A place for the discussion of all things not closely related to the sport and its competitive side. (Locked down several times a year during the major championships)
Unfortunately, Med Schools don't let you in based on track knowledge, so they make you take this "MCAT" thing to decide whether or not you're worth their time.
Wish me luck (if you're feeling generous). I know we've got a few docs on the board, anyone have some last minute advice?
Relax the night before is the best answer, as Dr. Jay. I'm sure you'r prepared. The night before mine I went to see that Bill Murray comedy, "Meatballs." Laughed all night and didn't worry one time because of it.
bambam wrote:Relax the night before is the best answer, as Dr. Jay. I'm sure you'r prepared. The night before mine I went to see that Bill Murray comedy, "Meatballs." Laughed all night and didn't worry one time because of it.
Bam Bam, the only time I ever talked to the "real" Bill Murray, he bawled me out for throwing a javelin near his sacred football players, down on the football field just beyond the tunnel, when he and the players had exited the tunnel and were walking straight up the track toward the practice field at the far end. I ignored him and kept throwing !
I went to the med. school in Europe a very long time ago, so instead of MCAT we had oral admission exams. All I can do is to say Good luck and root for you.
Pego wrote:I went to the med. school in Europe a very long time ago, so instead of MCAT we had oral admission exams. All I can do is to say Good luck and root for you.
Pego wrote:I went to the med. school in Europe a very long time ago, so instead of MCAT we had oral admission exams. All I can do is to say Good luck and root for you.
Did you mean dental school? LOL
:-)))))))
To think of it, those exams took place in April 50 years ago.
BisonHurdler wrote:Unfortunately, Med Schools don't let you in based on track knowledge, so they make you take this "MCAT" thing to decide whether or not you're worth their time.
Wish me luck (if you're feeling generous). I know we've got a few docs on the board, anyone have some last minute advice?
Goodluck Mr. Bison and dont worry cause you know stuff, i wish i knew stuff but i dont even suspect anything.
Pego wrote:To think of it, those exams took place in April 50 years ago.
Sample Questions:
1. When blood-letting, is is best to drain the femoral artery or the carotid?
2. Where's the best place to place leeches.
3. Phrenologists recommend which bumps to best predict a predilection for consumption?
4. Are tarot cards or tea leaves better for diagnoses?
5. Which night humors are the most deadly?
1. Cubital and antebrachial veins.
2. Chest.
3. This particular witchcraft has always been recognized as such.
4. See #3.
5. Drinking a rootbeer, I'd say.
Pego wrote:To think of it, those exams took place in April 50 years ago.
Sample Questions:
1. When blood-letting, is is best to drain the femoral artery or the carotid?
2. Where's the best place to place leeches.
3. Phrenologists recommend which bumps to best predict a predilection for consumption?
4. Are tarot cards or tea leaves better for diagnoses?
5. Which night humors are the most deadly?
1. Cubital and antebrachial veins. 2. Chest. 3. This particular witchcraft has always been recognized as such. 4. See #3. 5. Drinking a rootbeer, I'd say.
Not sure about #5, but I can certainly see why you must be a great physician - you KNOW your stuff!
Thanks guys (and mojo). It never hurts to have some extra words of encouragement. I've been trying to balance relaxation with last minute preparations the last week or so. I plan to do nothing MCAT-related on Friday.
tafnut wrote:2. Where's the best place to place leeches.
From my experience as a resident, we used to use them on fingernail beds after digit replants - yes, we really did use them and they still do. If you cannot connect any good veins together under the microscope, even if you have arterial fill, the digit will become occluded and not survive. In those cases, we would place leeches on the fingernail bed to drain the blood. Couldn't stand doing it. Nurses hated it too.
bambam wrote:From my experience as a resident, we used to use them on fingernail beds after digit replants - yes, we really did use them and they still do. If you cannot connect any good veins together under the microscope, even if you have arterial fill, the digit will become occluded and not survive. In those cases, we would place leeches on the fingernail bed to drain the blood. Couldn't stand doing it. Nurses hated it too.
Umm, leeches under the fingernails. Maybe the bamboo shoots weren't so bad after all . . .
Haha, it was quite an experience. No amount of preparation really prepares you for the real thing.
I found it to be a bit more difficult than the practice exams published by the AAMC (the people who administer the MCAT). I had been doing great on those practice exams, and went into the exam knowing that if I scored in the same range as my practice scores, I'd be sitting pretty.
But I just don't see that happening. There were parts that I had no trouble on, and parts that were brutal. It's all luck of the draw, really, as there are numerous different test forms, which share SOME of the same material/passages/questions, but maybe only 30-50%. With the extremely broad spectrum of information required for the test, there is a seemingly infinite number of different topics they can cover. So really, you just cross your fingers and hope that your test form plays to your own strengths. Mine was kind in some places, and not kind at all in others.
The only good thing is that on another messageboard I frequent for med/pre-med students, the general consensus is that this exam was A) much harder than the AAMC's practice exams that are supposed to "accurately represent" the material, and/or B) much more difficult than previous MCATs (for people who were re-taking). The entire thing is "curved", so we'll see . . .
But then again, no one ever feels like they aced it afterwards anyway. I won't know how I did until mid-October . . .
BisonHurdler wrote:The only good thing is that on another messageboard I frequent for med/pre-med students. . .
Does that board have its own version of tafnut, maybe "mednut"?
I'm the leading poster over there too. AND on the 'Rocket Science' board, and the 'Mensa' board, and the 'Really Deep Philosophical' board . . . shall I continue?
It strikes me that they look similar to the CA exams up here. If you walk out anything but scared stiff, you're toast. Exams last 16 hours and if you knew how to answer every question completely, they would take twice that long. So, if you aren't smart to know what you don't know, you are going to walk out confident...and doomed.
BisonHurdler wrote:The only good thing is that on another messageboard I frequent for med/pre-med students, the general consensus is that this exam was A) much harder than the AAMC's practice exams that are supposed to "accurately represent" the material, and/or B) much more difficult than previous MCATs (for people who were re-taking). The entire thing is "curved", so we'll see . . .
But then again, no one ever feels like they aced it afterwards anyway. I won't know how I did until mid-October . . .
Did you do the computerized one, or the print version? How'd you find the physical sciences section?
BisonHurdler wrote:The only good thing is that on another messageboard I frequent for med/pre-med students. . .
Does that board have its own version of tafnut, maybe "mednut"?
I'm the leading poster over there too. AND on the 'Rocket Science' board, and the 'Mensa' board, and the 'Really Deep Philosophical' board . . . shall I continue?
I bet a large % of folks who post here would qualify for Mensa, and we probably have more fun than they (the Mensans) do.
DrJay wrote:I bet a large % of folks who post here would qualify for Mensa, and we probably have more fun than they (the Mensans) do.
Agree. I am embarrassed to admit that I took the test in college, passed, actually paid dues for a year, only to find out it's a racket for them to sell you stuff, so you can show everyone how smart you are. Any organization that says I'm smart and wants me to join them, cannot be intelligent OR exclusive.
DrJay wrote:I bet a large % of folks who post here would qualify for Mensa, and we probably have more fun than they (the Mensans) do.
Agree. I am embarrassed to admit that I took the test in college, passed, actually paid dues for a year, only to find out it's a racket for them to sell you stuff, so you can show everyone how smart you are. Any organization that says I'm smart and wants me to join them, cannot be intelligent OR exclusive.
Same with all these honour societies. I usually recommend the students don't bother since almost always they have to pay for the pleasure of joining. Some honour!
DrJay wrote:I bet a large % of folks who post here would qualify for Mensa, and we probably have more fun than they (the Mensans) do.
Agree. I am embarrassed to admit that I took the test in college, passed, actually paid dues for a year, only to find out it's a racket for them to sell you stuff, so you can show everyone how smart you are. Any organization that says I'm smart and wants me to join them, cannot be intelligent OR exclusive.
Same with all these honour societies. I usually recommend the students don't bother since almost always they have to pay for the pleasure of joining. Some honour!
No danger of me being recruited by Mensa but my attorney daughter, apparently some kind of borderline genius, was and had the same experience.
She attended a couple of Mensa functions but bailed out when she discovered the only topic of conversation was relative IQs.
BisonHurdler wrote:The only good thing is that on another messageboard I frequent for med/pre-med students, the general consensus is that this exam was A) much harder than the AAMC's practice exams that are supposed to "accurately represent" the material, and/or B) much more difficult than previous MCATs (for people who were re-taking). The entire thing is "curved", so we'll see . . .
But then again, no one ever feels like they aced it afterwards anyway. I won't know how I did until mid-October . . .
Did you do the computerized one, or the print version? How'd you find the physical sciences section?
I took the paper version (the last one to be administered by print. The AAMC is now fully switching to computer based testing). In all my practice exams, the Physical Sciences section was surprisingly my highest score on a consistent basis (I consider myself more of a bio person). I was counting on a real solid PS score to kind of ensure I got a good enough overall score.
That being said, I don't think I did all that well on the PS section in comparison to my practice scores. Obviously I really have no idea what my score will end up being until I see it, but I just felt a little flustered at times during that section, probably since it's the very first section. Also, out of the two PS components (physics and general chemistry), gen chem is traditionally my stronger area. Unfortunately, the form I had was very physics-heavy (as were most of them, it seems). That in itself didn't really play to my strengths, but I'm hoping I still did well on that. It was mostly newtonian stuff and electricity/magnetism with a little bit of fluids thrown in just for fun. The questions ran the gamut from determining the kinetic energy of a satellite (easy) to predicting what changes would be necessary to make to a copper wire wrapped around a spool (which is spun and then stopped which generates a small current) so that the current would not exist at all (the choices were something like change the mass of the charge carriers, change the size of the charge carriers, and two others. I've kind of blocked out a lot of the stuff from saturday so I'm fuzzy on the details. There was another passage about a system of solar panels/solar cells, with some odd questions related to it.
Overall I felt that the questions either fell within the really easy or really obscure categories, with little middle ground.
A few years ago our group was looking for a new practice administrator. We interviewed this one guy who was supposed to be the next great thing. His resume noted that he was a member of Mensa. I wanted to reject him without the interview, just for putting that in there. But he was about as obnoxious as they come, making us feel like we were lucky just to interview him, and we picked the other guy. He's been here for 3 years and we love him. No idea what happened to Mr. Mensa.
Just got my results (midnight EST)! I did roughly what I was averaging on my practice exams, which was MUCH higher than I expected after leaving the real thing!
