Perth College - Pathway to Medicine Access Course

[PTMNO1]

Perth College - Pathway to Medicine

Hi, my name is Alex and I'm a former access to medicine student who completed the course at Perth college, and secured one of the guarenteed places for St Andrews Bute Medical School. I thought it was about time someone broke the course down to show that it has a lot to offer in comparison to other access courses.

The access to medicine course is designed to bring non-traditional backgrounds into medical education.


Course Prerequisites:

It is best described in these official websites:

School of Medicine

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New access course opens the world of medical careers :: UHI

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How to apply

You don't have to apply through UCAS, you apply directly to the college. I would advise that you contact Dr Robert Boyd directly and he will inform you if you're eligible for enrolement.


Subject Areas

DNA structure and function
Human Biology
Microbiology
Maths (v.basic)
Health and Safety
Cell Biology
I.T.

Chemistry - split into 4 units (fundamentals 1 & 2, Organic and Inorganic) This subject is usually the seperator in academic abilities across the class.

Finally in the second semester you will complete a Self Selected Project (5000 words) where you can choose to investigate an area of science you're interested in.

UK CAT

A lot of mature students are worried about the UK Cat test, so the following facts should ease your transition. The UK Cat is a requirement of this course but it is completed during the first semester of the access course, before the Med School UKCat cut-off date. This aptitude test is a formality and doesn't count towards selection (as long as you don't score less than a monkey); it's mainly to allow St Andrews medical school to tick the relevant admissions boxes for legal reasons. If you wanted to practice I would advise some practice with the UKCat book, the test is simple and don't listen to anyone who says you can't study..... practice will improve your score.

What's good about it?

Regardless of what anyone says, this course has 5 guarenteed places for the top 5 students. My year started with 10, 3 dropped out, one was clearly wasting his time and the last 6 gained a place in St Andrews (they gave us another guarenteed place).

Other than the places in St Andrews, I believe Aberdeen and Dundee medical schools are now showing proper interest and I'm pretty sure they will start accepting applications this year. Not sure about Glasgow as they have a thing with Stow College.


Funding

You should apply through SAAS, everyone is allowed 7 years of funding, so that should cover the Perth year and the 6 via St Andrews. You should receive around £450 p/m to keep you going. If you've done a loan eligible course before then you may have to make a contribution towards the end of your 7 years studying.

Teaching

The teaching in Perth is superb. They truly understand that you may have been out of education for years so they take it really slowly to begin with and eventually pick up the pace after a month or two. The teachers are mostly available for tutorial session if you're having trouble, especially chemistry. Additionally, the teachers are all Dr's or better in their fields so you have the best teaching available.

Support

Other than the stuff I mentioned in the teaching section, we have a group of 15 students at St Andrews, of which there is always someone available to help if you struggle with the Perth coursework. We're also there to help with the transition to St Andrews.

Examinations

Firstly the Practicals........ simple lab experiments and lab reports for a few subjects that are mandatory. Not really examined, you just have to complete them and hand them in.

Written exams are what seperates who's going and who's not. Out of all the subjects I mentioned earlier; Chemistry (4 exams), Human biology, Cell Biology and DNA are used to seperate the pack. All of these have a pass mark of 70% and above.

The Student Selected Project has a 60% pass mark as do all the other subjects on the list.

As a pathway to medicine student you are allowed 2 resits thoughout the year, although not in the same exam.


Work Experience

This is where Perth College truly excells. They organised a 5 day placement for EVERYONE in a hospital under a consultant where you observe their day to day activities. There are several placements on offer.... Paediatrics, general medicine, geriatrics and surgery, to name a few. I chose surgery and spent most of my time in theatre watching operations like a right anterior colon resection, right inguinal hernia removal and a cholecystectomy. Magic stuff.

Additional to this, they arrange a health and safety visit to a microbiology lab...... cool to see the equipment on offer, otherwise boring.

Easing the transition

They take you on a visit to St Andrews in April to sit in on a practical class as well as a lecture to get a feel for what St Andrews is like. Here you can ask questions about the course and see what pathway lies ahead. During this you will probably meet a few former students for lunch (me includedL-)).

Overall this is a smashing course with a high success rate. Myself and my fellow Perth classmates of 2007/8 have just breezed through our first year medical exams. Just look at the citations of the first website link. Perth College truly prepares you for the leap to university study.

You can PM me with any questions and I'll do my best to help.

Good luck in your applications.


Thanks, Alex

[leemkule]

Hi again Alex, great post.

I was on this years (08/09) pathway to medicine at Perth and it truly was an excellent experience and I feel thoroughly prepared to attend med school next year.

As Alex said, the standard of teaching is absolutely fantastic and all the lecturers are supportive and easy to find if you require help.

One comment that I'd like to make is that I think our year was the last to follow the Chemistry structure that Alex explained. I'm not 100% certain, but I think they are scrapping inorganic chemistry and adding an Introduction to fundamental chemistry which has an exam at the end of it to make the learning curve a bit less steep.

Again, as was the case last year, our year had 6 out of the initial 10 pass, which is an incredibly high success rate. However we have yet to have confirmation as to whether the person who finished 6 will gain a place.

I strongly recommend that anyone who fits the entry criteria and is serious about studying medicine considers this course, it's a great opportunity for you.

Looking forward to next year, see you there!

[Zedd]

Is there an oral/presentation component to the course?

[leemkule]

Yeah, there is a presentation skills for science unit which involves a summary of a scientific article, a more in depth chemistry report, a poster presentation (on the subject of your graded unit) and a gene therapy presentation of 7-10 minutes.

[PTMNO1]

As my fellow St Andrews medic said, there's a unit spanning both semesters and it's supposed to teach you generic scientific research skills in a fashion that allows you to take a project from start to finish..... like the real scientific community.

For instance, they begin with the teaching of basic scientific concepts, then get you to test them via lab experimentation. This is complimented by analysing scientific papers in parrallel with writing lab reports on the experiments. This gives you the ground work to be able to begin preparations for your Student Selected Project (SSP).

In addition to this you will have to prepare a 10 minute powerpoint presentation on a method of gene therapy. However, don't let this be a burden as it's rather informal and everyone always passes.

Finally a poster presentation where you display your SSP findings before a small congregation of college staff......... just don't make my mistake and blabber on about Parkinson's disease to a fuc**** neuro-scientist (what are the chances eh) :-)

Are you thinking of applying Zed?

[Zedd]

Are you thinking of applying Zed?

I had sent in an application but pulled out before my interview but now, with my situation being a bit different, I'm considering reapplying (assuming they have any spaces left).

We've done a similar thing for my access to biomed course this year, an 8-10 minute talk (I did cholesterol and put everyone to sleep), ~2500 word essay (Effect of drug discovery on society, my writing is apparently "flowery") and our biology and chemistry projects ('optimal growth media of varied cultures' & 'determination of alcohol concentration by optical density').

Part of my concern would be my lack of experience/volunteering of health care (care homes, hospital, gp, etc) so, when they ask me to bring my personal statement for medicine with me to the interview I feel like I'm writing an incomplete PS...should that be a problem? Presumably they work with you on your PS during the first month of the course, correct?

[leemkule]

I don't think you're too late to reapply, a girl got accepted to the course really late, she came a few weeks into the year. I think you're kind of misunderstanding how the course works, you apply to Perth College and when you attend the interview there are staff members from St Andrews University. If you are accepted on the PTM, you are automatically accepted to St Andrews if you finish top 5 and get the required grades. The UCAS form is just a formality. Most people just condensed their Perth application personal statement.

Do you have any work experience at all? There were some people from my year that only had very small amounts of work experience. It's not about quantity of experience, it's what you gained from it.

[PTMNO1]

I spoke to the Dr Boyd today and he said he's still accepting applications for this year. Personally, I started 2 weeks into the course as unknown to me I was sunning it in Africa when I was supposed to be at an interview:-) I just called and re-arranged, phew.

The lucky thing for us is that due to poor advertising in the past there has not been huge interest in the Perth course; this is apparently soon to be changed.

My advice is to never pull an application, but since you're in "that place" I would just re-apply. Call Dr Boyd and have a quick chat about the course and express your interest in applying, possibly voicing your reasons for withdrawal.

Simon (Leemkule) is correct in saying that everything is dealt with before the start of the course i.e. St Andrews interview, personal statement.

If you're worried about the process you can send me your email and I would be glad to send the personal statement & any questions I got at interview as a guide.

Now, I've spoken with the head of admissions at St Andrews and the main thing they want.... CAN'T EMPHASISE THIS ENOUGH..... they want you to be reflective. Tell them what you have done and what you learned from it; additionally you can inform them of any strategies you have employed to improve your methods or experiences in the future. During 1st year at St Andrews they constantly babble on about reflection.

The work experience thing can be a bit tricky; technically you're ok with having none as it's an access course for non-traditional backgrounds, but why not quickly organise something and it gives you something to back up your commitment.

Have a few questions for them....... just not my one:-/ Asking Dr Boyd why did he get into medicine, which he proceeded to tell me, "I'm a botanist son." Classic me:-)

Finally just add in something about the course at St Andrews.... lecture based, fully integrated, dissection (seeing with your hands). Remember, anyone who reads this post has an advantage at interview as you know the course inside out:-)

Alex

[Diana021]

Is it true that an applicant has to have no tradition of university study in their immediate family?

[PTMNO1]

Hi Diana, welcome to the thread.

That was an initial stipulation when I joined the course, but my mother had done a social sciences degree (first degree in the family) and 1 of my sisters was doing English literature. I didn't disclose this, nor was I asked..... To be honest, it's none of their business

However, I've emailed the course tutor to ask for clarification on this as it is a little ambiguous

Alex