New here, my Pre-med adviser recommended I pop on and give this forum a look. So far, in reading a couple of posts, I am really glad I joined! The forum is pretty informative. And it is fantastic to be talking to a group of people in my age-ish bracket, 38.
I am aiming at DO school (MSUCOM, LECOM, OU-Athens and Kirksville), more than likely, although I am not opposed to allopathic school. Family Practice, Internal Med or General Surgery is what I’d like go into. I’d like to work abroad and/or rurally, the abroad being the only hesitation that I have towards DO school. I worked in Physical Med and Rehab for a DO who is a Physiatrist as a manual therapist for six years and loved it.
I graduate this coming May with a BofA in Biology. My current over-all is a 3.95, which I am aiming to hang on to. Both semesters of Bio, OChem and Gen Chem were A’s, first semester of Physics was an A and second was a B (I was so happy to get that B, I cannot even begin to express it). Had a couple of A-'s, but overall A’s.
This is, in part, making up for a fairly shoddy academic record when I was in my late teens in college the first go-round. While I’ve been told that what you do 20 years prior has limited impact on what is looked at when you apply to med-school, I still have some collywobbles about it. I know DO schools do grade replacement, but MD schools do not.
I have not taken the MCATs. This is mostly due to a hiccup and I was diverted for a semester. At this point, my goal is to take them in June of 2016 and apply thereafter. I need a BioChem course and taking a Graduate-level Biochem as a non-degree seeking student was recommended as opposed to taking an under-grad level after I graduate over the summer. Thoughts on this? I also really need to review OChem before I jump into it. My other reason, other than reviewing/prepping, is to pay down some bills/save some money before I incur yet another $70K+ in debt.
I have taken a practice MCAT, the old one, cold without prepping and got a 25 on it. The Bio/OChem and Verbal Reasoning definitely carried the load. And I have a lot of review to do for the Physical Sciences. While I am happy to see that they factor less on the new MCAT-beast, they still factor and I do need to work on them. How did/do you handle the math sans calculator and remembering formulas? I know there has to be a way, heck I did it in Pre-Calc, I am just not sure how to go about it with regards to Physics and GenChem.
Any additional thoughts would be great!
Hello, and welcome to OPM! Congrats on your current GPA – that is definitely something to be proud of. Medical schools definitely do look at all your academics, including ones from 20 years ago, but an upward trend (which you clearly exhibit) can make all the difference.
For biochem, I’m not sure about the graduate vs. undergrad courses. I’d talk to your advisor about that, or maybe someone else here can weigh in?
As for the MCAT – you’re correct that you need to have those formulas down cold. They do give you scratch paper, but I barely used mine when I took the MCAT in 2013. You just simply don’t have time. I used flashcards to help me memorize the formulas, then TONS of MCAT practice problems to help me become skilled at using those formulas in MCAT-style questions (which are way different than classroom-style questions, as I’m sure you discovered).
Hope this helps … best wishes to you, and keep posting!
Welcome!
Biochem:
I would take an undergraduate course. My biochem prof is renown for being top notch, taught medicinal biochem for the university’s medical school and told us point blank:
how he taught, what he taught and what we put into the course would directly correlate to the 2015 MCAT and med school.
I agree.
For the 2014 MCAT, biochem was not on it in so far as there was no rationale required to understand what histidine’s impact in biology and enzymatic reactions was.
There is on the 2015.
How I would approach biochem is the same way I was taught:
Start by drawing the amino acids by grouping:
- phobic
- phillic
- acid/base
- glycine
lol
Draw the structure, the 3 letter acronym, and the single letter next to each one.
Practice that everyday until you can do all of them in less than 5 minutes (I can do them all in less than 3 - yes, I’ve timed myself)
Then, take those amino acids and start learning how to string them together…
For instance:
how would you draw the entire molecule that spells:
W-A-D-G-E-R
That was on my exam, worth 10 points.
Once you can do that, then start to learn the conformational changes with strand, double helix, then tertiary structures and finally, Quaternary structures.
Once you can do that, learn enzyme mechanics, graphs:
why does a competitive inhibitor do something different than a non-competitive? How does that impact a graph?
If there is an allosteric site, how is that different than competitive? can it be the same (competitive and allosteric??)… how do bond angles play into that structure and placement?
How does the acid/base of the amino acids used in the protein create a binding pocket or bounce out?
Then you get into DNA/RNA, hemo/myo and you’re set.
I LOVED biochem and found it by far, having little to do if anything with organic.
If you can follow a proton and understand basic Fischer projections or ring structures and boats, you’re set for biochem.
Ring structures matter for glycolysis, gluconeogenesis, chymotrypsin, and many others. Simply knowing which way the molecule flips it’s hydrogens or oxygens gets you 50% of the way through the rings.
On the MCAT, I’m retaking the Kaplan course, I’ve read through the biochem prep.
There is about 5% of the information that we did not cover in my 4000 level biochem class… and those salient points are not heavily required for anything I learned in my biochem course.
The physics, gen chem is less on the new exam in the comparison to the old exam in that it is integrated.
Why does the tympanic membrane work as it does and how does the sound traveling through the ear relate to physics?
Or if the O2 pressure in the veins is one thing but the artery is working differently and the lungs are operating in a different capacity, will the acid in the system pump more blood into the heart to increase the O2 or will it decrease and what will be the pressure of velocity of the blood flow?
Acceleration, velocity and gen chem.
Or arm lifting a weight: what molecules are required for the muscle to respond to an impulse from the brain and how fast and how much pressure is exerted on the bone to lift the weight.
Fulcrum, forces, acid/base
I’m excited to take the 2015!!! Plays to my strength
For biochem, I’d be interested in why the advisor suggested a graduate course. Is it to show you can handle these difficult classes and give you an extra boost on your application? Is it content? The first reason is a better reason to make it graduate, the second reason isn’t valid as the MCAT will test undergrad-level knowledge.
Above all, don’t ruin your hard earned GPA taking a class you won’t do well in.
@Adoc2be wrote:
Welcome!
Biochem:
I would take an undergraduate course. My biochem prof is renown for being top notch, taught medicinal biochem for the university’s medical school and told us point blank:
how he taught, what he taught and what we put into the course would directly correlate to the 2015 MCAT and med school.
I agree.
For the 2014 MCAT, biochem was not on it in so far as there was no rationale required to understand what histidine’s impact in biology and enzymatic reactions was.
There is on the 2015.
How I would approach biochem is the same way I was taught:
Start by drawing the amino acids by grouping:
- phobic
- phillic
- acid/base
- glycine lol
Draw the structure, the 3 letter acronym, and the single letter next to each one.
Practice that everyday until you can do all of them in less than 5 minutes (I can do them all in less than 3 - yes, I’ve timed myself)
Then, take those amino acids and start learning how to string them together…
For instance:
how would you draw the entire molecule that spells:
W-A-D-G-E-R
That was on my exam, worth 10 points.
Once you can do that, then start to learn the conformational changes with strand, double helix, then tertiary structures and finally, Quaternary structures.
Once you can do that, learn enzyme mechanics, graphs:
why does a competitive inhibitor do something different than a non-competitive? How does that impact a graph?
If there is an allosteric site, how is that different than competitive? can it be the same (competitive and allosteric??)… how do bond angles play into that structure and placement?
How does the acid/base of the amino acids used in the protein create a binding pocket or bounce out?
Then you get into DNA/RNA, hemo/myo and you’re set.
I LOVED biochem and found it by far, having little to do if anything with organic.
If you can follow a proton and understand basic Fischer projections or ring structures and boats, you’re set for biochem.
Ring structures matter for glycolysis, gluconeogenesis, chymotrypsin, and many others. Simply knowing which way the molecule flips it’s hydrogens or oxygens gets you 50% of the way through the rings.
On the MCAT, I’m retaking the Kaplan course, I’ve read through the biochem prep.
There is about 5% of the information that we did not cover in my 4000 level biochem class… and those salient points are not heavily required for anything I learned in my biochem course.
The physics, gen chem is less on the new exam in the comparison to the old exam in that it is integrated.
Why does the tympanic membrane work as it does and how does the sound traveling through the ear relate to physics?
Or if the O2 pressure in the veins is one thing but the artery is working differently and the lungs are operating in a different capacity, will the acid in the system pump more blood into the heart to increase the O2 or will it decrease and what will be the pressure of velocity of the blood flow?
Acceleration, velocity and gen chem.
Or arm lifting a weight: what molecules are required for the muscle to respond to an impulse from the brain and how fast and how much pressure is exerted on the bone to lift the weight.
Fulcrum, forces, acid/base
I’m excited to take the 2015!!! Plays to my strength
WOW!!! What an awesome load of information! Thank you!
I am almost done with Biochem (undergrad, when I questioned the advisor about recommending the grad-level, she retracted that recommendation), the final exam is next week, and I have LOVED this class! It seems that BChem gives OChem a passing nod, however I have appreciated understanding structures and some mechanisms. Sounds like I need to hammer out my a.a. structures, creating molecules, metabolism processes and such a few million times more. I also need to go over the boat structures, we covered Hayworth and Fischer projections, but not the boat conformations.
You are definitely not breaking my heart hearing that physics and GChem feature less prominently and are more integrated. I have thought that Newtonian Physics and electromagnetics would all make a lot more sense if they related to the physiological processes. The math in those two classes makes me panic a bit, so I am going to practice ad nauseum until I don’t feel like panicking when I see the questions.
MCAT prep (hardcore) starts after the end of this semester… which I had better get back to studying for if I am going to hang onto my grades.
Thank you, again!
@Tallulah Philange wrote:
For biochem, I’d be interested in why the advisor suggested a graduate course. Is it to show you can handle these difficult classes and give you an extra boost on your application? Is it content? The first reason is a better reason to make it graduate, the second reason isn’t valid as the MCAT will test undergrad-level knowledge.
Above all, don’t ruin your hard earned GPA taking a class you won’t do well in.
Her reasoning behind it was that I have taken the class after graduating with my undergraduate degree. Apparently, to her, it would show better on my application. One of the colleges that I was going to apply to required me to take it as a grad-level if I was taking it after I received my Bachelors. However, the advisor changed her mind and I took it as an undergrad course and it has been plenty challenging, and fun, as a 400-level course. Nearly done!
I just finished the biochem portion of MS 1 year. Having taken Biochem in my post-bacc, i would say that having some foundational knowledge helped with terminology (I pretty much forgot all of the pathways). That being said, undergrad biochem and medical biochem were taught differently, and the expectations for tests were a bit different.
Undergrad put a big emphasis on memorizing whole cycles, being able to draw different amino acids, and getting into the weeds on a lot of stuff that in the end really don’t matter. Medical school biochem (at least at my school) was a firehose of just about all of the metabolic pathways, but with the expectation that we would primarily focus on what can be controlled via medicine. Understanding the pathways and how they integrate was more important than committing each substrate, enzyme, and metabolite to memory. For example, I was responsible for knowing regulatory enzymes, major intermediates that could be used in other pathways, synthesized conditionally non-essential amino acids/fatty acids, or had pharmacological interventions that could help treat whatever disease was caused by the pathway. It essentially crammed Biochem I into 2 weeks with more attention on a bigger, more useful perspective. Don’t get me wrong, the undergrad class was probably easier, but really only because it was spread out over a semester.
@Kennymac wrote:
I just finished the biochem portion of MS 1 year. Having taken Biochem in my post-bacc, i would say that having some foundational knowledge helped with terminology (I pretty much forgot all of the pathways). That being said, undergrad biochem and medical biochem were taught differently, and the expectations for tests were a bit different.
Undergrad put a big emphasis on memorizing whole cycles, being able to draw different amino acids, and getting into the weeds on a lot of stuff that in the end really don’t matter. Medical school biochem (at least at my school) was a firehose of just about all of the metabolic pathways, but with the expectation that we would primarily focus on what can be controlled via medicine. Understanding the pathways and how they integrate was more important than committing each substrate, enzyme, and metabolite to memory. For example, I was responsible for knowing regulatory enzymes, major intermediates that could be used in other pathways, synthesized conditionally non-essential amino acids/fatty acids, or had pharmacological interventions that could help treat whatever disease was caused by the pathway. It essentially crammed Biochem I into 2 weeks with more attention on a bigger, more useful perspective. Don’t get me wrong, the undergrad class was probably easier, but really only because it was spread out over a semester.
Good information to have, thank you! Sounds like the majority of what I spent the last 14 weeks learning for the UG class. I wondered how the MS BioChem was run. One of the med schools that I have been talking to said that the reason they recommended taking UG Biochem was due to the sheer amount of information crammed at you in a short period of time that having some background was going to be a huge help. And I can see why.
I am currently hammering the pathways, as that is the subject matter for the last exam of the class, and then the big wrap up is next week. MCAT studying starts after Christmas and I think I would have been sunk if I hadn’t taken BC before trying to learn enzyme kinematics and such from a tutorial.
Biochem is a prerequisite class that will continue to pay dividends in med school and beyond. I took biochem in my DIY post back and I am very glad I did, I took 3 classes, one of which was graduate level. I felt like my first semester Biochem class we covered in med school in 2- 2 1/2 weeks, so the amount of material crammed into a small time frame is immense. Even if the material on MCAT is superficially tested, it’s tested on both COMLEX and USMLE, so the more times you’re exposed to it the better.
As far as what you want to do after med school, going abroad should not be an issue if you go to DO school. By the time you graduate the merger should be complete and every residency will be ACGME. Therefore all the countries that recognize ACGME residency training should reciprocally license you. Good luck to you on your journey!