Arts Grads. on Medical Courses?

**Violet19** · 10-01-2008, 12:16 AM

Hi Everyone,

Just wondering if there are any other people in the same position as me? I've got an arts degree - English Lit. - and am thrilled to have an offer on a graduate entry course (...best pre-Chrismas present ever!)

I was just wondering if anyone else from an arts background is in the middle of a graduate entry course? If so, how are you finding it, what's it like going back to Science etc.? And just generally... what's your experience of the whole business compared to science grads.?

Anyway that's it really! Just wondered if anyone had any wisdom and also fancied seeing if a few ppl might get chatting about pros and cons, and maybe what they think people from non-traditional backgrounds can bring to medicine even!

Ta x

**auden** · 10-01-2008, 02:07 AM

there are lots of us about!

I'm in my third year and loving it

First two years' science was fine but I'm not sure I'm the best to comment as I've always been 'comfortable' with the sciences despite having done arts a levels/history degree. However, on our course, the science is very clinically relevant and so I felt that made it easier to digest too. And none of it is actually that hard - no particle physics required - there's just a lot of it!!

I'm not sure that there's really any pro/con to it - basically I don't think your background makes much difference by the clinical years. Certainly there are differences in terms of personalities/past experiences/work ethics etc etc but they're not differences of past degree but cut across that boundary.

The only area that is maybe different is arts grads tend not to have done 'scientific' type posters/essays before and the scientists have more trouble with the essays we have to write for the social science side of our course. But the impact of that is quite small!

**Violet19** · 10-01-2008, 03:17 PM

Thanks that's really reassuring! That's kind of what I'd hoped to hear, I too always felt like I very much had an arts side and a science side of my brain! And found the Chemistry and Biology I've done before fine and interesting etc. Other medical students have said the same thing to me, that it's the quantity of what you have to learn not the complextity of it that is testing.

Out of curiosity, what led you down the Medicine route after a History degree?

**dc1** · 10-01-2008, 05:02 PM

Congrats on the offer, Violet19! Can I just ask you, where did you do the english and lit. degree and to which college of Cambridge were you accepted?

**Violet19** · 10-01-2008, 05:33 PM

I did English at Oxford, and the College I got an offer from is Lucy Cavendish College: there are only 3 colleges that offer the Cambridge graduate 4yr course, all of them are colleges particularly for "mature" students and postgrads.

How about you? What degree did you do previously? What courses have you applied for this year?

**aspirant doc** · 11-01-2008, 04:59 PM

Hi Violet

I'm an arts grad, and to be honest as long as you can handle a bit of science, it's perfectly manageable to be a medical student. There are a few others here too and I know loads at other medical schools.

Studying science isn't really a problem; I'm not saying it's easy, there's just a whole load of it to learn.

I think there are many advantages to being an arts grad medic; writing essays and reports, balancing and resolving conflicting views, non-scientific lateral thought in projects etc.

**auden** · 13-01-2008, 12:26 AM

Originally Posted by Violet19

Out of curiosity, what led you down the Medicine route after a History degree?

I was a patient a lot and reckoned I could do better

Seriously, a lot of seeing how the NHS ran from the patient's side of things and feeling I could be a decent doctor, both because of that and because I would be capable of it. Couple that with having pretty low job satisfaction making money for a big corporate (don't get me wrong, they were very nice, I just didn't find that really did it for me!) and here I am