterday we had our Anatomy Unit IV exam (head and neck), coming up on Friday is our Anatomy shelf exam (basically a national, standardized final - see this post if you want to know more of my thoughts on shelf exams), and then the following Monday is our final for Ethics, Humanism, and Professionalism.

This is by far the busiest week in terms of tests that I have had so far in med school. BUT before you start feeling tooooo bad for me, I look to other med schools to make myself feel better.


NJMS has a block schedule, which means we really only take one major class at a time. Just as a reminder (in case for some weird reason you haven't memorized every single word I've ever written in the blog), our first block included MGM, or Molecular and Genetic Medicine (basically biochemistry) plus a Physician's Core class of Medical Interviewing.

Our second block, which we are finishing up right now, is ACE (Anatomy, Cell Biology, and Embryology - with Histology thrown in there too, but apparently it doesn't deserve it's own letter in the title) with a Physician's Core class of Ethics, Humanism, and Professionalism, or EHP. People really freaking love mnemonics in med school.

Coming up next is Physiology with Physical Exam.


But people I know at other med schools take alllll of their classes at once. Yes, they move slower than us in each subject (because the class will last the whole year), but it's still like, 7 classes they have to be able to keep straight at once. And come exam week - now that is an exam week that makes my exam week from hell look like the easiest exam week ever (woo, beat my record!).


Obviously, there are pros and cons to both a block schedule and a regular schedule (for instance, some schools have a systems-based curriculum, so in every class they will be learning about the heart at the same time - the biochemistry behind it, how it develops in the embryo, the anatomy of it, how it works in physiology, drugs and diseases related to it in pharmacology - and that's sort of a cool way to learn).


But come exam week, I am VERY happy with our block schedule. Not only do we rarely have more than one exam at a time, but we can also actually enjoy ourselves for a night or two after an exam instead of struggling to catch up in all the other classes we abandoned while cramming for the exam for that one class.

Finals: Some are Scarier than Others

Sorry for the long delay on posting, but I am officially finished with my first two classes of med school, and I am still alive! The finals for the two classes were completely different. Today you get to learn about the shelf exam, and tomorrow the OSCE. Spoiler alert: the OSCE was infinitely times scarier.

So, our MGM (aka biochem and genetics) final was last Friday. As many of you know, that was awesome timing because it allowed me to actually enjoy my birthday this weekend (thanks to those who were part of it!). Throughout the class, we had three non-cumulative tests, and then a cumulative final a mere ONE AND A HALF days after our third test. That sucked. The final was actually a national biochemstry test, scored and curved by a national board (aka our professors were too lazy to write and grade a final exam - I'm joking, they had good reasons, see below).

This national exam is called the "shelf." There is a shelf exam available for each course/topic in medical school, and it is a way of assessing your abilities in a subject in comparison to the rest of the country. This also means that based on how your class does as a whole, you can see how your med school ranks in comparison to others in specific subjects.



Here are my thoughts on taking the shelf exam instead of a final written by our own professors:

Con: The test doesn't necessarily follow what we focused on in class, so it seemed like the test was missing questions on topics we had covered really well, and vice versa - I definitely came across some (many?) questions on things that I am positive I had never seen before, and let me tell you, that is not a fun feeling during a test. But at least it's curved.

Pro: Getting used to these kinds of tests starts preparing us for the USMLE Step 1 which we take at the end of second year and is super important for getting into residencies. The Step 1 is also a national, standardized exam that will not be prepared by my professors.

a different kind of shelf

Level of scariness: Same as any scantron test. Even less scary because we were so tired and burnt out from studying for Wednesday's exam that by Friday we were all just ready to be done.

[fun fact: they are supposedly called shelf exams because they are "off-the-shelf," meaning ready-made as opposed to custom-made]