First off, I would like to state for the record that I'm not trying to scare anybody off from treading the path towards becoming an MD. In fact, it is actually a quite noble profession. However, I will be discussing uncomfortable truths here that one might face during his or her medical training..
The road to earning the right to place the letters "MD" after your name is a long and ardous task, entailing much more than just plain old brain power.. let me explain..
We start with pre-med.. With the exception of the 7-year INTARMED program offered by PGH to those who are bionic enough to endure it, regular people must have a college degree prior to being accepted into medical school. Pre-med courses are classically Bachelor of Science programs like biology, chemistry, paychology, or even those pre-professional ones like Medical Technology, Pharmacy, or Physical Therapy. These would range from 3-5 years depending on the college/university as well as the course curriculum itself. As far as I can remember, DLSU offers 3-year programs, while Physical Therapy is generally a 5-year affair..
Getting your college diploma alone is not enough to get into med school. There is also the NMAT, which is basically a glorified entrance test which is administered nationally, and ranks prospective medical students based on their performance. There will be a corresponding percentile rank, and some schools use the NMAT ranking as a cutoff to tell whether an application would be entertained or not. Example: UST and FEU reportedly use the NMAT cutoff rank of 65 to screen prospective applicants.
So now you've entered medical school. Congratulations and welcome to another 3 years of classroom work (with things turned up by a great many notches). The curriculum would progress at a speed far greater than anything you have experienced in college. There will also be more tests given, and some laboratory subjects as well, the most famius being the cadaver dissection for 1st year anatomy class, which by the way, runs for an entire year, as are most basic medicine subjects.
Brains, although important, is not the sole requirement for medical school. It also requires a great deal of determination, and a genuine interest to learn and see it through to the end.. Many a story have I heard about the poor unsure student who only went to med school because of his or her parents' wishes, and would unfortunately drop out sometime during the first school year because they were enduring a lot of hardships, and their heart was not really into it.. :(
If you were lucky enough to survive the first 3 years of medical school and are already brimming with confidence due to all the knowledge you've gained, then you'll be in for the surprise of your life when you reach your fourth year, the so called junior internship (JI) or clinical clerkship (clerk). For this year of your medical training, you will be rotating around the various departments or specialties, to give you exposure and experience of hadling actual patients with actual diseases that need to be treated, Rotations outside the mother hospital may be common, because in some instances, the exposure than can be provided by the said hospitals may be lacking. For example, clerks from UST would rotate to Fabella for their Obstetrics rotation in order to gain hands-on experience with delivering babies. San Lazaro Hospital is another rotation wherein the clerks would be exposed to cases of infectious diseases.
It is during clerkship that the limits of one's physical, mental, and emotional endurance are tested. For most of the clerks, this would be the first time they would be going on 24+ hour duties straight at the hospital. It doesn't seem so bad when done one in a while, but bear in mind that this would go on for an entire year, and that the schedules could find you going on duty once every 3-4 days depending on the manpower available. As a clerk, you are the lowest animal on the hospital heirachy food chain, being outranked by senior interns, residents, fellows, and consultants. As such you will be expected to do the more basic tasks like interviewing and monitoring patients, performing proper physical examinations, doing paperworks, assisting in procedures, and preparing reports (since you're basicall still a 4th year sstudent anyway). As you near the end of clerkship year, there will still be final examinations, the format of which may vary among the different medical schools.
After completion of clerkship and graduation from medical school, you would have earned your medical degree, and with it, the MD title. But now you move on to Post-Graduate Internship (or Senior Internship in those hospitals whohave clerks/JIs). Internship is required by the PRC as a prerequisite to taking the licensure examinations. Before clerkship ends, you apply to have your internship at institutions of your choice (3 choices ranked accordingly), and this is submitted to the APMC which oversees the matching of incoming interns to their hospitals of choice (whenever possible). As an intern, you will be saddled with more responsibilities since you already proudly wear the mantle of Doctor (but still cannot practice since you don't have a license yet). Intership year is another set of rotations around the different departments of the hospital, along with the corresponding duty schedules (16-24 hour duties). You would serve as the right hand man/woman of the residents supervising you. Resposibilities may vary from hospital to hospital, but the most glaring difference would be the level of trust a resident puts in you as compared to when you were just a mere JI, which is totally understandable, since you're now (supposedly) a much smarter, wiser, better version of yourself compared to a year ago.
After intership year, you pass your requirements to PRC, review everything you've been studying the past 4-5 years, and take the board examinations. If successful, you would earn your license and the right to practice as a GP (General Practicioner) .At this point, you would be on your own, and the decisions would be yours alone, whether you decidec to go into specialty training, go into practice as a GP (not advisable if you plan to live in NCR), or even just turn your back on medicine forever.
Whew! That was a long one.. I hope this helps! If you have any questions, feel free to drop them in the comments below.
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