STUDY TECHNIQUE. (Contributor: Muhammed Ahmed)

 

HOW TO STUDY:

(In the name of Allah, the most beneficent and the most merciful)

A-o-A, I hope y'all will be doing well. First of all, welcome to the whole new world of medicine, a world which becomes your passion, your dream, which has no boundaries, you'll be like a stem cell which will be different from all others, you'll have to sacrifice. That’s a whole new journey, a journey of patience, hard work and sacrifices. But believe me you'll be willing to do that, you'll work for it, you'll sacrifice to save a life. Well, all that journey will be accompanied by a lot of memories, a lot of fun, competitions, new experiences, celebrations, sports, and much more. 

             But to ace your dreams, you'll need guidance, a pathway, because it'll be different from your old methodologies of studying. So following are some guidelines,

 

Ø  HOW'S MBBS DIFFERENT FROM FSc.

 

As y'all must be here with appreciable marks and percentages, you must have studied much harder in FSc. But now you're in MBBS. Now what's the difference between MBBS and FSc.

Basically, there was rule of "SURVIVAL OF THE FITTEST" in FSc, you must had to secure more than 90% or 95% marks, you had to cram your whole book, each and every topic, you had to cram your text book and that's it. You had to write 6-7 pages per long question with a lot of presentation skills to get max marks in your exams. But now you're in a professional field, you've to write in a PRECISE PROFESSIONAL manner. There's a sea of knowledge and hundreds of books, there is no such text book. You have just an assigned topic and you have to learn and visualize it from a bundle of books as there'll be no one text book. You have to just pass the exam i.e minimum 50%.

Instead of writing 6-7 pages per questions you'll have to focus on the main points, the main procedure, the main demanded thing by the examiner. You don't have to write additional un-required detail.

Ø  MAKING NOTES:

 

(While reading your syllabus for the first time NEVER use short books or the short listed questions.)

   First of all listen all the lectures carefully, then during self study, read it thoroughly through text book and then consult slides provided by your teacher. You can write the summary of the whole topic which you have read (both slides and text book), and next day you'll be asked the summary of yesterday's topic by your teacher and you'll have to explain the topic briefly. Well, that's the time to make your first impression. Remember, "Your first impression is your last impression".

 

Making notes and summaries of your topics is very important For example, you'll study the whole topic of cell membrane, you'll go through a lot of detail. But when the examiner questions tell the 6 functions of cell membrane, believe me 70% students will not be able to answer this if they haven't studied the topic smartly i.e by compiling it and making the summaries and notes of the topic, so making notes of imp topics is so important but don't waste your time in compiling the unimportant questions.

 Now after completing a chapter, you must consult past papers (link given below).

 

 You should shortlist the questions of that chapter and make a list or if you can't make all that, you can get these questions marked by your seniors ( I made my own list From past papers).

  Then there'll be tutorials, which are most imp activity, in tutorials you'll have to explain the topic assigned my your teacher. Prepare well for Tutorials, You can make your own notes or summary type of the marked questions so that you can perform well in the tutorials.

  PAST PAPERS:

 https://drive.google.com/folderview?id=1RFPPsbnHsfQ8T_d_qzZ_HAmSF6fFVX9g

 

Also you have to do McQs, after completion of a chapter or block, from the books, described in "BOOKS TO CONSULT" Blog

Ø  USE OF SHORT BOOKS:

 

You must not use short books while studying for the first time. You can just use them for quick revision before viva or tests. Sometimes they are very helpful for having the overview of the chapter, as some students remain wandering in guyton and they don't even know that what they have to read, so they can have the overview of chapter and topics to study. But short books are neither referred nor liked by teachers.

 

Ø  VISUALIZATION:

 

Visualization is the most important aspect of learning medicine. You don't only have to cram the muscles, or nerve supplies, you also have to visualize them through Atlas, animated videos on muscles and nerve supplies, cadavers and anatomy models.

You don't only have to cram the topics like nerve supplies of muscles, you must Study them by relating them, believe me it will make your topic more interesting, for example, you study that the lateral skin of forearm has sensory inveration of lateral cutaneous nerve which is a branch of musculo-cutaneousnerve. Now you can assume your self a doctor, assume a patient coming to you with complain of sensory loss in lateral aspect of forearm, you must recall that it's innervated by a Branch of musculo-cutaneousnerve and you must know it's pathway so patient can have injury in the pathway of that nerve, also we can recall it's nerve roots.

So basically relating it with scenarios make it interesting.

 

 

Following are some useful apps and video links for visualization of anatomy

 

3D Model App:

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.catfishanimationstudio.MuscularSystemLite

 

Kenhub videos: (extremely helpful)

https://www.kenhub.com/

( You should get the subscription)

 

Viren kirya:

https://youtube.com/c/virenkariya

 

Acland:

https://youtube.com/channel/UCFTtKPB5G9lsS8h2z-uep7Q

 

Sam's Webster

https://youtube.com/c/SamWebster

 

Ø  MEMORIZATION:

 

        Medicine is all about memorizing things. Usually, during the preparation for class tests or modules and especially for Proffs, that's very very difficult to recall everything. For that purpose you must make notes. You can consult your own hand made notes, short books, and some videos found on YouTube for quick revision.

        Teaching others is the best method to memorize things, you can ask your colleagues to make your video while you are explaining topic especially bones and models, it will hardly take 5-10 mins. You can use these videos for your quick revision.

        Or there are some very helpful channels on YouTube which do the same ie quick revision or overview of the topics. ( Selfless medicos, Brainless medicos, ninja nerd etc)

        There is usually very short time to prepare to yourself for viva and exams. We made our own videos while demonstrating the bones and models and sometimes a topic of physio or biochem. That videos were extremely helpful for our revision.

 

Ø  HOW TO ATTEMPT QUESTIONS:

 

   Remember you have to write in PRECISE PROFESSIONAL MANNER. You don't have to add unnecessary information. 

   For example, if your are asked about "DEFINE LOCAL BLOOD FLOW CONTROL", you have to focus on describing the blood flow in tissues and cells not in general body. If you don't differentiate between both of them you'll not be awarded even a single mark, no matter how much you have written.

    You've to make FLOW CHARTS, TABLES, POINTS to explain the topic, making paragraphs is not appreciated.

    You must not miss any test or any Substage. It'll teach you alot of things. After your first class test, your test will be discussed with you by the department and a key will be shown. That key will show how much you were supposed to write. Well, I complied all the keys and got an idea that how much i have to write and what is required by the examiner. You can get the keys from your seniors which they received for their exams so that you can get idea about as much questions as you can.

 

A link of all keys we got during discussion is given:

    https://drive.google.com/folderview?id=1AsEYuAnBAnYuab3SGH1BVY6xjJNIFpao

                      

Ø  MYTHS:

Following are some myths which are usually common in first year students.

1. MYTHS: Internal assessment doesn't matter, so we can skip the tests. REALITY: internals matter alot, if you've a strong internal score, you can easily pass the Proff. So never ever skip any test, Tutorial or substage, even if you don't know a single word.

2. MYTHS: We can Study at the end of the year, 1-2 months are enough to prepare proffs. REALITY: every person has his own abilities, so don't rely on others experiences , that can cost you alot! Start studying from the day 1.

 

That's was all from my side, I wish you best of luck for your journey. I'll be there if you are willing to know anything else :)

 

 

Written by:  Muhammed Ahmed. ( CR previous 1st year) 19004
Edited by: Aiza Anwar ( publishing direc.)